The majority of the U.S.' unemployed have attended college.
(Senior Baboon, 243
Points)
on 5/25/12 at 1:00am
Interesting article... pretty depressing too when you really look at it. With all the discussions that we've had on here about the usefulness and ROI of a college degree, does this further support the notion that it's largely useless now? At least for a majority of people? I wonder, am I doing my students a disservice in getting them to apply to colleges, considering their ability and institutions that they'll likely matriculate at.
More kids are going, but not finishing...
If a college grad is
If a college grad is currently in a graduate program they don't count towards the unemployed do they?
this counts the morons that
this counts the morons that never finished, and the morons who major in useless subjects. The title of your thread is misleading, I only had to read the first couple of paragraph's to see college GRADUATES have the lowest unemployment rate among individuals 25 and older. ROI on college (especially publics) is great if you major in STEM, business, econ, or some pre-proffesional degree meant to send you to law/medical/pharmacy/med school etc.
p.s. as you are a teacher, i'd advise you discuss with your students the importance of finishing (that college is not for everyone and they should assess whether they think they can finish), and majoring in a topic relevant to today's society.
I am willing to bet that if
I am willing to bet that if they broke down the stats by college major, it would be a completely different story.
I always found it odd that if you were to really level with kids about what they hope to get out of going to college, "getting a job" would be top on their list (or at least a #2). And yet, so many of them end up doing majors that do not give them the skills or knowledge for the kinds of jobs that employers need to fill.
If kids are going to see college as a trade school, then they should approach their studies as if it were a trade school.
Yes, if you come from a wealthy background and have a lot of contacts to set you up for jobs, then you can major in whatever you want. English. Classical studies. Art history. Sociology.
The problem is, simply put, you have too many middle class kids who are majoring in the wrong fields.
Too many folks in liberal arts, and nowhere near enough in science, engineering and business. It just seems like there's a phobia of science and engineering in the west. That's where the jobs are. You are far less likely to find an unemployed electrical engineer or a bioengineering grad than you will a political science major. It's like the only people who aren't afraid of science and engineering are the Asians/Asian-Americans and Eastern Europeans.
The last thing we need is to tell people that college is useless, and having an even dumber country. What needs to happen is that more kids need to be forced to go into science and engineering. To bang it into their heads:
You want a job? Major in engineering or sciences. Hate math? Tough shit. Get used to it, because learning to be functional at math is what will pay your rent.
Alex Chu
www.mbaapply.com
@BigBucks That's all I do my
@BigBucks
That's all I do my man, but 17 year olds swear they know everything about the world. I've tried to talk kids out of going to Greensburg state and majoring in dance, but it's a big knucklehead section here. You can give them graphs, charts, personal anecdotes, guest speakers, everything... some kids just have to let life be their teacher, unfortunately.
As far as the title goes, I just took the title from the article. If people found it misleading, my apologies.
MBApply I second that
MBApply I second that sentiment. I am Nigerian-born but U.S. raised and among my peers (other Nigerians) in my neighborhood we all go to college and you won't find an art/sociology/psychology/english major among us (we are talking like 50+ ppl here ages 18-27). We all major in a science to go to med/pharmacy/nursing/dental school, engineering, or some kind of business (mostly accounting). None of us have had trouble finding work after graduating. Even my econ major is seen as too risky in our community lol, when you have parents who have truly struggled they want their children to do something safe that will provide a steady pay-check and my mom was like "that finance is so risky people always getting laid off" lol. I think this rings the same with the Asians and eastern Europeans, their parents understand the difficulties that life can bring. There is a disconnect in middle-class white America regarding the realities of life, with white parents (for the most part) encouraging their kids to major in whatever the hell they want because they think this is the 60s where a college degree meant a job. Among minorities you will not find the same issues.
most virgins(male) have
most virgins(male) have penis. so what?
I third Alex. When I applied
I third Alex.
When I applied to school, I wanted to study math.
My parents vetoed that. They did not want me living in their basement. They said pick one:
-Engineering
-Computer Science
-Accounting
-Finance
-Actuarial Science
I chose Computer Science. When I graduated, jobs were falling into my lap along with all of the other CS majors and engineers. We didn't even need to network. You just had to show up to the interview and prove you knew what you were doing, and you got a nice white-collar job.
Work hard, play hard.
Honestly, if your kid is
Honestly, if your kid is attending a good school with good recruiting from banking and especially consulting firms, let them major in whatever they want. There are many people with non-econ social sciences degrees and/or humanities degrees that are going to work for consulting companies, so the argument that you shouldn't allow your kids to study "soft" majors is invalid. Obviously, if you're at Average State U., like most of America, throw all the previous advice about.
To me, it's all about planning and accepting the potential lifestyle consequences that come with a major. If my kid wants to major in art history, fine. As long as he or she is thinking about post-graduate options (be it grad school, law school, med school, job related to art history, job not related to art history) early on in their college career, they should be in a decent position come senior year. The trap that Americans fall into is majoring in a liberal arts study, and then getting to senior year and realizing that they have no fucking clue what they want to do because they haven't thought about it.
