<p>With today's economy, it seems as though getting a college degree is a waste of money unless you are going for a STEM major. It seems that humanities degrees don't serve anyone, or at least that's the attitude that has been projected lately. It seems like people suggest that unless you're going to get a degree in Chemical Engineering, Computer Science, Biology, etc. you shouldn't even bother with college.</p>
<p>I want to be a Political Science major. I have wanted to major in PoliSci for the better part of my life. Political theory has always fascinated me and I excel at it. To this day, I have not taken a single history/social science course, AP or otherwise, that I did not both enjoy and get an A+ in. Ideally, I'd be using my degree in Political Science to eventually go to Law School. That's another thing that people tend to be cynical about - law degrees. The market suggests that over saturation has turned the field of Law into a rat race and that tons of individuals graduating from law school have trouble finding work. I myself have always attributed that to individuals going to Law School because of the potential money, lacking actual passion for law itself. </p>
<p>To me, if I can go to law school and get a degree and land myself a job where I can afford to have a roof over my head and not starve to death, basically, then I'm completely okay with it. While it'd be nice to be a private practice attorney in a white shoe law firm commanding an 800,000 dollar a year salary, money is not my motivation. I don't mind being a rinky-dink family attorney living in some small working class town writing wills or serving as a public defender. But people say that even that is impossible these days.</p>
<p>But I suppose Biology is more promising than English Literature or Philosophy, right? In general, sciences tend to trump humanities in which is more lucrative or promising, though I understand that Computer Science and XYZ Engineering may supersede Bio.</p>
<p>Well I’ve been hearing math and pure sciences are very competitive. They are saturated with extremely talented people. I think it’s going to be hard no matter what you do.</p>
<p>If you’re going to a professional school, then you’re undergrad major is pretty much irrelevant as long as you excel, get your required classes down, and show why you want to do what you want to do.</p>
<p>I don’t really see why you’re worried though. PoliSci is a popular major among pre-laws. </p>
<p>In 20 years I’ll be a starving journalist working 80 hours a week and getting paid peanuts, but at least I’ll be doing what I like instead of doing something I dislike (basically anything STEM related).</p>
<p>Job prospects aren’t any better for those of us who want to be scientists, either. Many science PhDs are having great difficultly finding work in their field as well, and I believe biology is actually one of the lowest paying majors. I know a lot of PhD physicists end up working as quantitative analysts for financial companies, because it’s extremely hard to get a job at a lab/university. The myth that STEM graduates all get high-paying jobs largely only applies to the “TE” part of STEM and even then, engineering jobs are becoming more competitive as outsourcing becomes more common.</p>
<p>Also, I think it would be very difficult to get through an engineering degree if you didn’t enjoy it, much less live your life as an engineer…</p>