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What's Your STEM Degree Worth?
Jim_Austin writes A recent study by economist Douglas Webber calculates the lifetime earnings premium of college degrees in various broad areas, accounting for selection bias--that is, for the fact that people who already are likely to do well are also more likely to go to college. These premiums are not small. Science Careers got exclusive access to major-specific data, and published an article that tells how much more you can expect to earn because you got that college degree--for engineering, physics, computer science, chemistry, and biology majors.
I was hoping it would show the fields and the difference, such as between CompSci with and without degree. Not. It is CompSci degree vs Burger King? Well, duh...
>> My phd?
No, your STEM undergrad degree, dumbass.
From TFA: "Webber excluded from his sample people with postgraduate training."
At the risk of using an ad hominem fallacy, a university professor personally benefits when people choose to attend college. An economist at a university should recuse himself from issuing reports that encourage people to contribute to his pension fund.
Even for those in the bottom quartile of 'ability' (people that just limp into college).
A quick calculation based on this data says that the break-even point in opportunity costs (include any foregone earnings over 30k) is $215k for an undergrad in the humanities and 320k for the social sciences, and $460k if you do anything in a STEM fields.
So there you go: if your opportunity cost is less than 50K a year any under-grad degree, even if you are are not all that bright, may well pay off.
We're kind of assuming that if you are in the bottom quartile graduate school is a bit out of your league; though I'm sure there are a LOT of bottom quartile business majors who get reasonable MBAs and totally throw off our expectations about income and smarts.
It gives me a paycheck every two weeks but the work is utterly devoid of personal fulfillment. If I had known fifteen years ago what to expect from a career in software I would have spent my time getting a completely different degree.
Love sees no species.
Are 'IT Workers' really STEM, though? I thought IT was more like the data janitors. Modern day file clerks. The people who keep the laser printer humming and tell the wire-puller monkeys where to remove the ceiling tiles.
With STEM degrees, you usually go on to at least a Master, if not a Ph.D. A college degree in most STEM fields isn't worth much by itself.
Well, not really.
My degree was "free" as well. The price is a different one. I don't know about your university. What's your dropout rate? Ours is 95-98%. Yes. 2% actually get through the whole deal. They can easily afford that. With the university being "free", there is by no means any kind of shortage of people wanting a degree. So they upped the requirements over and over because .... well, just 'cause you tenfold the applicants, there ain't a demand for ten times as many university educated people.
Getting in is easy. Getting through and out is terribly hard. A bit like a marriage, when you think about it.
They don't hold your hand, they don't pamper you, they don't organize anything for you. Get it done or GTFO, either get your act together or move over, someone else will.
What gets out of there in the end with a degree is, with no false modesty, the absolute best of the best in the field. If he wasn't, he could never have gotten through it. Whatever comes out of there is not only one of the best people you could get from a professional point of view, he's able to plan and organize, he knows time management, he knows how to get projects from conception through to presentation.
When I compare that to universities that pamper their students 'cause they're dependent on them staying and paying their tuition fees... I can't help but prefer graduates from my university. I don't care whether your parents were rich enough to send you to school. I care whether you were smart and organized enough to get through.
Even though I have to say that most people working in my team don't have a degree at all.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
3.98 GPA and a more awards than you can shake a stick at.... And the only job I could find is with a shitty timeshare marketing company. No degree required for this job.
Lol.
FML.
They should either remove the "M" from STEM or stop telling gullible young smart guys that a STEM degree will lead to a higher paying job.
I went to my Social Security statement and added up my income since I graduated (Electronics Engineering degree (BSEE), 35 yrs. in my career until I retired). I stayed in the technical field (avoided management). The number: $2,727,247 I went to a community college and obtained my general education, later transferring to a state university. I'd estimate my total education cost at around $3K maximum (tuition was a whopping $59.65/qtr. when I graduated in '77). Starting salary was about $1.2k/month. Ending salary was about $10k/month. YMMV
I disagree. I worked for one of those "large computer companies". Most of our technical staff had a Bachelor's degree. A few had a Masters. There was zero pay difference between the B.S. degrees and M.S. degrees. It's all based on job performance. Ph.Ds were actually a disadvantage. Most managers stayed away from them because of the perception that they would be "bored" doing normal engineering jobs.
