The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
theatlantic.com
The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
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Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#2Well, this isn't incompatible with the perception that a lot more college grads are stuck in dead-end jobs.
Let's imagine three tiers of college grads: winners, middling, and losers, depending on how employable they were when they graduated.
Before, the winners and middling grads got real jobs, and the losers went to Joe-jobs.
Now, the winners are still getting real jobs, the middling folks are now in Joe-jobs, and the losers are unemployed.
And nobody cares about losers because we're all callous that way, so all we've noticed is that people who used to get the real jobs are now stuck in the Joe-jobs.
Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#3I just had several friends who were Architects take menial jobs after the housing market busted. These were guys who were 2 years removed from college, thinking they had paid their dues and were in their chosen fields.
Two are still trying to catch on to another firm somewhere and another completely changed fields to find a job. I wonder if they're including these people in those stats?
Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#4What a silly article. It ignores that you can get a college degree in anything. Do the analysis for art majors, literature majors, business majors, and various STEM majors. Look at 2 year degrees, 4 year degrees, and graduate degrees.
Sadly there are enough variation that you can almost make any statement technically true. You could say more people with college degrees are unemployed now than ever before in history. In absolute numbers sure, as a fraction of the available workforce not so much.
Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#5Perhaps the problem is that people who are destined for a dead-end job are now going to college:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Educational_Attainment_in_...
In 1990 ~20% of the US had bachelors degrees. In 2009 ~25% did.
In the same period, the % of college grads in low wage jobs also went up by about 5% (according to the OP).
Caveats: 1) That second 5% is from the population of grads not the total population, so that second 5% is a lower number. 2) The 5% total attainment measures the full pool, not the delta in the pool as would be appropriate to use in comparison to the recent college grads numbers in the article.
A lot of this "college grads now worse off" seems like partial views of the statistics that ignore the meteoric rise in enrollment over the same period.
One stat I haven't yet seen, that would make a great paper for anyone still in college, is: What percent of these numbers can be explained by higher GI bill usage following the Iraq and Afghanistan wars?
Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#6Perhaps the problem is that people who are destined for a dead-end job are now going to college: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Educational_Attainment_in_... In 1990 ~20% of the US had bachelors degrees. In 2009 ~25% did. In the same period, the % of college grads in low wage jobs also went up by about 5% (according to the OP). Caveats: 1) That second 5% is from the population of grads not the total population, so…
Blaming the victim, favorite American pastime.
Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#7These graphs ignore the fact that from 1992 to 2009, the percentage of people over 25 with a college degree rose from ~20% to ~27%: http://www.census.gov/prod/2012pubs/p20-566.pdf (page 3). Meanwhile, the first chart in the article shows from 1990 to 2012, consistently just over 30% of college degree holders had a job that didn't require their degree. That means that in 1990, 0.7 * 0.2 = 14% of the population had a college degree and a job that required one, while in 2009, 0.7 * 0.27 = 19% of the population had a college degree and a job that required one.
Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#8Perhaps the problem is that people who are destined for a dead-end job are now going to college: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Educational_Attainment_in_... In 1990 ~20% of the US had bachelors degrees. In 2009 ~25% did. In the same period, the % of college grads in low wage jobs also went up by about 5% (according to the OP). Caveats: 1) That second 5% is from the population of grads not the total population, so…
The real problem is people studying bullshit that nobody really needs.
Young people got sold the idea that they can be anything they want to be, they they are all special snowflakes. The reality is quite a bit more brutal.
What we really need is mandatory career counseling, once a year, for every student. The counselors must be familiar with the state of the market, the market trends, technology trends, number of future graduate trends, etc.
Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#9Perhaps the problem is that people who are destined for a dead-end job are now going to college: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Educational_Attainment_in_... In 1990 ~20% of the US had bachelors degrees. In 2009 ~25% did. In the same period, the % of college grads in low wage jobs also went up by about 5% (according to the OP). Caveats: 1) That second 5% is from the population of grads not the total population, so…
Blaming the victim, favorite American pastime.
In this case the victim is often responsible for making poor career choices.
The whole "I graduated, I'm entitled to a job" sentiment must go away, or we will end up with an army of hungry homeless history, women-study, art, philosophy graduates.
Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
Blaming the victim, favorite American pastime.
In this case the victim is often responsible for making poor career choices. The whole "I graduated, I'm entitled to a job" sentiment must go away, or we will end up with an army of hungry homeless history, women-study, art, philosophy graduates.
So what do you recommend they do? We can't all be programmers.