Hacker News Reader

Comment by quanticle | Hacker News Reader

I'm frustrated by articles like these that lump all of "college" into one bucket, as if the variety of degrees that one can earn at any four year institution can be combined into a single undifferentiated mass. Is college worth the cost? The answer, as with so many things in life is, "It depends." If you go to college with a clear idea of what sorts of careers your degree is going to open up, and what the earnings potential of those careers are then college can definitely be worth it. Is an engineering degree worth the money? Given the numbers I've seen fly around whenever Hacker News talks about engineering and programmer salaries, I'd have hard time arguing no. Is a degree in, say, Art History worth it? I don't know. I don't know anything about the sorts of careers Art History majors get, and what the costs of an Art History degree are.

View on HN

But that's exactly the point.

All growing up my generation was told, "Just get a degree! It doesn't matter what it's in, it doesn't matter what it costs, just get a degree!" There was no other acceptable route, so all the "good" kids went to college to get degrees.

That leaves parts of my generation racking up student loans they literally cannot pay off with the careers they will get, all the while assuming they'll be alright financially because "degree!"

Of course, college is a big bundle of things: Friends, connections, good time, hopefully skills to get a job. Of course, college is a great thing and completely necessary for some people. But there are a lot of people going into so much debt they would have been in a better position financially by not going.

I'm frustrated by comments like these that lump all of "my generation" into one bucket, as if the variety of people all around the same age can be combined into a single undifferentiated mass. Was your generation told this? The answer, as with so many things in life is, "It depends." Some millennials were probably given bad information that lead them to make poor choices. Some were given bad information but nonetheless were able to see past it to make good choices. Some just had rich parents so they were able to go to college without accruing any debt at all. Lumping 80 million people together (the majority of whom will never get a degree) is silly.

But that's exactly the point.

All growing up we were told, "Be a generalist, not a specialist" There was no other acceptable route, so all the "good" kids identified patterns to get ahead.

That leaves many of us barking up when we notice a pattern. Of course, a generalization is a big bundle of things: abstractions, ceteris paribus, the act of generalizing, a general statement, pattern naming

>I'm frustrated by comments like these that lump all of "my generation" into one bucket, as if the variety of people all around the same age can be combined into a single undifferentiated mass.

The scope of parent's comment is set at generation. Or specifically "my generation", localizing the experience to a time and place.

>The answer, as with so many things in life is, "It depends." Some millennials were probably given bad information that lead them to make poor choices. Some were given bad information but nonetheless were able to see past it to make good choices. Some just had rich parents so they were able to go to college without accruing any debt at all.

I had a similar experience as parent: the hubris of college education ejaculated throughout my k-12 education. Some of us saw through the BS, but there are plenty of people wondering what the hell kind phony dream they bought into, another American dream-bubble bursting with ulterior motives.

>Lumping 80 million people together (the majority of whom will never get a degree) is silly.

Culture is amorphous and hard to grasp in the present, arguably more difficult as time passes. But there are historical themes that can be said to have affected the "mind of the generation". I would call "get a college education" one of those themes, which has been pretty consistent from my interactions with people. Example: coming from older people "are you in school?" "No." "Shame on you."

I'm left with the question of how hard can it be to google the job prospects of the degree you're interested in? It's never been easier to discover that sort of thing.

Even during the medieval (i.e. pre internet) times I attended college, the pay for various majors were well known. Highest was chemical, lowest astronomy.

This is something that is super-frustrating to communicate in these discussions. I end up talking with people from the previous generation a lot, and this is something I hear, "how did you not know that that was dumb and shallow?"

Here's how: from grade school up onto high school, kids in my generation were told, by literally every adult around, "get a degree, it doesn't matter what in, you'll get a good job." The language never differed, there was never talk of trades, of military service, of starting a business, none of that. Every single adult and authority figure said the same thing.

When you're young, even if you start questioning stuff like that, when everyone you turn to says the same thing, where are you supposed to go for other points of view?

"Do what you love -- the money will come!"

Isn't part of the point of college to no longer unquestioningly accept what you're told by adults?

How can you go through 4 years of college and never even once google starting salaries in your chose profession? And none of your peers do either? And not notice any of the constant flow of articles on reddit and hackernews about this issue?

