<p>It is fairly frequent to see posts here assuming that majoring in a STEM subject automatically means good job prospects. Why is this assumption so common, even though legions of biology majors have found otherwise? (see the <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/internships-careers-employment/1121619-university-graduate-career-surveys.html%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/internships-careers-employment/1121619-university-graduate-career-surveys.html</a> ; note that biology is the most popular STEM major, and one of the most popular liberal arts majors overall)</p>
<p>Possibly because school districts are full of excitement over revamping K-12 schools to take advantage of various STEM grants and both parents and students are conditioned to think that science is everything?</p>
<p>Or were you being facetious?</p>
<p>The science and technology field is very common these days because those are where the jobs at. Think about it…we live in a world where we depend on technology and we are always willing to go that extra length to get the newest tech around (iphone 5) and science is a field that is always adapting and changing because of the demand for it. For example, people are always gonna be sick and thats why jobs are always available in the healthcare field. Hope that answers your question :)</p>
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<p>Some STEM subjects (currently, engineering, computer science, applied math, statistics) are where the jobs are at (but economic and industry cycles can have a large impact). Others, such as biology (which is very popular in college – there are about as many biology majors as all of engineering majors in colleges), have a lot of graduates and relatively few good jobs.</p>
<p>I think the STEM hype is not true over the long term. Unless one goes on to med school, law school, business school or a professional degree, the average stem major will end up in one of the non-“rich” income levels.</p>
<p>I would advise against going into healthcare unless you love, or at least really like it. It is difficult, stressful and very demanding.</p>
<p>Most STEM fields are heavily quantitative, and the vast majority of college students cannot do advanced math or do not like the amount of work necessary to master it. Biology is probably the least quantitative STEM field at the bachelor’s degree level, one where you can often substitute a good memory for quantitative analysis. </p>
<p>If you’re good at math, business and industry can find a wide range of jobs for you, from programmer to Wall Street analyst to actuary to data-miner for large consumer marketing firms.</p>
<p>It’s basic supply & demand. The job market needs workers with quantitative analyzing skills, but not as many students are interested in (or capable of) taking all the higher math required.</p>
<p>As an aeronautics engineer (i.e. rocket scientist) you can quit your daytime job to pursue your dream of acting. You can walk out of your engineering office and walk into an acting audition on the same day-- the barrier to entry is low. The acting field is flooded with so many hopefuls that the entry salary is abysmally low. </p>
<p>As an actor (drama major), it doesn’t work the other way. Same could be said for other non-STEM majors.</p>
<p>Biology also suffers from supply & demand issues. Too many graduates, so the market has imposed a higher level of credentialing (e.g., MD, PhD, nursing ) to separate the Men from the lab Mice. </p>
<p>STEM graduates do not automatically “end up rich”, but on average (minus biology) they can expect solid career prospects.</p>
<p>Considering that biology majors make up about 34% of all STEM graduates*, it is not a good idea to refer to “STEM majors” as a whole when referring to job and career prospects. An additional 9% of them are in physical sciences, some of which (like chemistry) also have poor job and career prospects.</p>
<p>*See [Bachelor’s</a> degrees conferred by degree-granting institutions, by field of study: Selected years, 1970-71 through 2009-10](<a href=“http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d11/tables/dt11_286.asp]Bachelor’s”>http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d11/tables/dt11_286.asp)</p>
<p>Note that the statistics indicate that only 9% of all bachelor’s degrees conferred in 2009-2010 were in STEM majors excluding the obviously less-math ones of biology and engineering technology (which is [different</a> from engineering](<a href=“http://www.abet.org/engineering-vs-engineering-technology/]different”>http://www.abet.org/engineering-vs-engineering-technology/)). For all STEM majors, the percentage was 15% of the total. Business majors made up 22% of the total.</p>
<p>Business majors are a dime a dozen:
[Wealth</a> or Waste? Rethinking - WSJ.com](<a href=“Wealth or Waste? Rethinking - WSJ”>Wealth or Waste? Rethinking - WSJ)</p>
<p>We can send more kids to STEM but at the end of the day if there are no jobs it will not do us any good. I found that out the hard way 30 years ago in my birth country.</p>
<p>Likewise, we can send kids to the ‘hot’ professions and it won’t do us any good either - look at law, computer science on a couple of occasions, etc.</p>
<p>Maybe because we tend to think of STEM majors as being math, eng’g, physics majors who can make a strong living, and we forget about the glut of bio majors out there.</p>
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<p>In computer science, at least, a lot of the graduates cannot program worth beans. Even in a STEM field – perhaps especially in a STEM field – you need to be able to show that you have the technical expertise to do the job, since businesses no longer wish to invest in training you. If you can’t finish in the top half of your class, you might be better off with a different major.</p>
<p>Something is seriously wrong with how to approach college and pre-college education.</p>
<p>UCB - so you want to redefine STEM - Biology as having good job prospects?</p>
<p>I am under the impression biology has jobs but not well paying compared to the rest?</p>
<p>No, just trying to get people to realize that some STEM majors do not have good job prospects, and that one should not lump all STEM majors together in this respect. Also, various types of engineering and CS have job prospects that depend on economic and industry cycles.</p>
<p>I’m told it’s a Cold War relic where the government was encouraging education in STEM fields…</p>
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<p>As someone from a family populated by several engineers with careers spanning 5+ decades…don’t get my older engineer uncles started. In one long bust cycle…they ended up having to serve as SAHD for several years in an era when that wasn’t as common and far less socially accepted than now. </p>
<p>I’ve also met dozens of real-life engineering/physics/math/CS folks who had to drive taxis or perform other odd jobs to tie themselves over during the bust periods. And some were top graduates from topflight engineering schools like MIT, Columbia SEAS, Cornell, Berkeley, etc. A few like one uncle even had a professional MSE on top of having a BSE…both from the abovenamed schools.</p>
<p>STEM’s have good employment prospects only if they resemble some version of the purple squirrel to the HR type doing the hiring…</p>