werepossum
Elite Member
- Jul 10, 2006
- 29,873
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Then I know I'm reasonably on plumb.I completely agree with everything you said.
Then I know I'm reasonably on plumb.I completely agree with everything you said.
I know what you mean.
Annoys me how the liberal arts people in here keep acting like everything is so ambiguous when it is not at all. If you have to ask whether or not your degree is useless, then it probably is.
Actually the OP is saying exactly that. To the extent he says he agrees with what you said he's contradicting himself.I wouldn't say any majors are useless, or even necessarily worth more than another. I don't think anyone is saying that.
Do you have any specific examples? I think you're just hearing people complain about the economy generally. There is no question that across the board unemployment is higher and that wages are down on average. I don't think it's unreasonable for a liberal arts graduate, or medical doctor (and yes I've heard doctors complain about this) to ask why they have a lower standard of living than someone with an identical education had in previous generations. Whining about certain people's choice of major (again, among the 33% that even have a college degree to begin with) is silly.Far too many people in my opinion get an education in whatever interests them and then rail at the world because their education does not provide the lifestyle choices they desire.
PhD in chemistry from UCLA, a top 20 institution, 2 year post doc at Columbia, a top 10 institution. Haven't gotten so much as a callback, let alone an interview, in the last month. I've applied to 20 odd jobs or so, all over the country, in various industries.
Offshoring has led to a glut of chemists on the market in the last 5 years or so. They're slowly starting to bring them back, so I hear, but a lot of other companies are still trying to outsource. Problem is, a lot of the outsourced countries just can't innovate.
That's really all I'm arguing. Youth now even compared to a decade ago are facing substantial employment challenges. I just think it's a particularly bad time to spend four years getting a dubious degree and entering a very possibly bad job market with likely more debt than they'd have had in the past, because student loan debt keeps skyrocketing.I'm not arguing that it's just as easy for people with BA to get a job as people with BS degrees but Doppel and especially OP are going overboard, especially when you take into account people's actual interests.
If i were trying to get published I'd quantify it. For the internet I enjoy sweeping generalizations, but within those generalizations is some truth.but ideally you'd quantify the difference before making sweeping statements.
It's actually worse. I knew many, many people at college getting degrees in psychology/ologies and believe me, they weren't doing it because it was interesting. Maybe that's what they sold to their parents. They did it because it was damned easy. Maybe first semester calculus tore them a new one and then suddenly they didn't want a bachelor of science after all, but how convenient that all of a sudden they want to read about Freud. Also seemed to me that their classes started later in the dayDo you have any specific examples?
You may consider this semantics, but there's a big difference between "useless" and "worthless". "Worthless" implies something has no inherent value. "Useless" implies something has no suitable use. Talonstrike specifically said "useless" majors, in which he is correct as a generality. Many graduates in soft disciplines now find their degrees are useless because they cannot use them to find a job - generally considered the prime reason to get an education. Those degrees are, at the moment, useless. They are not worthless because they still represent learning, commitment, dedication. They have (hopefully) enriched the lives of those who got them. But they cannot be put to use. Hence, they are useless, and their worth is (at the moment) only non-financial. That's not the result all non-STEM majors have found, of course, and some STEM graduates likewise find their degree is not doing what it should, or rather, what they thought it would. But clearly an engineering B.S. is more useful than a liberal arts B.A. from the same school at this point in time. I'd argue that it's also worth more, because the primary reason to get a degree is to get a good job. But an education's worth is a much more difficult thing on which to agree than is an education's usefulness, the former being at least partly intangible and the latter being much more cut and dried.Actually the OP is saying exactly that. To the extent he says he agrees with what you said he's contradicting himself.
Do you have any specific examples? I think you're just hearing people complain about the economy generally. There is no question that across the board unemployment is higher and that wages are down on average. I don't think it's unreasonable for a liberal arts graduate, or medical doctor (and yes I've heard doctors complain about this) to ask why they have a lower standard of living than someone with an identical education had in previous generations. Whining about certain people's choice of major (again, among the 33% that even have a college degree to begin with) is silly.
Man, that's rough. Hope things pick up. I've seen SO many people with degrees in chemistry go back to school to degree in chemical engineering just to find a job.PhD in chemistry from UCLA, a top 20 institution, 2 year post doc at Columbia, a top 10 institution. Haven't gotten so much as a callback, let alone an interview, in the last month. I've applied to 20 odd jobs or so, all over the country, in various industries.
Offshoring has led to a glut of chemists on the market in the last 5 years or so. They're slowly starting to bring them back, so I hear, but a lot of other companies are still trying to outsource. Problem is, a lot of the outsourced countries just can't innovate.
