Posted on 06/03/2025 11:55:55 AM PDT by millenial4freedom
Conventional wisdom long held that majoring in a STEM field was a surefire path to job security and high earnings. But new data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York challenges that narrative, revealing that recent graduates with degrees in computer engineering face significantly higher unemployment than their counterparts in the humanities.
According to the Fed’s analysis of 2023 Census data, the unemployment rate for computer engineering majors stood at 7.5%, compared to just 3% for art history majors. The finding has surprised many education and labor market analysts, especially given the persistent demand for tech talent in the US economy.
This was when Biden was president and about the only growing workforce was government. Humanities majors were in vogue because it meant that you were leftist indoctrinated.
Bet they are almost all Asian and white male. Jobs being held back for minorities.
Uh oh, you better put your flame-proof suit on, ‘cause this article ain’t gonna go over well here at FR... :-)
How to Lie with Statistics, 101. Finding a job for 100,000 new graduates is harder than finding 11 jobs for all the students who were talked into a major in art history. I call BS on the statistics for this claim.
It doesn’t say where the Art History majors are employed.
It DOES say that almost 50% are UNDERemployed.
Statistics being what they are, there’s a concern that’s not addressed here: the ascendency of AI. Firms like Microsoft are committed to having more than 50% of their code developed by AI. At some point it’ll be that AI is developing the code, and the senior level programmers who remain will do QA and some minor fixes. Computer programming will become a niche skill in 20 years.
Learn to code, well at least “with a slight Indian accent”
Indians control hiring decisions since they have taken over IT recruiting.
But how many art history majors are working in an art related field? It’s the kind of useless degree that lands you a job in an HR department.
Yeah we definitely don’t need any more H-1B workers and the ones here need to be sent back. I was talking with a friend yesterday who is into AI and he was telling me how easy it was get AI to write the software you need. Gonna be a lot of white collar layoffs coming up. Feel sorry for those students who spent all that time and money on college and now their degree is becoming next to worthless.
First, is this fact a sad statement about (1) the economy, (2) the courses and computer science minors that student's choose, or (3) the courses that universities teach?
Second, I wonder what Mike Rowe would say about the value of apprenticeships and trade schools versus academic classrooms.
As someone who entered the workforce over 50 years ago, but who has spent many of those years hiring for software and hard engineering jobs; I can say that “most” young people fresh out of college, have virtually no clue about the real world. I had been an advisor to an engineering department for over a decade and made suggestions to engineering students and to faculty on courses and “extras” that would make graduates much more attractive to employers.
Specifically, most universities don't spend a lot of effort in teaching those aspects that are important to employers. Most course work is geared around “trying to figure out an answer and then having the instructor correct it.” That is not how the real work environment works. You need to figure out the right answer, get it correct and check your work in some way.
Similarly, in coding you don't just write code that works, you need to document the code and check it so that someone else can later modify the code without having to recreate it.
Finally, far too many young programmers and engineers are asking for a job, as opposed to demonstrating that they view a job as part of a career path they want and are committed to. I can't tell you the number of times I have not hired someone who says they want to work hard and will do a job, as opposed to hiring someone who demonstrates that they view the position as part of a career path they have chosen by being involved in professional societies, having published a paper, attended a professional conference, or taken a non-college course to gain a certification or proficiency in some topic.
Surely nobody's buying that particular stat?!
That’s a Biden job destruction for White and Asian workers thing.
Latest job report - 7.5 million new job openings since President Trump took office.
And that is just the start of the Trump MAGA job growth program.
What a difference a new President makes.
Pretty sure that those programmers will be able to find a good job in the emerging Trump economy.
Apparently there are not enough liberal arts majors getting jobs at Starbucks.
You mean offshoring IT jobs and H1B visa’s didn’t leave enough for domestic grads to find a job?
Gee... whodathunkit...
Art History grads aren’t looking for a job.
They don’t get counted lol
That’s because the employers DON’T HIRE US CITIZENS...Instead they hire Green Card indians at 40-50% of going salaries.
It’s been going on a long time in my industry....But the kicker is, you get what you pay for.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.