Not All College Majors Are Created Equal

Four years after graduating, Many college class of 1993 members were not doing well in the job market four years after graduating.  Only 62% had jobs requiring a Bachelor's degree and 55% had related to their major or had career potential. Professional degree majors did better than arts and science majors.

For the complete report visit Four Years after graduation: The class of 1993. The mean earnings of majors with only a bachelors is available at Recent Earnings Data By Major.

If many college graduates aren't working at jobs requiring a college degree, why do they make so much money? Answer is, some do and some don't. Data from  the Bureau of Labor Statistics provides some answers. Their publication News on January 26, 2005  states first decile 2004 earnings for Bachelor's degree only graduates were $23,608 while the high school only median earnings were $29,608. So very low bachelors' only graduates earn substantially less than median high school graduates. 2000 Earning by Highest Degree Attained states that 17% of the bachelor's only graduates, one out of six, earned less than the median high school only graduate.  One out of six is very significant and those who think many graduates went to top tier schools are fooling themselves. 

Interestingly, 17% of the bachelor's only graduates scored in the lowest two levels of the 1992 National Adult Literacy Survey.  Economists Frederic L. Pryor of Swarthmore College and David L. Schaffer of the University of Wisconsin at Eau Clair wrote Who's Not Working and Why, an analysis of tests conducted as part of  the 1992 National Adult Literacy Survey. They feel " . . . it is those college-educated workers with functional literacy little better than the average high school graduate who end up in these lower-level jobs." See Who Gets the Good Jobs and How Much They Pay for more information.

Solving the problem is a college administration problem, and a student interest problem.

Educators in Florida want to increase degrees granted in high job demand, high cost to educate, difficult majors from 41% in 2002-03 to 50%. Students will come from  low job demand, low cost to educate, easier majors. This will cause budget problems and a tenured faculty will not give up easily. In the 1970's, New Hampshire wouldn't give their college professors a raise. So the professors increased credits awarded for courses from three to four and reduced time they spent in the classroom by 25 percent. 

High demand jobs tend to be more academic and require more homework.  But the 2002 assessment of student attitudes and plans  from UCLA's Higher Educational Research Institute show anything but an academic, home work oriented freshman class.
1. Students spending six or more hours of homework a week during their senior year was down to 33.4percent from last year's low of 34.9 percent and 
    the 1987 high of 47 percent.
2. Less than one hour homework a week was up from 8.5 percent to 15.9 percent. 
3. Interest in business careers was down to 13.8 percent from 23.9% in 1986.
4. Interest in majoring in art, music, speech, and drama was 5.8 percent.
5. Planning to work during college increased to 47.1percent from 35.3 percent in 1989.

Economist Paul Krugman and television personality  Bill O'Rilley were on Tim Russert show last night hustling their recent books. Mr. Krugman wanted to blame the poor job creation on the Bush administration and Mr. O'Rilley wanted to blame it on 9/11. Actually, poor job creation was caused by the outsourcing of white collar jobs made possible by the Internet and the computer finally increasing the efficiency of American workers. This process represents the most recent form of Joseph Schumpeter's, "Creative Destruction." 

Many experts believe a better educated workforce is the best way to create high paying employment. There are two reasons education is not the answer.
We can not educate average Americans to compete with very well educated, highly intelligent people from countries such as India and Ireland.
We cannot educate average Americans to can compete with computers. The number of countries using in sourcing  to enhance their economic well-being will grow at an ever increasing rate and computer will continue to replace blue and white collar workers at an ever increasing rate.

The editor/author of this material is Walter Antoniotti.