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Comment by seniorThrowaway | Hacker News Reader

I think college's value proposition and entire model has been eroded. Major school's CS grads are finding jobs upon graduation at an 11% rate (I don't have the primary source on this, but it is published by a site I read that never fudges these kinds of things, going back many years). AI probably has a lot to do with that, but it's exposing something more fundamental. CS wasn't supposed to be a programming boot camp anyway, it is at its heart an academic degree much close to pure mathematics than programming. Maybe it should go back to that? Maybe college never should have been for everyone? That was the norm for the vast majority of the existence of higher education. Maybe we don't need gleaming campus' with huge facilities overhead costs? When storing knowledge required physical books it made sense to build learning facilities around large libraries, but that hasn't been the case for decades now. Should young people really be taking on life long non-dischargeable debt for a glorified high school diploma? I think the answer is no, they shouldn't, and that the entire college bubble needs to be popped.

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> Major school's CS grads are finding jobs upon graduation at an 11% rate (I don't have the primary source on this, but it is published by a site I read that never fudges these kinds of things, going back many years).

I think you may have misread something. 11% is closer to the unemployment or underemployment rate for recent grads, not the employment rate.

There may have been a short window during the intense layoffs where you could have looked at a specific graduation cohort and found a low rate of job placement at time of graduation, but that’s a very different statistic. Many take time off after graduation, travel, choose to go to grad school, or just don’t start job searching in earnest until after graduation.

Jee I wish OP would have linked the source instead of just… alluding to it and promising that it’s reliable.

“… a site I read…” Lol

In 2024 is 74%, not 11%

https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market#--:...

That is, 7% are unemployed, and 19% aren't able to find comp sci jobs.

I suspect it's worse now, but probably not 11%?

> Major school's CS grads are finding jobs upon graduation at an 11% rate

That number makes me very skeptical, even in 2026. Maybe what you are saying is that the unemployment figure is 11%? That would be pretty bad compared to two years ago, but within the realm of plausible if we were seeing a major upset in the employment market.

E.g. 2024 data: https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market#--:...

I'd interpret that as 11% of CS grads are finding appropriate jobs (not underemployment) within a set amount of time after graduation. That data from the fed includes all people aged 22-27 with a bachelor's degree.

Where that number is coming from, or what that time frame would be I'm not sure. But I do think it would be more interesting to see the amount of time recent grads spent unemployed or underemployed vs a presumptive snapshot of current employment state.

That's the way I interpreted it, too. A CS grad working at Home Depot stocking shelves or an accounting grad working at Starbucks would not count toward unemployment figures, but it's probably not what anyone would consider a properly-employed college graduate.

Sample size of <10, but a lot of my friends are at the age where their kids are graduating from undergrad recently, and pretty much zero of them are working in their field, and many are struggling to find anything at all, even retail or bartending.

> probably not what anyone would consider a properly-employed college graduate

Agreed, but wouldn't that be captured as 'under employment'? The stats are there for that, too, seems to be close to 20%.

Yea, I'd call that underemployed. Does that mean 80% of recent college grads are employed in their area of study? I would be shocked if that were true.

It means that they are employed in a position that requires a college degree.

Underemployment in the Fed’s data is defined as working any job where at least 50% of people in the job field say you don’t need a college degree. So 80% of recent grads are working in jobs where the perception is you need a degree. Which with the insane requirements for entry level jobs could still be underemployment from a practical perspective

The census data you linked lists unemployment and underemployment for graduates aged 22-27. Assuming nontraditional graduates are a relatively small minority, that's a 5 year window after graduation.

I would find it believable, though not interesting, for only 11% of CS grads to have a local-median-pay, CS-related job locked in at graduation.

defunding education systems strikes again

The model has not really eroded. It just became more obvious that some people had assumptions that were always wrong.

In some circles, it was popular to assume that academic degrees are supposed to be job training instead of education. And then that got interpreted narrowly as the skills you need in your first job after graduation. But a full career is 40+ years. Even when the job market was not changing as quickly as now, nobody could predict the skills you would need 20 years later. If you bought that viewpoint, you spent years preparing for the first few years of your career, which was obviously wasteful.

