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The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

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Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#71

Post by leggomylibro »

bcrosby95 wrote: post #54
greglindahl wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am in STEM and I honestly think there's a shortage of smart STEM workers, because not every person trained or experienced in STEM is someone I would hire. Ask around, you'll find quite a few people like me.

That's like saying there's a shortage of good STEM jobs because I wouldn't take any STEM job out there.

They're not mutually exclusive; I'm starting to think that the market for coders is basically a market for lemons.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons

So we end up with employers who don't want to pay top dollar in case they get a lemon, and competent developers who are either happy where they are or unwilling to work for lemon rates.

And have you interviewed candidates for development positions recently? It is depressing, and I say that as someone who catches flak about being too generous and letting too many "poor-quality" candidates through screens.

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#72

Post by sdinsn »

cybersnowflake wrote: post #27

The only people who honestly think there are a shortage of stem workers are those who aren't in stem.

There is not a shortage of "STEM" workers- but there are a number of more specific industries that have a shortage of workers, and these industries fall under "STEM".

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#73

Post by WalterBright »

vikinghckr wrote: post #9

Slightly off topic, but I feel like when people talk of STEM as a lucrative field of study, they tend to imply CS. Non-CS STEM field hardly have a shortage of qualified and talented people. In fact, there's probably a oversupply compared to job prospects in non-CS STEM fields. I see so many talented Math/Physics majors end up switching to CS and do mundane software engineering work.

> Math/Physics majors end up switching to CS and do mundane software engineering work

My degree is in mechanical engineering, and I have had a nice career doing mundane compilers. A big motivator to switching to software is I could start a business with nearly zero investment.

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#74

Post by WalterBright »

Retric wrote: post #68
vikinghckr wrote: post #9

Slightly off topic, but I feel like when people talk of STEM as a lucrative field of study, they tend to imply CS. Non-CS STEM field hardly have a shortage of qualified and talented people. In fact, there's probably a oversupply compared to job prospects in non-CS STEM fields. I see so many talented Math/Physics majors end up switching to CS and do mundane software engineering work.

People with a solid STEM background may not get a job in their field, but they learn skills that are generally useful outside of their specialty. I was working with a recent MIT graduate who had a Masters in Engine Design. While his job had little to do with that, it did make use of his significant statistics training and paid a significant salary. By comparison my coworker with a Philosophy degree had gained what he…

It's true that non-CS STEM degrees are very fungible. CS degrees, however, are not.

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#75

Post by gridlockd »

Here's how these inflated numbers come about:

Companies notice that they're getting less applicants with higher salary expectations.

When those companies are surveyed by the government, they cry wolf: "There's a shortage of workers!" they exclaim, when really it's just a "shortage" in the number of applicants with the same salary expectations as before - a trend that has to be nipped in the bud.

The goal then is to have policy bring labor supply back in favor of the companies, by dumping money into education and liberalizing immigration. Essentially, it's another bit of corporate welfare that can be marketed as philantropy.

The joke's on them though, because unlike most other professions, software developers have the ability to create more work than there would have been, had they never been hired in the first place.

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#76

Post by knolax »

claudiawerner wrote: post #56
6thaccount2 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have literally been saying just this for years when someone says "STEAM". At that point, it is just school again. I agree that History, Art, Music, Literature, Philosophy...etc are important and can't imagine a world without them, but the whole point behind STEM was to put a focus on Math and Science because those help us keep our economic edge and solve the world's upcoming problems on the technical side. Providin…

Two points: it seems a little grotesque to be focusing on creating people trained in STEM solely for the purpose of keeping an "economic edge", as if they were troops that we need to keep us safe, and university students are some kind of army we need to train, and secondly more and more ethical and cultural issues due to what STEM students go on to create have come to light recently, and training in critical thinking…

> it seems a little grotesque to be focusing on creating people trained in STEM solely for the purpose of keeping an "economic edge", as if they were troops that we need to keep us safe

But the reality of the situation is that economic "troops" are required to maintain our current standard of living. It seems to me even more grotesque to ignore the immediate needs of society because it feels wrong from some ivory tower philosophical perspective.

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#77

Post by 6thaccount2 »

claudiawerner wrote: post #56
6thaccount2 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have literally been saying just this for years when someone says "STEAM". At that point, it is just school again. I agree that History, Art, Music, Literature, Philosophy...etc are important and can't imagine a world without them, but the whole point behind STEM was to put a focus on Math and Science because those help us keep our economic edge and solve the world's upcoming problems on the technical side. Providin…

Two points: it seems a little grotesque to be focusing on creating people trained in STEM solely for the purpose of keeping an "economic edge", as if they were troops that we need to keep us safe, and university students are some kind of army we need to train, and secondly more and more ethical and cultural issues due to what STEM students go on to create have come to light recently, and training in critical thinking…

I think "grotesque" is a little extreme here. Economic edge is certainly an advantage that comes out of constantly producing new technologies which aid humanity. I can understand your concern though as many technologies come with environmental impacts...etc. Another way to view this in a more positive light is that we're also in the midst of a green revolution (wind, solar, energy storage... etc). The more people we have tackling these hard technical problems (transportation, renewable energy generation, fusion, finding an end to cancer, optimizing food production) the better. Of course, this can't come at the expense of our humanity, but providing additional focus on pivotal subjects like mathematics is vital to the human race.

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#78

Post by damnyou »

Retric wrote: post #66
damnyou wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

STEAM just correctly recognizes that STEM people systematically underrate the importance of history and social studies.

It’s not a question of importance, but abundance. Looking at salaries there is an over abundance of history and social studies graduates. It’s simply a supply vs demand imbalance, and one that has real consequences. Many STEM fields are also over saturated, and some arts fields can make a good career path. But, nuances are not really the point of this discussion.

Yes, you have successfully identified a structural issue with modern capitalism.

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#79

Post by knolax »

damnyou wrote: post #39
knolax wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Social Studies majors systematically overrate the epistemological integrity of their fields.

Yeah, yet there should still be more social studies people in power at tech companies.

A major in philosophy is not required to have a conscience.

Re: The STEM Crisis Is a Myth (2013)

#80

Post by gridlockd »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #36
rland wrote: post #30

It seems to me that there is a shortage of qualified employees and yet also a shortage of jobs in every single well-paid, well regarded sector. It's almost as if we want people to train themselves to work doing hard stuff and also don't want to pay them to do it. In other news, water is wet.

Define "shortage". Scenario 1: People are starving. There is not enough food available, at any price, to meet the need, and there is a hard lower bound on how much is needed. We say that there's a shortage of food. Scenario 2: There is a supply-and-demand situation for some limited good, and some who desire to use that good get priced out. This is the normal functioning of a market. Those who get priced out, though,…

Yes, there's always a "shortage" of workers willing to work for less than market rate, just like there's always a "shortage" of free beer. That's market equilibrium.

It's clearly not a shortage in the economic sense, but it still makes sense to frame it as such, if you're buying labor.

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