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The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

theatlantic.com

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Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#21

Post by john_b »

Jormundir wrote: post #15
ye wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 fut…

There's also the problem across the aisle of employers looking for bullshit skills and experience that are almost completely irrelevant to the jobs they're offering. Graduating from college today and trying to move into the workforce feels like a lockout, like there's some sort of employer union to purposefully bar recent grads out of employment. It really has nothing to do with studying "bullshit degrees", as so man…

> "Really the problem is that there just aren't enough jobs for college grads, and the jobs that are available, employers naively put bars of experience, completely ignoring a mass of very competent workers."

If your premise is true and any employer with competitors did this systematically they would be subjecting themselves to a significant competitive disadvantage. You're postulating that employers in general voluntarily ignore their own best interests. Some companies may be this mismanaged, but suggesting that the market as a whole is this incompetent is quite a stretch.

Rather, it's likely that employers have some incentive to put up these seemingly arbitrary bars of experience. Perhaps they're mitigating risks (e.g. of high turnover) or they have trouble filtering the candidate pool to a manageable size with other qualifications.

Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#22

Post by mgkimsal »

ye wrote: post #20
Jormundir wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the problem across the aisle of employers looking for bullshit skills and experience that are almost completely irrelevant to the jobs they're offering. Graduating from college today and trying to move into the workforce feels like a lockout, like there's some sort of employer union to purposefully bar recent grads out of employment. It really has nothing to do with studying "bullshit degrees", as so man…

> as so many of the graduates with "bullshit degrees" are incredibly competent A history graduate is competent in what exactly? They aren't even competent at teaching history, which generally requires Masters or PhD. > Counseling students of the trends of the market is stupid I never said the students should counseled on the trends. But the counselors must be aware of them.

"A history graduate is competent in what exactly?"

Studying/researching problems.

Writing persuasive documents based on evidence.

Working collaboratively in teams doing research.

Or, at least, that's what I'd expect. I'd expect that almost anyone graduating with a 4 year degree in anything.

Sadly, I know it's not the case. > 20 years ago, I was taking a college course on 'intro to china'. It was definitely a 'blow off' class - a 2 credit class you had to take to fulfill some general ed requirement.

The class was 2 months, 1 (or maybe 2?) nights per week, and we had to write 4 'papers'. The 'papers' needed to be 1-2 pages on any topic of our choice relating to China - historical, modern, political, whatever. The instructor was a librarian by trade, and loved China, and taught the class.

First papers go back to the students, and 3-5 students in the back - 'non traditionals' by the look of it (all over 30 IIRC) started complaining - loudly - that they'd been marked down because of spelling and grammar mistakes. The instructor replied that this was a college class and they should be able to write basic English competently enough to avoid basic spelling and grammar mistakes - we should all know how to use semicolons, commas, periods, capitalization rules, possessive forms, etc.

One of the students shouted back "this isn't an English class - this is unfair bullshit that I'm being marked down like this". Sadly, a group of people all chimed in agreeing. The teacher was visibly shaken.

Of course, not arguing this is the state of every single college class out there, and it wasn't even the norm in my experience. I was just shocked at the time that it happened at all, but now it doesn't shock me any more. Just saddens me that people think like this. Those sorts of people shouldn't be going to college in the first place, but were sold the line "get a college degree and your life will be great". It's not true.

Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#23

Post by ffrryuu »

btian wrote: post #11
ye wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

They should learn skills that are desirable in the current economy. Not just programming, but also nursing, chemical engineering etc.

Nursing has topped, the industry lost jobs last year.

Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#24

Post by Pxtl »

ye wrote: post #8
thatthatis wrote: post #5

Perhaps 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 fut…

And people who studied bullshit that nobody really needs used to get jobs. Talk to a 50-year-old businessman about his degree and you'll find out he studied lit or philosophy.

Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#25

Post by Pxtl »

ye wrote: post #9
ffrryuu wrote: post #6

Earlier 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.

But it used to work that way.

A generation or two ago you had a bunch of guys with degrees in literature and art-history managing plants full guys with highschool diplomas. And they all were middle-class or higher.

Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#26

Post by dinkumthinkum »

ye wrote: post #12
ffrryuu wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what do you recommend they do? We can't all be programmers.

There are only a few options I see for them 1) Give up and work for a shitty job, until it gets automated, then go homeless and hope the government keeps them alive 2) Learn new marketable skills and get a job. You're right, we can't all be programmers, but we can be nurses, car mechanics, accountants, pilots, welders, plumbers, farmers, etc. 3) Start a small business. Many successful small businesses are literally a…

Your number 2 is silly and it makes it hard for me to take you seriously. If those are the jobs you think students should go towards, which exactly are the dead end jobs you speak of?

Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#27

Post by ye »

dinkumthinkum wrote: post #26
ye wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are only a few options I see for them 1) Give up and work for a shitty job, until it gets automated, then go homeless and hope the government keeps them alive 2) Learn new marketable skills and get a job. You're right, we can't all be programmers, but we can be nurses, car mechanics, accountants, pilots, welders, plumbers, farmers, etc. 3) Start a small business. Many successful small businesses are literally a…

Your number 2 is silly and it makes it hard for me to take you seriously. If those are the jobs you think students should go towards, which exactly are the dead end jobs you speak of?

All the jobs I listed, apart from nursing, are well paid.

Nursing is more for people who like to help/save other people, and it's a noble profession in my mind.

Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#28

Post by polymatter »

ye wrote: post #20
Jormundir wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the problem across the aisle of employers looking for bullshit skills and experience that are almost completely irrelevant to the jobs they're offering. Graduating from college today and trying to move into the workforce feels like a lockout, like there's some sort of employer union to purposefully bar recent grads out of employment. It really has nothing to do with studying "bullshit degrees", as so man…

> as so many of the graduates with "bullshit degrees" are incredibly competent A history graduate is competent in what exactly? They aren't even competent at teaching history, which generally requires Masters or PhD. > Counseling students of the trends of the market is stupid I never said the students should counseled on the trends. But the counselors must be aware of them.

A history graduate learns how to analyze disparate sources of variable quality for a specific purpose and argue a conclusion. They should be masters of long form report, able to select relevant information from a huge library and be able to defend a position cogently. I think its some of the most transferable skills there is.

I'm not sure my comp sci degree was particularly useful. The vast majority of what I learnt turns out in retrospect to be "industry focused" aka completely obsolete now.

Re: The Growth of College Grads in Dead-End Jobs

#30

Post by lsc »

Jormundir wrote: post #15
ye wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 fut…

There's also the problem across the aisle of employers looking for bullshit skills and experience that are almost completely irrelevant to the jobs they're offering. Graduating from college today and trying to move into the workforce feels like a lockout, like there's some sort of employer union to purposefully bar recent grads out of employment. It really has nothing to do with studying "bullshit degrees", as so man…

>One thing I might be in support of is more of a compromise: cut out more of the atrociously poor general education in exchange for a policy of something like 1 career degree (Business, Science, Engineering), 1 arts degree (Everyone must double major). But this would likely have the drawback of students having to grind through a subject they're not interested in and are never going to apply in practice.

I would argue the opposite.

Learning how to write is essential for everyone. Of course, I would also argue that learning how to program is essential for everyone. Now, we aren't all going to be Knuth or Shakespeare, but... you are going to be at a severe disadvantage, really, no matter what field you choose, if you can't do those things at all.

You learn the basics of those two things? You are going to do okay, no matter what your degree was in.

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