The actual value proposition was already stated 200+ years ago:

> There are undeniably certain kinds of knowledge that must be of a general nature and, more importantly, a certain cultivation of the mind and character that nobody can afford to be without. People obviously cannot be good craftworkers, merchants, soldiers or businessmen unless, regardless of their occupation, they are good, upstanding and – according to their condition – well-informed human beings and citizens. If this basis is laid through schooling, vocational skills are easily acquired later on, and a person is always free to move from one occupation to another, as so often happens in life.

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

Of course, colleges can be made more cost-effective by focusing more narrowly on education. For some reason, American higher education ended up being weirdly collectivist in an otherwise individualist culture. The ideal college experience became a separate stage of life between childhood and adulthood. You live on a campus outside the real world, and that campus is located in a place few people would otherwise move to. The incentives got weird, and colleges started prioritizing aspects of the college experience that are not directly related to education.

The idea that the AVERAGE person should spend 4 years BOTH not working AND incurring massive amounts of (non-defaultable) debt is bananas.

College either needs to be 1) way cheaper, 2) mainly for the state-subsidized exceptional and independently wealthy, or 3) move to a different model.

We have too many colleges LARPing as Harvard, and too few colleges even attempting to be affordable, practical, or actually deliver value to the ordinary person.

Waterloo University sort of nails the balance with their focus on constant, paid internships.

Higher education improves society as a whole. It should be paid for from general taxation, and available to all. Humanities subjects are just as valid a topic of study as STEM.

A couple of generations ago these were uncontroversial statements, now most people think you are crazy for suggesting such a thing. I think you can trace a lot of the problems in the western world back to this.

Lots of things benefit society and don't cost $40k per year per person in subsidies - mainly to the upper middle class.

Strange how I never see this line deployed against the mortgage interest deduction or health care for wealthy retirees, both of which are considerably more expensive.

Subsidizing college education, at least, has a reliably positive ROI.

Then at the very least college debt should be dischargeable in bankruptcy the way people can walk away from their mortgage.

Agreed. The idiotic law not allowing college debt to be cleared by bankruptcy is the primary reason why college has gotten so expensive.

Then treat college debt like any other loan instead of subsidies backstopped with government bailouts.

> mortgage interest deduction

By far the worst offender.

> health care for wealthy retirees

Theoretically, they paid into the system to get their dues.

> Subsidizing college education, at least, has a reliably positive ROI.

There's evidence at the State level, at least in many states, it does not pay for itself.

> Strange how I never see this line deployed against the mortgage interest deduction or health care for wealthy retirees

For what it's worth, I see arguments like this all the time. Might just be the corner of the information ecosystem you hang out in.

> Subsidizing college education, at least, has a reliably positive ROI.

Maybe it did in the past, where the greatest marginal gains were. Does it still hold true now? Over a third of the US has a bachelor's degree. Is there a reliably positive ROI to society in taking that third to, say, half?

You're both right. College is beneficial to society. And it costs way too much to deliver right now.

You could copy-paste these statements to describe American healthcare vs European healthcare and get a very different reaction. Even though it's true for that field too.

Why the actual fuck does a humanities degree cost anywhere near as much as an engineering degree? Literally all you need is some professors and a space to teach in. You could run them in co-working spaces, parks (weather permitting), or coffee shops ffs, with no administrative staff or other bloat. (For real: small seminars in a coffee shop or a public park would be dope)

Education is beneficial to society and making it cheaper makes it more widely accessible. You and the person you responded to actually agree on a lot.

> Higher education improves society as a whole. It should be paid for from general taxation, and available to all

> A couple of generations ago these were uncontroversial statements

I don't believe those strong assertions you're making were uncontroversial at any time, and are likely objectively less true now than they were in the past.

So community colleges?

God I wish community college would be subsidized. Some states now cover it for your first degree which is a great start and some also are now starting to subsidize courses for retirees but man I would so love to just go and do like random courses I have no intention of pursuing a career in.

