[pjlegato]

The headline ("Two College Degrees Later, I Was Still Picking Kale For Rich People") is a statement of disappointed entitlement, of outrage over a belief that some implicit social contract has not been fulfilled.

The reality is that just having "a degree" in a generic sense is no longer the magical ticket to a middle class lifestyle that it was in 1960. It's become too common and is no longer much of a differentiator in most job markets.

A related issue is that many, many people have degrees in non-marketable subjects. Whatever one may think of the intrinsic value of studying history, philosophy, English literature, anthropology, art history, etc. there simply is not much demand in our society for specialists in these fields -- and so you wind up picking kale for rich people, with a pile of student loan debt to pay.

We utterly fail to communicate that fact to young students entering college. We do the opposite: follow your dream, follow your passion for anthropology or whatever and it will all somehow work out in the end. Turns out that's not actually true. Telling students that it is true is what leads to indignation and this sense of entitlement. Society just doesn't need more than a tiny number of anthropologists. Whether one thinks that society ought to need more of them is irrelevant.

It's disingenous to keep encouraging kids to get degrees in non-marketable subjects, to keep pretending that economic reality should not be a factor in what you choose to study.

[gearoidoc]

I agree with you with one caveat: there really was a social contract in place that said something along the lines of "Finish third level and you'll walk into a job thats better than flipping burgers".

That contract has been broken. I think it was stupid to begin with but it was a message very clearly sent from generations, society, government that went before. As you say, it still is.

So does the writer have reason to be aggrieved? I think so. However, at some stage in an adults life they need to do some critical thinking and independently decide whats the optimal way to climb the pay ladder (legally).

That critical thinking is something that is simply not taught in schools. Perhaps its not teachable at all.

[_rpd]

> there really was a social contract in place that said something along the lines of "Finish third level and you'll walk into a job thats better than flipping burgers"

Was this ever true for a Masters in Creative Writing? My understanding is that this class of degree has always been a social signal for "my family is so wealthy, I will never need to work."

[pjlegato]

With the advent of government subsidized mass higher education in the US starting in the 1960s, that changed. Many high school teachers and college professors began heavily encouraging their idealistic, young, poor students to "follow their passion" and study creative writing and other non-marketable subjects.

This group feels that it is vulgar and crass to even mention money or economics in the context of art or pure academics, much less integrate it into your life's plans, thus setting almost all of their naive students up for massive disappointment when they graduate with a huge pile of student loan debt and no jobs available except picking kale for rich people for barely above minimum wage.

[gearoidoc]

"This group feels that it is vulgar and crass to even mention money or economics in the context of art or pure academics" - I'm not sure where you're gleaning that from - my point was there was/still is a social contract in place that tells young people that graduating from a third level institution will be a signifier of above average intelligence and/or work ethic thus leading to at least better than working class job.

Perhaps you had the foresight (or your parents did) to see that such qualifications would drastically decrease in social value. Others didn't. Then again, maybe you just happen to work in tech and lack empathy for those who didn't luck out in their chosen industry.

[pjlegato]

No, actually, I speak from painfully learned experience, as a former poor student who is now the holder of a non-marketable university degree in history and philosophy, and a pile of student loan debt.

But my personal experience is entirely irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

Let's keep the personal stereotyping and passive-aggresive insults out of this discussion.

[chriskanan]

I completely agree. It reminds me of this article: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/29/your-money/student-loans/2...

I think we need to do a far better job of informing students in high school about how their choice of major in college influences their income. At the very least, we need to discourage them from taking on large amounts of debt for majors where their expected income will be low. Even if we could convince them, many students probably don't know how hard it is to live off of $30-50k per year, and at that point in their lives (17-20 years old) they might argue that they would rather major in Women's Studies or Philosophy.

Unfortunately, I doubt colleges would allow substantial guidance in this area during "Introduction to College" classes that students take their Freshman year for a variety of reasons. Some professors would argue that college is not meant to prepare people for the workforce (it makes you a better citizen and more worldly), but that really hasn't been true for many years.

[fleitz]

Yup, there's a lot of people driving beamers who complain about how their parents forced them into law, medicine, or engineering.