MBAApply: I am willing to bet
I am willing to bet that if they broke down the stats by college major, it would be a completely different story.
I always found it odd that if you were to really level with kids about what they hope to get out of going to college, "getting a job" would be top on their list (or at least a #2). And yet, so many of them end up doing majors that do not give them the skills or knowledge for the kinds of jobs that employers need to fill.
If kids are going to see college as a trade school, then they should approach their studies as if it were a trade school.
Yes, if you come from a wealthy background and have a lot of contacts to set you up for jobs, then you can major in whatever you want. English. Classical studies. Art history. Sociology.
The problem is, simply put, you have too many middle class kids who are majoring in the wrong fields.
Too many folks in liberal arts, and nowhere near enough in science, engineering and business. It just seems like there's a phobia of science and engineering in the west. That's where the jobs are. You are far less likely to find an unemployed electrical engineer or a bioengineering grad than you will a political science major. It's like the only people who aren't afraid of science and engineering are the Asians/Asian-Americans and Eastern Europeans.
The last thing we need is to tell people that college is useless, and having an even dumber country. What needs to happen is that more kids need to be forced to go into science and engineering. To bang it into their heads:
You want a job? Major in engineering or sciences. Hate math? Tough shit. Get used to it, because learning to be functional at math is what will pay your rent.
I agree with this, but what are you going to do with the current unemployed masses? Giving them an avenue to pick up maths and sciences as well as other skills that are in demand could go a long way. A proper education shouldn't be a once in a lifetime opportunity.
Societies recycle paper and metals, why not their human capital?
relinquis... Killing the GMAT this December; Over/Under set at: 725 GMATs.
So its submit or die? Go STEM
So its submit or die? Go STEM fields or you are screwed. Is this what college is coming to?
I had a roommate who was miserable, because his parents required him to take Engineering and was little good at it. But hey, if your parents are footing the bill, they have the right.
Guess all the arts are left up to the rich kids now.
Relinquis: I agree with this,
I agree with this, but what are you going to do with the current unemployed masses? Giving them an avenue to pick up maths and sciences as well as other skills that are in demand could go a long way. A proper education shouldn't be a once in a lifetime opportunity.
Societies recycle paper and metals, why not their human capital?
I agree. But there also needs to be a will to change course as well.
I honestly don't think this generation is any more entitled than previous ones. It's that they've come up with a very harsh reality that all of us simply never expected - until it's happened and now we go "oh, of course! We should've known!"
The kids these days are not any better or worse than their parents (baby boomers). In fact they probably are even more level headed than the post WWII kids in the 60s and 70s who didn't need to do a whole lot or have a lot of direction to attain a middle class lifestyle.
My hunch is that eventually we will look at the post-war baby boom generation as an anomaly (rather than the norm) or a perfect storm.
Anyhow, I do think the current generation of college grads deserve a second shot - that is, again, if they are willing to give up on the notion that they can have it as easy as their American/European parents did in the 60s/70s and early 80s. The ease in which we were able to make ends meet by doing very little (at least in the West) in the last 50 years was an anomaly, and we're likely back to "normal" - which is that it's very hard for most people to just get by, and that opportunities are hard to come by.
In fact, I think all of us will have to reinvent ourselves and our careers a few times over. The half life of a career is diminishing fast (i.e. you will hit a plateau much faster, and then become obsolete or too expensive much faster, even in engineering/sciences because there's always a younger, cheaper person to replace you with the newest/freshest technical know how).
College should be just the beginning. Most if not all of us will be forced to change every 10-15 years or so.
Example: the finance folks who got laid off in the last 3-4 years? Especially those in the 2008-10 era -- most of those kinds of jobs aren't coming back for a while, and those laid off finance people (from analysts all the way to MDs) have no choice but to find something new outside the industry, and for some that may mean starting over (going back to school, starting a new biz, starting from a more junior level in a different field).
Of course, the big question is how do you convince these unemployed college grads to take on more tuition expenses for more education. Yes education shouldn't be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but its effectively being priced that way by universities.
Alex Chu
www.mbaapply.com
Aldrich IV: So its submit or
So its submit or die? Go STEM fields or you are screwed. Is this what college is coming to?
I had a roommate who was miserable, because his parents required him to take Engineering and was little good at it. But hey, if your parents are footing the bill, they have the right.
Guess all the arts are left up to the rich kids now.
Until the 20th century, universities were for the wealthy and privileged (at least in the West). You sent your kids to university so they can become cultured *gentlemen* (all men) -- you studied Latin, Greek, the Classics, literature, history, art, and politics. None of these disciplines were supposed to be practical because that was not the intent. This is what "an institute of higher learning" is all about. You learned knowledge for knowledge sake. If you were privileged, you didn't have an occupation. You were "men of leisure" who owned property, slaves/serfs, and collected/acquired stuff. Having an occupation was for commoners (who didn't go to universities: they learned a trade through on-the-job apprenticeships and trade schools). In a way, university was also a form of networking - rich boys getting to know other rich boys. The only disciplines that were more practical were medicine and law.