European universities are not resorts like in the US and community college keep that small footprint mentality as well. They have done it right. Focus on the education and keep costs lower. I have friends in Europe that work for a few years then just take time off and study something that interests them in their subsidized universities and I am so jealous because their costs are so low.

When I went to community college (and then university) there were a few moments where I actually wasn't treading water in my CS degree and I was able to take a wide variety of classes. They were some of the happiest moments of my life.

Recently visited LA and walked around LACC during the evening. The campus is enormous (and famously was the scene for the TV show Community). I just thought of the enormous variety of subjects being taught, imagine if that was accessible to anyone when they desired.

Isn't LACC subsidized ($46/unit resident tuition seems pretty good)?

Yes just rechecked and you are right. I am not a CA native (was just visiting LA) and so happy to see that this is available. I originally thought they just subsidized degrees for only "first degree" seeking students. Maybe I need to move to LA. My local CC is $225 per credit for in state residents.

They are! The State of California contributes the following to the system: -- Total CCC Funding Is $20 Billion in 2026-27 Under Governor’s Budget.

https://lao.ca.gov/reports/2026/5150/2026-27_CCC_030506.pdf

That's absolutely not the point of higher education, don't drag it down to the level of industry please.

There have been several attempts to raise the bar for Community Colleges to offer Bachelors programs... the existing universities and entrenched professional programs have fought it tooth and nail.

My daughter got her associates carrying no debt... but has struggled to get into an appropriate higher level program. She's currently working PT in two jobs, one as a prep cook in a high end eatery and as a park associate at the local zoo. Neither is offering a particularly compelling pay or benefits that most jobs should offer IMO.

I'm with you on college though, in terms of there should be way cheaper options all around... I think there should even be grant programs for better vocational/trade programs as an alternative path for Bachelors class degrees.

I view it as an arms race. We even went beyond college degrees being common. Now it's fairly common to also do grad school and other resumé-padding. Yeah that means more learning, but there's also a big zero-sum aspect to this.

Specific example is medical school/residency. To "DMZ" this, they'd need to ignore anything students do during gap years, ignore research too unless it's an MD-PhD program. Everyone should be going straight through unless some personal challenge forces them to delay.

I don't look to CS as an example because it's an unusual bubble on top of all that. CS degrees also became super competitive and subsequently worthless around 2000.

> Maybe college never should have been for everyone?

This is my sentiment. School counselors pushed everyone to colleges, but actively dissed trade schools. Forcing students to take classes in subjects they absolutely do not care about is a terrible idea for a secondary education track. If someone really just wants to learn a trade and have a nice life, there is nothing wrong with that.

Did CS course really just become coding boot camps? That seems like an insult to CS grads that came before. That's not a diss to boot camp attendees, but CS grad learns way more than how to code a specific language. However, if someone wants to just code, there's nothing wrong with that. Not everyone is interested in knowing how a CPU works or how much L2 cache improves anything. There's plenty of code that can be written with GC languages so that the coder never even has to think about any of the underpinnings of the system. There's other code that'll never work like that and requires more lower level understanding. There's plenty of work to share

Well yeah, trades suck ass. There are alot of dudes in cushy well paid office gigs extolling the virtues of trade work.

It wasn’t some awful conspiracy, physical trade jobs are hard work and with no pensions or benefit protection, there’s a lot of guys struggling when their bodies are broken at 40. In the 80s, most urban trades were unionized with benefit funds etc. Not the case in 2026.

And a bunch of tech peeps are overweight physically out of shape with other health effects as bad as what you're saying about trades. Humans get old.

I know plenty of trades people that do hard work and think cushy office gigs are hell on earth and that type of work sucks ass. Just because it's not your preferred career doesn't mean you should denigrate those that do. Besides, if there were no trades, you'd have no place to live, you'd have no food to eat, you'd have no car to drive, and you'd have no internet as who was going to build that infrastructure?

Im not denigrating anyone. I worked dairy farms from age 7 to 23.