This is neither unknown nor secret nor obscure knowledge.

> Every single adult and authority figure said the same thing.

Not me. I've said otherwise for 40 years.

I said, "to hell with this" and dropped out, so I may not be the best person to ask, but I think "common knowledge" is more difficult to question than most people think. Especially when you don't recognize it as such.

Overall, the frustrating thing to watch is that the kids saddled with six figure student loans, a generic degree and no special skills were just playing by the rules. They were trying to find their passion and studying really hard just like good boys and girls should, then life kicks them in the teeth.

I think people in college now are much more cognizant of it, but five years ago people didn't talk about student loans as much.

Even five years ago, the student loans were significantly lower, right? I graduated 9 years ago, and I paid exponentially less. I can't even believe it when I see the tuition costs, even at my public university.

I find myself wanting to continue to give people the same advice I received, the same advice that served me so well, and the advice I believe in strongly—go to college. It will make you a better person. You will become yourself there, and improve yourself and grow. Better, improved, grown, whole people are the ones who earn more money, but that's a side-effect, not a goal.

But when tuition is four times what it was when I found that advice invaluable—it's much more difficult. Even in this thread I'm still giving the same narrative around the intangible and immeasurable value of a college education (I believe in it still, very strongly), but the cost is out of whack.

This is what an economic imbalance feels like, folks. There's beginning to be a huge rift between the perceived value of a university education (invaluable, extreme, incomparable experience, must-do, must-have) and the price (extremely high).

We cannot comprehend it. After all, who can put a price tag on being a better, improved, more whole person? Is it $20,000? Sure. What if we double it? $40,000? Sure, still invaluable. $80,000? Remains invaluable, intangible, unmeasurably important. $160,000? How can we deal with this? How can we put a price tag on a whole experience that remains, throughout all the number shifting, invaluable?

Needs intervention.

I still fully believe that the university experience is invaluable. But that's not the problem. The problem is that it's become overpriced because we are mentally unable to reconcile the immensity of its effect on a life with a single price tag. Thus, it is open to economic "play."

So we rail against it and come up with alternatives, and rationalize that it's not as invaluable as we thought it was after all, and, well, why don't we take some parts here and connect them with this series of tubes and voila! This is the same thing for only a fraction of the price; why would you ever go to that big overpriced agglomerated monster anyway when you can get these results right here?

All the while, I can't help but see holes in the real quality of the experience of growing up. You have to be smart about it, I guess.

Clearly, there's a reason this is an argument, and not a clear-cut case of college being valuable so you should go do it, and the reason is a price tag.

At least it's simple.

I'm not sure what your college experience (if any--I don't want to presume one way or another) was like, but I've had a chance to see it both from the science/industry perspective, i.e. the CS/engineering subjects, and from a language/art/music perspective (I myself have accumulated most of a couple of different degrees, in wildly divergent subjects, but not yet a whole one).

Seldom have I ever had the conversation with anyone about, "what kind of job will we get after ___?" For me, it isn't so relevant because my tech background lets me make money pretty easily. For others, it seems like the focus is almost always almost exclusively on finishing the schoolwork.

The schools themselves certainly never bring up the subject of any kind of career planning or job readiness, because that isn't really the role of the university--these aren't trade schools, after all.

Maybe they should, but if everyone's making the same mistake, then I find it hard to say "everyone is dumb/wrong," with an implication that they should all just suck it up and deal with having made some mistake. I think it makes more sense to look for social causes for why everyone's making the same mistake, and find a larger-scale solution than individual suffering of consequences.

As for this: "Not me. I've said otherwise for 40 years." I'm quite certain you weren't a part of the adult/authority figure group my peers and I had access to in the K-12 period of our lives. I find it commendable that you have said otherwise, but your ideas were absolutely not well-represented among the adults present in my generation's upbringing. So, it's great that you've been saying so, but not all that helpful in advancing the discussion.

> I find it commendable that you have said otherwise

Please, google "starting salaries for majors".

It's not any harder than that.

The thing is, unless advice I give says what people want to hear, they don't want to hear it. The most unwanted advice I give is to stop blaming others for ones' own decisions. Take responsibility for them. It's actually quite empowering.