You may consider this semantics, but there's a big difference between "useless" and "worthless". "Worthless" implies something has no inherent value. "Useless" implies something has no suitable use. Talonstrike specifically said "useless" majors, in which he is correct as a generality. Many graduates in soft disciplines now find their degrees are useless because they cannot use them to find a job - generally considered the prime reason to get an education. Those degrees are, at the moment, useless. They are not worthless because they still represent learning, commitment, dedication. They have (hopefully) enriched the lives of those who got them. But they cannot be put to use. Hence, they are useless, and their worth is (at the moment) only non-financial. That's not the result all non-STEM majors have found, of course, and some STEM graduates likewise find their degree is not doing what it should, or rather, what they thought it would. But clearly an engineering B.S. is more useful than a liberal arts B.A. from the same school at this point in time. I'd argue that it's also worth more, because the primary reason to get a degree is to get a good job. But an education's worth is a much more difficult thing on which to agree than is an education's usefulness, the former being at least partly intangible and the latter being much more cut and dried.
Yes, hopefully it's only a minority of non-STEM graduates finding their degrees useless, and hopefully that percentage will decline. But then, very little in the world is absolute, and if we are to speak only about absolutes then it will be a very quiet world.You're going overboard again. If I go with your definition of useless, there is actually a demand for liberal arts majors. It's not as big as a demand as nursing or computer science, but there's still a demand. Yes, there are jobs that would want someone who has a degree in design or art. "Useless", even as you define it, is an exaggeration.
That's really all I'm arguing. Youth now even compared to a decade ago are facing substantial employment challenges. I just think it's a particularly bad time to spend four years getting a dubious degree and entering a very possibly bad job market with likely more debt than they'd have had in the past, because student loan debt keeps skyrocketing.
Decades ago a high school diploma got you a decent middle-class job. Then you wanted to have a degree, but any degree was ok, now you don't want just any degree, you want a decent one.If i were trying to get published I'd quantify it. For the internet I enjoy sweeping generalizations, but within those generalizations is some truth.
When i speak of toilet paper degrees I mean when compared to others. I would still rather have a major in philosophy than no degree at all, but I'd rather have one in business.It's actually worse. I knew many, many people at college getting degrees in psychology/ologies and believe me, they weren't doing it because it was interesting. Maybe that's what they sold to their parents. They did it because it was damned easy. Maybe first semester calculus tore them a new one and then suddenly they didn't want a bachelor of science after all, but how convenient that all of a sudden they want to read about Freud. Also seemed to me that their classes started later in the day
Yes, this is what the data show.But the sad fact is there seems to be more people in liberal arts department drifting through life, don't know what they want, don't know what the society expects, and just become bitter and complain all the time.
I'm not looking in academia, but those are traditionally harder to get.Are you looking in academia too? Or does that seem even more difficult?
Decades ago a high school diploma got you a decent middle-class job. Then you wanted to have a degree, but any degree was ok, now you don't want just any degree, you want a decent one.If i were trying to get published I'd quantify it.
PhD in chemistry from UCLA, a top 20 institution, 2 year post doc at Columbia, a top 10 institution. Haven't gotten so much as a callback, let alone an interview, in the last month. I've applied to 20 odd jobs or so, all over the country, in various industries.
Offshoring has led to a glut of chemists on the market in the last 5 years or so. They're slowly starting to bring them back, so I hear, but a lot of other companies are still trying to outsource. Problem is, a lot of the outsourced countries just can't innovate.
Not sure what your game is on this one...it should be clear enough I mean real as in lots, not real as in does it exist or does it not. You can make "real money" at McDonalds, but CEOs are making real money.
Enough money is subjective to some extent, and to others not. I.e. if you have to pay back an insane amount of money and your income is that of a new teacher it probably won't seem like enough.
Not only can English majors become teachers they can also become a CEO or an entrepreneur, though one of the courses I took as part of my science degree was statistics and it told me that just because something can happen doesn't mean it will. And this is precisely borne out by my link. Science dominates; arts are dominated.
My main gist is we need to stop telling high school grads that any degree is good enough. If they want to get an easy degree (because arts degrees are much easier to get than science) then they should know they're more likely to have a lower income later on and throughout their career and try to gain employment among a more competitive field because their skill set just isn't valued as much.
Would you like some cheese with that whine? It's not my fault you didn't major in something useful and weren't able to get a good job.
I'm seriously considering moving to a different country if the U.S. economy doesn't improve at all by the time I graduate
useless majors = majors that do not correlate to meaningful careers.
So what the thread tells us, despite all the pontificating, is that students and degrees have changed very little, if at all, while job opportunities have narrowed & diminished.
So much for trickledown economics.
No the numbers have changed. Before this big "get a degree and succeed" marketing campaign (fueled by esy to come by student loans, tax subsidies, etc) more people considered careers right out of high school.
There are manufacturing jobs in this country. And some industries are having trouble finding qualified recruits. Someone with $100,000 of student loan debt and a brand spanking new degree in Ancient Crimean dance theory would be loathe to take.
Job opportunities have shifted. You can't go to MCSE boot camp and expect a $75,000 job after taking a few test anymore.
Why do so many people seem to think that the sole purpose of an education is to get a job?
It's completely absurd.