It’s a brutal lifestyle and I’ve seen my share of hardworking, broken 50 year olds trying to make it mostly on the lesser paying job their wife is left with because raising kids with a dad who’s out the door at 5am and home at 7pm is brutal.

I think the notion that's being challenged is that a college degree is an automatic way out of "dad who’s out the door at 5am and home at 7pm", no matter what the degree is for and who is getting the degree; or that being credentialed and unemployed is better than that.

In 2024, 42.8% of the population ages 25 to 39, 41.5% ages 40 to 54, and 34.2% age 55 and older held a bachelor’s degree or higher.

[1]: https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2025/educatio...

That does not seem like everyone is going to college.

"Everyone" is hyperbole, of course. But it's already too high a number.

When I graduated in the early 2010s I recall the number was closer to ~35%. Honestly given the economy today and the expectations of employers of having a college degree for even basic stuff, these numbers seem pretty low.

In Europe only about 43% have a college degree. So even with heavily subsidized schools there is really only a certain percentage of people that take this path.

[1]:https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/w/d...

> the expectations of employers of having a college degree for even basic stuff

This is mostly an unintentional side-effect of civil rights law, stemming from Griggs v. Duke Power Co.

Quick search shows around 6% unemployment for CS grads. Where is your number from? That is massively different.

Anyone have the stats for how the enrollment trends have been for CS programs at universities? Has there been a noticeable drop-off, potentially due to concerns of AI reducing/eliminating entry-level/junior roles? I suppose there would be some lag, since if you've been planning most of your high school career to get a CS degree, there is inertia in changing majors and applying to different universities. And now that we're mid-April, I'd even think the data for the incoming freshman would be pretty close at a 90% confidence level for the upcoming 2026/2027 academic year.

Check out the Taulbee survey results:

"In 2023–24, Bachelor’s degree production fell 5.5% compared to the previous year across CS, CE, and I departments. Among departments reporting both years, the decrease was 4.3%. Despite this drop, production remains well above pre-pandemic levels and reflects continued strength following the post-2020 rebound. CS saw a 7.4% decrease and CE a 13.3% decrease."

But it also looks like enrollment in CS programs increased in 2024/2025:

"U.S. CS departments reported an increase in new majors per department of 12.8%"

  https://datavisualization.cra.org/TaulbeeSurvey/CRA_Taulbee_Survey_Report_2024.html#Bachelor%E2%80%99s_Program_Production_and_Enrollments

I think we need more Software Engineers, and fewer Computer Scientists.

IME, CS as a profession, doesn't need to concern itself with maintenance, secure coding practices, administration, system implementation, etc. There's no class called "maintaining this POS code base from 10 years ago."

CS folk fail when they don't make the top of a leader board for sorting algos.

Software Engineers fail if they tell you that maintenance requires 10 manual touch points over a weekend.

Different concerns. While software engineering is built upon CS fundamentals, ultimately your concern is with what's coming years down the line when your unpatched "hack week" project is underpinning the business model.

Internet universities have been available for several decades; correspondence degrees for almost a century. Sure, credentialing is a large part of students' choices to attend in-person. Yet the primary reason students attend universities in person is because most people learn best in-person, with personal interaction.

I would not be confident in underemployment figures for 2025 published this early in the year. The New York Federal Reserve has published underemployment rates from 2024 only a couple months ago [1]. In it, computer science underemployment is lower than other majors, even in the mathematical and natural sciences. Aggregated new graduate underemployment has been higher in previous decades than the current level. Underemployment is the right metric to consider because it captures people who accepted lower-skill jobs in order to support themselves.

1. https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market#--:...

> Yet the primary reason students attend universities in person is

the parties, the co-eds, and the start of life from outside the direct supervision of parental units. Let's be honest, all of this education stuff is secondary to that.

This seems like the conclusion someone would come to by watching 1980s college movies, not someone who looked at data. Community colleges, vocational schools, and commuter students represent a large proportion of college students, and are removed from the Animal House experience.