When I went to college in the 70's, it was the custom for seniors to tape their job offer and rejection letters on their dorm door for all to see. You bet we talked about jobs after college. I specifically chose classes based on how valuable I thought they'd be to my future career choice, and so did plenty of others.

For example, lots of students quite deliberately did double majors, such as: "AY for fun, and EE for money." This was decades before google. Everyone knew that there were no jobs in AY.

I'm not sure why you're taking such a sanctimonious approach here.

I'm also not sure why you keep repeating this advice, as though I or anyone on this board need to hear it.

My point, which I'll try to make again, is that, among my peer group and in my generation, the universally prevalent idea was, "get a degree in anything, you'll get a job," full stop. (Please, don't take this as a sign that I need you to tell me to "google starting salaries for majors" again!). When you're a 16 year old without much technical aptitude--not me, but certainly my friends--that sounds like a good proposition! The schools won't do anything to disabuse the incoming students of that, either. Why would they? Every department wants a steady influx of students, so none of them are going to say, "nope, no jobs here!"

I think you probably grew up in quite a different era, which is why I keep getting a sense of "kids these days" in your messages.

I do kind of wonder what it would take to get you to empathize with people who grew up in a different time, under different circumstances, people who are part of a substantial cohort, who all acted in good faith on bad life advice and are all paying a substantial price for it.

If, in response, you're going to say "just google it!" or "personal responsibility!" then please, let's save us all the typing and let it go.

> "get a degree, it doesn't matter what in, you'll get a good job."

What generation is that? I was in college in the late 90s and growing up I was never told just go to college. It was always become a medical doctor or lawyer.

About as hard as it is to understand that correlation does not imply causation, but these people were still expecting career success out of their education anyway. The downside of making education available to everyone is that you get everyone.

The point of college is not to maximize your earning potential.

It is to improve yourself, invest in yourself, and become a better human being. Higher pay is a possible side-effect.

I hear people say this all the time, but I don't remember being told this. I remember being told to go to college and to get a 'good' degree (this was well before STEM was a common term) meaning something not liberal arts and preferably something math heavy (although business is also good). I was told to meet people and talk to companies which come to colleges campus a lot. I was told to try new things and experiment and figure out what I liked and who I was. I remember having people who didn't go to college come in and talk to us, and people who went to vocational schools and people who enlisted in the military. They all said "if you college isn't your thing, there are other ways to having a fulfilling career." I was never told, "get a degree no matter the cost."

This was evident during the first semester of freshman year of college. Freshman everywhere were sure they were going to be the next bestselling author, or the next insightful historian, or the next psychologist to make a huge breakthrough. They all knew it was hard to get a cushy job in those soft fields, they just thought they'd be the one to do it out of every incoming freshman in every school in every state in the country.

"I remember being told to go to college and to get a 'good' degree (this was well before STEM was a common term) meaning something not liberal arts and preferably something math heavy..."

I'm curious when the meaning of "liberal arts" changed. When I was in college liberal arts was a superset of STEM - well, at least SM. Physics was just as much a liberal arts field as history. A vocationally-focused degree in, say, criminology wouldn't be liberal arts, and neither would a self-guided major in peace studies. It seems like lately I've seen more and more people use the term as meaning 'all humanities, social sciences, and anything else that seems fluffy', which seems surprising to me. (Not that the comment above necessarily means it this way, though it does seem kind of close in spirit).

People seem to forget that a law degree was probably the most common example of a "good degree" you'd hear about in the 90's. And if you want to get a law degree, the American Bar Association recommends an undergraduate degree in "history, English, philosophy, political science, economics or business."

Up until maybe 30 years ago it made perfect sense to "just get a degree." College degrees were rare enough that they were a differentiator.

The people pushing to get any old degree were just following the logic of the world they grew up in. I suspect a lot of millenials will encourage their kids to get degrees in STEM fields and especially CS, even though in 30 years that won't be the best advice.

Agreed. I would take this a step further, though.

If the degree is simply a means to an end, a credential, a set of skills needed for some job, then I would submit that a live-in university is a grossly inefficient way to transmit those skills, in most cases. Something more akin to community college, or perhaps what Georgia Tech or Coursera, et al. are doing is more appropriate.

