The thread title uses the words “would offer better paying jobs.” Better paying jobs tend to have unique requirements/expectations that most bachelor’s degree recipients do not fulfill, which relates to why employers are willing to pay a premium salary for the job. One reason for higher early career earnings can be unique major-specific skills. This contributes to why early career jobs that do not prefer any specific major or grad/professional degree tend to be lower median earnings.
For some higher earning early career jobs that unique factor more relates to in demand non-major-specific skills/ability, such as being generally bright or having a particular personality. An example is non-tech sales. Finance/consulting also can fit to some extent. Later on in career, past work experience is often a key unique factors that employers will pay a premium for.
I previously linked to the Cal Poly outcomes summary, which is unique in that it has survey question asking grads if their job is “major related”. Some numbers showing % of employed students who say their job is major-related are below:
Percent of Cal Poly Grads Who Say their Job is “Major-Related”
Business – 100% Major Related
Computer Science – 100% Major Related
Education – 100% Major Related
Management – 100% Major Related
Civil Eng – 99.5% Major Related
Aerospace Eng – 99% Major Related
Architecture – 99% Major Related
Accounting – 98% Major Related
Art and Design – 98% Major Related
Biomedical Eng – 98% Major Related
Electrical Eng – 98% Major Related
Finance - 98% Major Related
Industrial Eng – 97% Major Related
Mechanical Eng – 97% Major Related
Statistics – 96% Major Related
Economics – 92% Major Related
Physics – 92% Major Related
Biology – 89% Major Related
Mathematics – 88% Major Related
English – 81% Major Related
Psychology – 77% Major Related
Sociology – 71% Major Related
Political Science – 70% Major Related
History – 44% Major Related
Philosophy – 37% Major Related
Sociology was mentioned a few posts back, so I’ll post some more details numbers for sociology:
Sociology Majors at Cal Poly
68% working, 16% grad school, 9% seeking
71% of those working say job is major related
Most Common Job Titles of Cal Poly Sociology Majors
Case Manager – Median Salary = $34k
Rehabilitation Specialist – Median Salary = $37k
Other Job Tiles With Multiple Entries that Have Too Small Sample for Salary to Be Listed
Recruiter (Most common job title, but split so no salary)
You are using a small sample size from a different era. I also think that the conclusion that the offspring of college educated parents will be fine no matter what is no longer accurate. There are probably 50% more business and STEM graduates than there were 20 years ago. That means that most employers that are looking for a graduate from one of those majors have a pretty good chance of finding one. That wasn’t the case 20 or 30 years ago.
What I’m trying to figure out (with the help of this interesting thread) is whether or not college majors matter outside STEM or business or performing arts. I come from a STEM/biz world. I do know many people (admittedly middle aged) who are in the rest of the job market not requiring college acquired specialist knowledge.
Off the top of my head, I know HR specialists, chief of staff types, business analysts, marketing, tech and non tech sales, media people who don’t have related majors. The commonality is that they did go to college. College does serve as a sort of filter, if you will, but does not provide any kind of job knowledge aside from writing practice and maybe a kind of “finishing school” effect. Knowing how to network, apply for jobs, learning some business-y lingo.
Another category of jobs are the “middle management” jobs - not sure how to summarize. For example , people who manage gym franchises, chains of hair salons/spas, hospitality. Most of the people I have met doing this have college degrees but not in business. Just worked themselves up from front desk reception or something like that.
There are some jobs where it matters. Teaching at the high school or college level would be an obvious example. There are also some other jobs where a relevant college major is likely to be an advantage (e.g. at a history-focused museum, some jobs may be those where history majors would have an advantage). Licensed professions where the license requires a specific major (e.g. architecture; also nursing if you do not consider it to be “STEM”) are another type of example.
However, it is true that there are many jobs for college graduates that are mostly major-agnostic (including both those where the general skills indicated by a BA/BS degree are needed, and those where a BA/BS degree is required only for credential creep purposes).
So back to the original question, if many jobs (including well-paying ones) are major agnostic, does it make sense for a parent to push well-paying majors? Unless of course, there is a chance that the kid may actually be inclined towards a degree that confers specialist knowledge or leads to licensure. And as enumerated by others above, don’t want to cut yourself off too soon or spend $ that you don’t have on a meandering path.
I know many kids who do just fine getting internships and jobs without the intervention of parents. And I would add that some of the hardest workers in our society work for low wages, so hard work as a parental model does not always mean privilege.
Of course, but surely there is a small difference in knowing how to get jobs/internships if you are the child of hardworking min wage workers vs. child of hardworking white collar professionals.