The primary goal for attending college, as stated by both students and parents, is for preparation for entrance into the workforce and adult life.

One can go to the engineering or computer science building in almost any U.S. or Canadian university and observe a student population that doesn't party on a regular basis.

This seems like the conclusion someone would come to by not having an honest conversation about the subject. It is entirely possible that one can attend classes while attending various parties on the weekend or even various events at night after classes. Your knee jerk reaction to my comment that everything is going to be Animal House, Porky's, or Revenge of the Nerds level of shenanigans says more about you.

You still haven't presented any data or even rebutted my claims. Just the banal observation that students periodically attend social events coupled with a mild insult. There are better websites for your preferred type of social media experience.

> The primary goal for attending college, as stated by both students and parents, is for preparation for entrance into the workforce and adult life.

Let's observe revealed preferences, not stated ones.

> One can go to the engineering or computer science building in almost any U.S. or Canadian university and observe a student population that doesn't party on a regular basis.

This is a small fraction of the total college population.

Most people in college are only there because it's the default next step after high school. In fact, a lot of people in graduate school are only there because it's the default next step after a bachelor's degree.

> Most people in college are only there because it's the default next step after high school. In fact, a lot of people in graduate school are only there because it's the default next step after a bachelor's degree.

Exactly! Not because of parties!

Engineering students in CANADA dont party? Excuse me? Has GP ever been to Canada lol?

I said this a week ago, and it swung in votes like crazy: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47655525

“ I don’t know about anyone else here, but college was not educating because I was at college. I did all of the reading and studying on my own. The classes weren’t very interesting, most of my TAs didn’t speak the native language well at all, nor did half the professors. I enjoyed my time, I made a lot of lifelong friends, and figured out how to live on my own. My buddies that enrolled in boot camp instead of college learned all those same skills, for free. Education won’t be ruined or blemished my LLMs, the whole thing was a joke to begin with. The bit that ruined college was unlimited student loans… and all of our best and brightest folks running the colleges raping students for money. It’s pathetic, evil, and somehow espoused.

I remember my calc teachers, married, last name gulick, university of maryland. The calc book was sold as the same book for calc 1/2/3. The couple, gulick were the authors. Every semester they released a new edition, the only thing that changed was the problem set numbers. So, if you took calc 1/2/3, you spent $200/semester for the same fucking book. Magical times.”

let's see the site, if we can't have a primary source

Yup. I've also seen a number like that mentioned by the Moonshots podcast by peter diamantis.. they showed that quarter by quarter the placement rate for CS grads had declined every querter for the last 3 years from 93% at 91K per year down to 19% at about 65k. it was one of their last podcasts from about a week ago.

> CS wasn't supposed to be a programming boot camp anyway, it is at its heart an academic degree much close to pure mathematics than programming. Maybe it should go back to that? Maybe college never should have been for everyone?

That's absolutely what I think, since even before the proliferation of LLMs.

> I don't have the primary source on this, but it is published by a site I read that never fudges these kinds of things, going back many years

What's the secondary source then?

> Maybe college never should have been for everyone? That was the norm for the vast majority of the existence of higher education.

This is the only real answer.

If college is considered a glorified high school diploma, then not having one is like not having a high school diploma.

I think what you wrote makes sense, and you missed one critical aspect : shared access to excessively expensive capitalized facilities and equipment.

One example from 1985 onwards that i can think of is NSF funding of supercomputer centers. 40 years ago, SIMD / vector processors with boatloads of memory were not ubiquitous, nor were shared memory multicore / multiprocessors, a situation which differs with the reality today.

This NSF funding established the 5 supercomputing centers

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

and then further downstream effects include popular access to creations from the supercomputer centers, such as Mosaic from NCSA, and an expansion of ideas outside the compuserve / aol paradigms.

I think similar situations apply for other engineering disciplines, mechanical and chemical and physics and so on. Probably true for the arts in various forms: people don't have personal pipe organs to learn Bach on, for a crazy example, but universities do.

For various industries, learning requires physical equipment too expensive for individuals, historically and still.

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