If, on the other hand, the goal is to sharpen critical thinking, to learn how to solve difficult problems, to become more well-read, to become a writer, to debate ideas, and a host of other less tangible skills, then a university is called for.

In either case, what the modern undergraduate university has become accomplishes neither. It is an obscenely expensive, grotesque, hyper-social playground with the occasional cookie-cutter class, with the exception of a smattering of upper-level classes.

The university will only survive the next few years is if they return to their more austere roots and shed about 60% of the students and 80% of the staff in the process.

Yes, you could hire a few professors, rent a few classrooms with chairs and whiteboards, and you have the essence of a university. No real need for all this bloat. Students could live at home and brown bag it for lunch.

Learning in many fields is social. When you have a sufficiently nerdy student body, the best debates, mind-expanding and perspective-enhancing experiences, friendships, etc. are not in classrooms but in dorm common rooms at 3am. They're spontaneous conversations between people who bumped into each other at a coffee shop outside a reading room, both procrastinating a paper. They're at dinner with your dorm-mates at your table together in the dining hall. Common spaces, and a curated set of people (for intellectual ability, general passion, etc) spending a lot of time in those common spaces, are an incredibly important component of a modern elite education.

If lectures are all that matter, just do it on the internet. They aren't.

If that's the real value of college education, it's definitely not worth $40K a year x 4.

Yah, see hacker spaces, and social dinners....

Take a look at NPR's "What you'll Actually Pay At 1,550 Colleges" [0]. To pay $40k at a good school you'd have to be pretty wealthy ($110k+ household income). At median income, good but not Ivy League private schools (UChicago, Columbia, CalTech, MIT) are running $8-12k.

[0] http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/09/30/444446022/what-...

Very true, but the typical college student's experience does not include that.

I agree with you but what you've described is a kind of idealized depiction of a college student. In real life, there's a lot of partying that may build certain social skills but doesn't really justify the massive cost. The huge amount of substance abuse and generally immature behavior of my fellow 1st and 2nd year peers was ridiculous, as was their inattention to their studies. It was, for many, nothing but a prolonged adolescence as well as a big waste of time and (parents') money.

Grad school was more like a scholarly atmosphere as you described; we'd regularly meet after class at the coffee shop and discuss nearly everything. But we all had our own apartments and private lives.

> Students could live at home

The most valuable part of my college education was the experience I got living away from home.

Which you could have done without the overhead of college.

Getting your first job in a town away from your parents would have worked too, and may have actually been a better experience.

Maybe, that was your point.

We neglect to appreciate the effective and intentional system that college is, that forces us to have such a variety of new experiences, most not of our own choosing.

It would be a shame if our ability to make wise, independent choices at age 18 was the major determinant for our potential in life. Many would not choose to invest in themselves.

The university experience is invaluable. Look at it whole. Don't take it for granted.

I completely agree with the noble goals you've called out, and I'll add two points:

First, when is it truly undesirable to broaden your skills, to develop intangible quality, to improve your abilities as a human being beyond a specific depth? I argue (and I know it's arguable) that it's always a positive. To some degree I think the market agrees with this and, without a clear answer to "what is a good education worth," has overvalued (or rather, overpriced) the unmeasurable intangible results of a college education, which is one of our problems.

Second, I completely disagree that the modern undergraduate university accomplishes neither of these things. It is obscenely expensive (needs correction), but it is not "grotesque," it is not "hyper-social" in the derogatory sense (simply diversely social, which is neutral/positive), it is not a "playground" other than the type that nurtures minds and enhances opportunities for learning, it is not "cookie cutter" except in the sense of being an effective and repeatable system.

The university deserves to survive, it deserves to flourish, and it is an institution deserving respect for the effect it has had and will continue to have on the rise of civilization and the improvement of society.

Because it is both difficult to measure and easy to understand such an enormous impact, universities have become expensive. That is regrettable and needs recalibration from a more powerful entity (public universities have it right, but they rightfully need support from society). But don't think for a second that the castration of the university to an austere intellectualized minority luxury is the way forward for the institution of higher learning or for society itself.

As civilization becomes more complex and more difficult to comprehend, we will only need more and better universities, and ones that continue in the tradition of the liberal arts—that we may continue to be human in the face of ever greater inhumanity. Save us all if we are required to measure that.

