I would point out that perhaps the most important thing the study of mathematics provides is not its value as vocational training, but that it teaches you how to think logically. This is especially true (if you don't go the applied route) in graduate school. Most non-mathematics majors I encounter are quite surprised when I tell them that in the last 3 semesters of graduate classes I took none of my textbooks had numbers in them, except to ennumerate problems to be solved, and none of "the answers" involved numbers at all.

I think that's the real tragedy of the general population's understanding of mathematics - they think its all about finding some numerical answer. In short, that all of mathematics is merely arithmetic!