I think there’s definitely a difference in whether kids put effort into this at an early stage of college. Part of this may be due to the level of intimidation for some kids about joining the clubs that educate you about these opportunities (eg consulting or finance clubs) if you are finding your feet in a college full of wealthy, privileged peers. Though differences in personality also have a lot to do with it.
Even for the non-STEM or business specific jobs, there are so many STEM and Business majors graduating every year that an employer can, for example, usually find a Business Management or Accounting major for the Business Analyst jobs.
Marketing and sales was where a lot of the personable, smart social sciences majors went 30 years ago, but marketing in particular has gotten much more sophisticated in the last 10 years. I am sure it is possible to break in without a marketing degree, but I wouldn’t want to be the history major going up against 5 marketing majors in the second round of interviews at a marketing agency or for an in-house job.
And so many companies’ products and solutions now have some kind of technology component to them, that even an entry level, sales support job might need some kind of technology knowledge at most companies. It doesn’t have to be STEM, but data science or even MIS undergrad is kind of table stakes for a job like that.
The further a kid goes out on the pure social sciences spectrum, the less that degree even has value as a filter. And I have two undergraduate majors, one of which was political science, so I certainly see value in the degree. But being completely realistic, why put yourself in that spot as a kid coming out of college? Get the business or some kind of vocational degree like MIS, and then you have options.
One last thought is that we are in the current extended job boom that is not going to last forever. When the entry level pool of jobs shrinks in the next recession, the kids with the social sciences degrees will have a disproportionately tougher time.
Not always by any means. The child of someone on a cleaning crew might have more drive than the child of more privileged parents. It is hard to generalize.
That’s a good example of the difference between elite and non-elite colleges. At an elite college the filter is simply attending the college in the first place, regardless of the major. At a less elite college then yes, it’s about what you’ve learned in your major.
Two semi-unrelated thoughts. I do get asked by my friends to help their kids out on occasion.
If the kids are pre-college and not sure what they want to do, I advise them to get one of two degrees: accounting, or if they really don’t know what they want to do, math. Math works as a good “filter” major to prove you are smart and hardworking, and accounting is a good baseline major to go into almost any field. I know a lot of mediocre accounting majors that make very good livings. The kids rarely listen to me, but that is my advice to them.
If the kid is graduating college in the next year, I have a decent network in several fields where I could make some phone calls, but I don’t see a lot of opportunities to help a newly graduated history or poli sci major get a job. On the other hand, I also can’t remember the last time someone whose kid had a STEM or business degree needed my help. They usually do just fine on their own.
Perhaps it can help to work backwards. What kinds of careers could the student be interested in? Even if undecided, there are likely some career paths can be ruled out by the student, while others are at least of potential interest (however, the student may not be aware of the existence of many career paths; parents can help, but often parents also are not aware of many career paths). From the list of the latter, which ones impose restrictions on college major, and which ones do not? Given the restrictions, can the student choose a college major that leaves the most career paths open out of those of possible interest?
Yeah, I hear you. So what I see happening with kids is if they aren’t STEM or performing arts that families look to hobbies.
Say a kid loves sports, then they look for schools with sports management, etc.
Or politics, but no interest in being an analyst or lawyer, but has the personality to be a lobbyist (or fixer) then go to college in DC or near a state capital and focus on internships.
Or fashion and shopping, then business with a focus on marketing and fashion.
This seems to be a common theme and sensible to me.
Again this seems like a very “non-elite” approach. I can see the potential benefits for the majority of kids in the US at a directional school but CC parents are really not a representative sample. You aren’t going to go to a LAC (as students who don’t know what they want to do are often encouraged to consider on CC) and study accounting. And I can’t think of anything more dispiriting for a moderately talented student than studying math at a top college with a bunch of superstar peers.
I realize you said the kids of your friends, so maybe your advice is appropriate to them, but suggesting Accounting or Math presupposes at least some interest and aptitude with numbers, data, and for Math, the logic/abstract thinking required for that major.
In my own case, I did get a STEM degree, and did fine in lower level math classes. But I might have struggled at upper level math, and lost interest after linear algebra.
And if anyone had suggested Accounting to me as a good major, I would have looked for another advisor.
Regardless of job prospects or economic forecasts, there really are some students who want to be teachers, social workers, non-profit type employees, etc.
However, do sports management jobs actually favor those with sports management majors, versus general business or other majors? Sometimes, specialized majors aimed at a particular career path do not give significant advantage over a more general major in that career path, but could be limiting in that employers outside of that career path may see it as a negative signal. (Computer game design can be another example of such a major.)
Hah! Very true. None of my friends are on Reddit or CC. At least, I only started to post after my kid had applications in. Likely would have driven her mad otherwise.