I couldn't agree more about the intrinsic or potential value of the idealized university, and I've seen glimpses of that ideal in my small sliver of experience there.

I was using hyperbole for rhetorical reasons, but the words were chosen deliberately.

Grotesque: college athletics. Hyper-social: the Greek system, "hookup culture". Playground: grade inflation. All egregious, ubiquitous examples. Sure, there are many exceptions, but in my experience at decent to good campuses, these things are dominant influences, if not the definitive ones. This includes most of the great American campuses. (I don't know much about what it's like outside the US.)

Universities cannot be serious places if they are filled with unserious people doing unserious things. No institution could.

I disagree, and I think you're projecting both judgement and a cognitive bias for an ideal situation for you that would never occur in reality. It's a sort of golden age or nirvana fallacy, looking back at universities of the past or your 'ideal university' as somehow better or more serious than the ones that exist today.

For the past, at least, this wasn't true at all. If anything universities were were sillier, rowdier places. If it wasn't alcohol, it was other mischief and vice, more serious sports, and more pervasive greek systems. The offenses against seriousness you list aren't even that bad, to be honest. They suffer from a sort of 'vocal minority' effect, where they seem extremely loud and horrible, but in reality are just the outward projections of a minority percentage or a minority effect.

A university is a microcosm of society. It has never been and will never be a completely serious place, because humans are not completely serious beings. Part of the glorious beauty and effectiveness of the university, even in its average form, is that it allows humans to be humans and to explore humanity; not only its serious aspects, but also its flaws, vices, and many varied possibilities. This is not a negative 'dominant influence,' but instead a highly functional, necessary, and intentional nod to the most effective development of a human being.

Just look at it: there is somehow a great seriousness coming out of this crazy world of drinking, hyper-social behavior, hookups, greek systems, grade inflation, and college sports. This should tell you something: the whole experience of college and the seriousness of its intended result are not at odds, but instead—paradoxically in a sort of crazy zen-like relationship—necessary for one another to exist. There is a profound recognition that a serious, well-balanced human being capable of greatness is not constructed by seriousness itself, nor of serious places, but rather by a plentiful variety of experience.

It is not the aim of universities to be serious places. They know better. They understand the complexities of culture, of society, and of the development of young people at a very critical stage of life. In the end, they most certainly achieve serious results very consistently—not in spite of their lack of seriousness, but in large part because of it, and especially thanks to an appreciation for it.

And on an anecdotal note, I believe in universities strongly because I did indeed experience a great one, and I know many people who had their own great experiences as well. At my university, I saw and experienced all of the things you mention. All of these unserious offenses should have distracted me from my academic focus, but they did not. They only enhanced it and helped form me into the person I am today, and I strongly, unequivocally believe that I am better for it.

> articles like these that lump all of "college" into one bucket

The reason they do this is because my generation actually was brought up with the idea that going to college, any college, and getting any degree made you more successful than those without degrees. Now, some realized that this wasn't true, but it wasn't the message hammered into us from kindegarten on.

It used to be very true, back in the days before "everyone" had a degree. Even as recently as when you were in kindergarten.

> Given the numbers I've seen fly around whenever Hacker News talks about engineering and programmer salaries, I'd have hard time arguing no.

Even there, though, there are plenty of people (myself, for instance) doing just fine in this industry without a degree. There are things I'll likely never work on, like complex computer vision stuff involving oodles of math, but heck, most people without a masters or doctorate don't work on that anyway.

I've actually been studying computer vision on the side. The highest formal math education I had was Integral Calculus. I'm not going to be hired doing that any time soon but it is fun to play around with none the less.

It's a crap situation, and victim blaming doesn't help.

We just happened to be lucky we like STEM. I know I was lucky enough to find my passion before college, then follow it, which luckily just happened to be a booming field.

Sure we can look back and pat ourselves in the back. But really, it should just be for being in the right place at the right time.

Anyway, if you researched what you were going to do, why not pursue a career with a lot less risk/more career growth opportunities? Say being a MD?