Will dumping $80,000 into an educational institution for a piece of paper let me get any sort of semi-stable career?
You're going to spend your 20s doing something, the postgrad lifestyle isn't all that bad, neither's the workforce assuming you studied something that someone somewhere actually wants to pay you for.
Getting a PhD does pidgeon-hole you as a bit of an academic, though. It's not always necessarily an asset when applying for a job.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
...says the liberal art major.
I got through about 2.5 years of college before I was too poor to continue. I lucked out, got a job doing exactly the type of programming I wanted to do (custom automation control systems) but making next to nothing doing it (about $15k/year). Eventually being poor got old and I took a job with a "real" company making $60k. Six months in they bumped me to $68k and took me on as a full time employee.
Eventually I went back and finished my degree (BS in Comp Sci). I lost my job at almost the same time I finished the degree (I wasn't willing to move then the company did). That's why I know that the degree gave me a 10-15% bump in pay.
I learned almost nothing in college about programming. To this day I am of the belief that it is a certificate attesting that when told to do something silly you have the fortitude to actually get it done. Oh, and maybe you have the ability to learn new things...maybe. In the end I'm glad I got it, but only because of what it means to other people. Directly to me it means almost nothing.
with probable bankruptcy to boot.
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From:
http://100rsns.blogspot.com/20...
Another issue with the job markets for STEM and engineering degrees is that there is a lot of involuntary retirement from about age 35-40, in aggregate based primarily on age. Any gains realized up to that point tend to get thwacked pretty hard in the process of readjusting and finding other employment. The point being that majoring in STEM or engineering, and even performing well in STEM or engineering, is no guarantee of anything.
Many employers really don't know what they are hiring for and frequently have hiring practices counter to their stated wants. In fact, most people making hiring decisions have little to no actual knowledge of the disciplines they are hiring in.
As for what constitutes 'public support' - we've already voted with our taxpayer dollars for zombie studies. There is no greater form of express support than subsidy. Furthermore I guarantee you that there are at least three industries outside academia that will consume the products of 'zombie studies' - publishing, film/TV, and internet-based media - and it is no doubt pursuit of income from these sources that will enable 'zombie studies' to flourish. Like I said before, one does not buck the public purse with impunity.
H-1B workers are not "trained by the government," at least not through any kind of formally established program.
They are not paid "premium salaries," at least not according to the US Department of Labor: "...the Department's regulations require that the wages offered to a foreign worker must be the *prevailing wage rate* for the occupational classification in the area of employment.
The prevailing wage rate is defined as the *average wage* paid to similarly employed workers in a specific occupation in the area of intended employment...
The requirement to pay prevailing wages as a minimum is true of most employment based visa programs involving the Department of Labor. In addition, the H-1B, H-1B1, and E-3 programs require the employer to pay the prevailing wage or the actual wage paid by the employer to workers with similar skills and qualifications, whichever is higher." In short, they are supposed to be paid "prevailing wage" or going rate for that position with that employer. In many cases these minima are not met by the employer.
Let's read about that "crying demand for engineers" from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers:
Anio, Monica "Are Engineers Really In Demand," IEEE Roundup, 2/10/12 ... and from senior editor Patrick Thibodeau of Computerworld, who has reported on IT and engineering employment issues for over a decade:
Thibodeau, Patrick "What STEM Shortage? Electrical Engineering Lost 35,000 Jobs Last Year" Computerworld, 01/16/14.
As for "lies" about "domestic staff being displaced," the displacement of US citizen engineers has been documented for well over a decade by Dr. Norm Matloff, Professor of Computer Science at UC Davis. Distillations of his research on visa programs have appeared at Bloomberg.com ("How Foreign Students Hurt U.S. Innovation," 2/11/2013) and Barron's ("Where Are the Best and Brightest," June 8, 2013).
In these articles he takes the current president to task for his support of expanding green card giveaways as well as California Democrat Zoe Lofgren for her support of the H-1B program. The "people who hate the Koch Brothers" reflexively vote Democrat and don't go after the party faithful in op-ed pieces.
New Economic Perspectives