Note that it's not a coincidence that the Ivy League colleges (and top Euro universities like Oxford and Cambridge) and other old universities are known for their liberal arts/humanities disciplines and who also happen to be strong in medicine and law.
Now fast forward to the 20th century when the middle class swelled (i.e. when industrialization/mass production manufacturing and expansion in the Americas and Europe). Now, the middle class and the immigrants to the Americas had a different view. They saw education as a form of social/economic mobility. They were pragmatic and saw education as a means to an end (and introduced the concept of college = better jobs). It was more trade school than an 'institute of higher learning' but they wanted it both ways - pragmatic skills/knowledge with the prestige of a university.
It's not a coincidence that during this time you saw more science and engineering programs gain prominence in the "newer" universities. Stanford, MIT, and these new unis came of age during this time in the 20th century. Also, it was during this time when universities offered business/econ programs.
So what we've been stuck with up to now is a university culture that combines these two traditions, but where over time the STEM disciplines became more and more dominated by 1st and 2nd generation immigrants.
The thing is, studying the humanities/liberal arts on a formal basis was traditionally a "rick kid" discipline (i.e. the most talented musicians, artists, etc. never went to school - they *taught* the rich kids). But it's that a lot of middle class people have gotten away with being able to study something that wasn't supposed to be practical (lib arts) in the last 50 years and still manage to hold down jobs -- that is, until now.
Alex Chu
www.mbaapply.com
Yeah. The past few years have
Yeah. The past few years have been rough for people in my sector (RE investments), particularly for those early in their careers or with 4-6 years under their belts (expensive, but not producers).
I saw a lot of RE finance and investment people go into other fields, e.g. family businesses, consulting, politics, film, semi-retirement. A few have set up their own firms as well with varying success and I know a few people who hid in b-school and other academia for a couple of years.
Makes you think that the whole deferred-life plan and career mentality of previous generations doesn't apply anymore and you have to work on two competing areas, getting recession proof/financially independent and living your life in the moment... I've seen people sacrifice their 20s working demanding jobs only to lose their savings and their careers... It's like having a hangover without having gone to the party, only it lasts a few years not a few hours.
Ok... that was pretty depressing... I guess the lesson is get skills/education that are durable and live within your means, but don't forget to live.
relinquis... Killing the GMAT this December; Over/Under set at: 725 GMATs.
Do you guys think education
Do you guys think education will enter a post-industrial phase? Not that it would matter to the current generation of graduates.
relinquis... Killing the GMAT this December; Over/Under set at: 725 GMATs.
MBAApply: Aldrich IV: So
So its submit or die? Go STEM fields or you are screwed. Is this what college is coming to?
I had a roommate who was miserable, because his parents required him to take Engineering and was little good at it. But hey, if your parents are footing the bill, they have the right.
Guess all the arts are left up to the rich kids now.
Until the 20th century, universities were for the wealthy and privileged (at least in the West). You sent your kids to university so they can become cultured *gentlemen* (all men) -- you studied Latin, Greek, the Classics, literature, history, art, and politics. None of these disciplines were supposed to be practical because that was not the intent. This is what "an institute of higher learning" is all about. You learned knowledge for knowledge sake. If you were privileged, you didn't have an occupation. You were "men of leisure" who owned property, slaves/serfs, and collected/acquired stuff. Having an occupation was for commoners (who didn't go to universities: they learned a trade through on-the-job apprenticeships and trade schools). In a way, university was also a form of networking - rich boys getting to know other rich boys. The only disciplines that were more practical were medicine and law.
Note that it's not a coincidence that the Ivy League colleges (and top Euro universities like Oxford and Cambridge) and other old universities are known for their liberal arts/humanities disciplines and who also happen to be strong in medicine and law.
Now fast forward to the 20th century when the middle class swelled (i.e. when industrialization/mass production manufacturing and expansion in the Americas and Europe). Now, the middle class and the immigrants to the Americas had a different view. They saw education as a form of social/economic mobility. They were pragmatic and saw education as a means to an end (and introduced the concept of college = better jobs). It was more trade school than an 'institute of higher learning' but they wanted it both ways - pragmatic skills/knowledge with the prestige of a university.
It's not a coincidence that during this time you saw more science and engineering programs gain prominence in the "newer" universities. Stanford, MIT, and these new unis came of age during this time in the 20th century. Also, it was during this time when universities offered business/econ programs.
So what we've been stuck with up to now is a university culture that combines these two traditions, but where over time the STEM disciplines became more and more dominated by 1st and 2nd generation immigrants.
The thing is, studying the humanities/liberal arts on a formal basis was traditionally a "rick kid" discipline (i.e. the most talented musicians, artists, etc. never went to school - they *taught* the rich kids). But it's that a lot of middle class people have gotten away with being able to study something that wasn't supposed to be practical (lib arts) in the last 50 years and still manage to hold down jobs -- that is, until now.
My post was more just thoughtless, I understand the situation but thanks for laying it out. Its just different in this age when a college degree has almost become mandatory to secure a job (debt included). My anger comes from the notion we all have to go to college and spend 5 figures+ just to have a chance.
Our generation also has to
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Alex Chu
www.mbaapply.com
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