> I'm frustrated by articles like these that lump all of "college" into one bucket

I have a relative who thought of college in exactly this way. She gamed the admissions process to get into a "good" college, then took the easiest classes she could get away with for the next four years - openly mocking those who took classes that required effort. A few months after graduation, she was genuinely angry and felt betrayed that someone hadn't offered her a job with an office and a high 5 figure starting salary - presumably related to "leisure studies" which was her major. After all, she had gone to a good college like everyone had told her to. She was definitely not the only one of her friends who thought the same way.

I'm not an American, and at first I thought the "leisure studies" major was just sarcasm(similar to Kaldirim Muhendisligi, i.e. Sidewalk Engineering in Turkish), then I googled it, and I am completely baffled that it is actually a thing.

I totally agree, but it goes further than just differences between degrees. There are huge differences between individuals and institutions as well.

In every area, the best (and sometimes only) jobs go to the best people. Where an applicant attended college can have a big influence on how they're perceived by prospective employers.[0]

The question of individual performance also comes in to play. Some reports have said that almost 75% of STEM graduates don't actually work in STEM.[1] I'm sure some of that is driven by the fact that companies want to hire above-average people - but only 50% of people fall into that category. Even in the current crazy environment in computing, there are computing graduates who can't find jobs.

There's a lot more to this issue than engineering vs. art history.[2] Sure, there's a lot of people who get degrees in fields with small labor markets. There's also the 50% of graduates with below-average transcripts. On top of that, there's people who think attending a lousy college is better than no college at all - they're shouldering a whole lot of debt for something that may ultimately bring them close to zero benefit.

There are a lot of people for whom college has paid off in spades. These people aren't necessarily lucky, they may have simply made more sensible choices.

[0] Of course there are pros and cons to this, but we know it's true.

[1] http://www.cbsnews.com/news/a-shortage-of-scientists-and-tec...

[2] I'd rather an art history degree from a great school than an engineering degree from a terrible school.

This.

It's also worth mentioning that labor markets change. A lot of people working in Silicon Valley today weren't around after the first crash so they can't imagine how an engineer making six figures today with seemingly unlimited opportunities can find himself or herself making $0 tomorrow with seemingly few opportunities. But it has happened, can happen and will happen again at some point.

People with genuine talent in the industry have extremely little to worry about, IMO. I was shopping for a used car shortly after the 2000 crash. Car salesman found out what I do for a living and said, "Yeah, I was a programmer for a couple years; made a lot of money. Then when I got fired and couldn't get another job, I went back to selling used cars."

The no-talent temporary programmers are the ones who flood into and wash out of the market in crashes. If you have genuine talent, your time between employment is measured in hours right now, in days during normal times, and maybe in weeks during crashes.

I agree to some extent. At the end of a day if you are a master of something that is no longer needed your employment status will reflect that.

> People with genuine talent in the industry have extremely little to worry about...

This is probably true in just about any industry. But you're ignoring the fact that most people employed in tech don't have the kind of "genuine talent" to which you refer.

There are a lot of average/mediocre developers (who are not "no-talent temporary programmers") making six-figures building and maintaining run-of-the-mill CRUD apps at venture-backed startups who at some point are not going to be able to hop to another six figure job when their startup runs out of cash.

Completely agree.

" I'm sure some of that is driven by the fact that companies want to hire above-average people - but only 50% of people fall into that category."

And they're already employed/on the track to employment!

It's true that programming and engineering tend to pay more. But it is also true that those fields don't require a degree to work in them. You can get paid very well as a programmer even without a college degree.

Also, with programming the vast majority of that information is available for free online. It doesn't make sense to pay that much for something that you can get for free.

Outside of software engineering, all other kinds of engineering absolutely require an ABET accredited degree

in the US, you can make almost the same salary as a 'technical designer', who work alongside engineers. or if you're a very talented draftsman / cad operator / machinist kind of individual. your career as an employee will be somewhat limited - however, entrepreneurialism is the great equalizer when it comes to money. starting early in a trade field with a solid career foundation can set the stage for running a business later in life after a decade or two of wages and experience under your belt.

again, remember this is all in the context of paying/borrowing $TONS for college. that's the tradeoff here. is being an engineer worth the debt you incur as a very young person, versus starting in a lower track but making the most of your time and money earned.

That depends what you want to do. The work and opportunities a degree holding engineer will get is far higher than a tradesmen. Also, you dont need that much debt. A state school engineering degree is extremely affordable and gives the same opportunities as a more expensive degree.

