Posted on 11/15/2012 12:58:53 PM PST by eagleye85
As recently reported by USA Today, one third of millennials have earned four-year degrees. In my previous blog entry I discussed the financial perils facing these students, who often graduate unable to find a job in their major (unemployed or underemployed) and saddled heavily with debt.
However, it looks like the job market for those with Bachelor’s degrees is creeping upward somewhat, according to a new report issued by Michigan State University (pdf). “The new college labor market inches ahead with a 3 percent gain over last year across all degrees,” it states. “Strong demand for marketing, finance, human resources, and advertising majors as well as the inclusive ‘all majors’ group will push up hiring for Bachelor’s degrees by 5 percent.”
“This growth comes despite a softer market for engineers, accountants, and computer science majors than in the previous two years.” The authors surveyed 4,300 employer representatives, 67% of which were “full-time hiring managers or recruiters.”
“Employers were slightly more optimistic this year about the college labor market than last year, rating the overall market as ‘fair’ and ‘good,’” notes Susanna Kim for ABC News.
Well duh! When you start seeing major service industries cutting back full time to part time, that opens up more part time staff positions. So there will be more jobs for the art history majors, french lit types, at Dominoes, Papa Johns, et al..
While this may sound like good news, it is not. The demand for non-producing jobs is going down while the service jobs goes up?
Feminist Lit Majors and Nigerian Basketweaving Labor Theory Majors can get jobs now??
Obama’s Job Sharing Plan
"Our story continues to portray the growing strength for employment opportunities for new graduates in the face of monumentally difficult economic challenges. While the number of opportunities may be insufficient to provide every new graduate a meaningful position, the expansion continues to whittle away at the number having to enter part-time or non-career related employment."So, the hires they are talking about are not part-time or non-career related hires but ones which require a Bachelor's Degree or other degree.
Millennial birth years are from 1985 to 2004. Assuming equal births for all those years, less than one third (six years worth from 1985 through 1990) have reached or passed the age of 22, or about the average for a bachelor's degree.
I seriously doubt there is greater than 100% college graduation rate among people aged 22 through 27. Well, maybe in Cleveland or Philly, but elsewhere, not likely.
What do they do? Spend four years learning how to lie in technicolor and surroundsound?
The 4 year Liberal Arts degree today has the same weight as high school diploma back in the day.
It gives you a leg up when you apply for all those quality jobs produced by the Obama economy such as:
Barista, Dog Walker/Groomer, and parking lot attendant.
People with mechanical skill or good with their hands would probably be better off learning a trade at a community college or apprenticeship program. You will make more money on the job and owe less money than with traditional 4 year college tuition.
.....Being a little sarcastic here. College degrees obviously have value (that’s why I have two of them), but depending on what you’re studying and what your student debt will be, it might make more sense for many people to seek vocational training instead.
That’s not what we’re seeing among the recent grads we know. They can’t find jobs in their fields, but they are settling for service industry jobs. Plus kids we know with Bachelors are working a couple jobs, because nothing is full time, the jobs are not in their fields and pay is usually $10/hr or less.
At the country club near our house, young people (with bachelors, and not just “squishy” lib arts, but finance, and hard science degrees) are working part time as servers for banquets, etc. to make ends meet. They may have 2 or 3 part time jobs.
Our 24 year old has a good job, but he has his Masters, and needed his Masters for an entry level job at a Fortune 100 company. As I told someone the other day, the Masters degree seems to be the new Bachelors degree.
Keep in mind the news blurb from a few months ago that stated most new jobs were going to immigrants, legal or otherwise. It’s probably the case that foreign computer science grad’s are taking the jobs Americans need.
The hires they are talking about do not produce a usable good.If the pick up was in Engineering and Science fields I would feel there might be some hope. But by the jobs being pure administrative there is little hope of an overall pickup in hiring.
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