But if you want a position as an engineer you need to go to school to be one, its one of the more cut and dry professions out there (Not talking about software engineering)

I don't think that is 100% true, some states have an apprenticeship model for getting a EIT/PE as well. CA for example counts industry experience towards it, and getting an EIT can be done with just three years experience (or three years of course credits).

In fact, its actually possible in CA to get a PE without taking the FE (just learned that) if you hold a ABET degree.

http://www.bpelsg.ca.gov/applicants/faq_eng.pdf

More interesting than major is quality. Is an Art History degree from a rural commuter school interesting? Probably not. Is a Philosophy degree from Harvard interesting? I'd say so.

Yup. Prestige is more important than a lot of people like to admit.

I'll go as far as to say that when it comes to degrees like Art History, prestige (i.e. reputation of the school's department) is what matters the most. That way, you will get to do the interesting research and make the necessary connections to advance your career.

Correct, but if it works for art history, it should also work for other degrees that more directly translate into career paths, no?

Interesting result from a survey I conducted on behalf of an artist at the Venice Biennale (possibly the most important contemporary art event in the world): nearly all visitors during the preview (prior to the public opening) who answered (about 1000 people) said they held at least a master's degree. Albeit this is in Europe, where in many countries advanced degrees are quite common, but suffice it to say an Art History degree may be quite valuable to those looking to succeed in the art world.

Anecdotally, I know this to be the case. On the flip side, you are very unlikely to succeed unless you have connections from the outset.

I think the situation is more complicated than what the average salary is for a given degree, or even what career opportunities a particular degree opens up. I was a liberal arts major (Religious Studies) and through a winding path ended up becoming a programmer. I knew at the time that I wouldn't be able to do much with my degree, but sometimes people pick degrees because of things besides career options and earnings potential -- and I would argue that these decisions can still be classified as perfectly rational at the time. I thought I'd work any sort of job to pay off my thankfully small student loans and then become a monk, but life turned out differently. Now you might say that my story is an unusual exception, but I think that similar thoughts (minus monasticism) drive the hearts of most liberal arts majors.

We need to consider that in the current educational system we are asking young people who are in the midst of trying to understand the world and their place in it to make a decision that very few are equipped to decide, but which they generally cannot delay, and with which they will incur great cost. And the effects of making this decision will last their entire life -- I myself know that it's possible to "pivot", but extremely difficult to do so.

Furthermore, there's no guarantee that a job even awaits those who pursue high paying degrees. For anyone who graduated in 2008, those with degrees in finance or MBAs will suffer the consequences of ill timing the rest of their life. Likewise with those who graduated with CS degrees during the dot com crash, or with advanced degrees focused on AI during the AI Winter. Sometimes things completely beyond our control result in what seemed like a prudent decision falling apart.

So my point is that our current educational structure is not well suited towards producing people who are resilient to disruption. And I mean disruption in a few senses: graduating when the market for their skills crashes, studying for a decade to get a degree in something that is beginning to be replaced by automation (I know one M.D. in a particular field who is preparing for this), and so on. It of course takes some time to acquire the skills to perform any particular job, and it might be unrealistic to expect someone with a family to even have the time to work and retrain at the same time. I know places like Udacity have things like "nanodegrees" and Coursera has certificates and whatnot, but I remain unconvinced that there are enough, say, web development jobs to meet the demands of both the unemployed and the recently graduated. And once there are too many web developers, what will they retrain to (and what will be the mobility and growth potential of us current developers)?

My comment is starting to turn into a blog post, so I'll try to wrap it up now. Ultimately I think that disruptive forces -- whether economic, automation-driven, or something else -- will only increase over time, and will exacerbate the already existing problems, causing significant social upheaval because we do not equip people to function in such an environment, but rather try to train them for their lifelong job, which is a thing that no longer exists. And I guess that I just ended up stating one of the motivations behind a liberal arts education (as opposed to something like a trade school where you generally focus upon one particular set of job skills) without even intending to end up here: it's not necessarily that you need to know art history or music theory in particular, but that in expanding the scope of your intellect and the modes of thought you are capable of, you will be much better prepared to learn what you do need to learn and to think critically about it.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com