“Crammed and damned”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Things are hard for everybody now, it’s our administration and lazy congress.
In a few years things will look up and get much better.

This preceded AI and this administration. Employers aren’t necessarily willing to pay large premiums for college graduates.

The ideas that "everyone can learn" and "almost everyone can go to college" are erroneous. Sure, everyone can learn something -- but more than a few learn much less and at a much slower pace with frequent repetition and practice. Similarly, getting into just any college with minimal preparation and skills won't get you very far. Many students would be far better served if their parents and teachers encouraged them to learn a trade or skill that will lead to employment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The top 30ish universities (ie USNews pre-2023) and 15 LACs do not show the same trends. Unemployment is very low and salaries are significantly higher than those with a HS degree.

The best schools still payoff in spades.

How many of the students in a top 30'ish continue on for a masters and not trying to find employment within the ages of 22 and 27?

I haven’t seen the study, but presumably they’re not including people who are studying a masters in those unemployment statistics.

They usually don’t, which is why many of the top schools have paid fellowship programs for grads that make their employment numbers look better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Income is more well correlated to IQ than it is to education. Education was serving as a proxy for IQ for a couple generations, but then we started making college available to everyone (and I mean freaking everyone). So the correlation between education and IQ was diminished, and therefore the usefulness of education as a proxy for IQ, which is in turn a predictor of income, was lost.

I appreciate your idealism, but in the real world income is more related to connections than either IQ (LOL) or education (LOL!!!).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Things are hard for everybody now, it’s our administration and lazy congress.
In a few years things will look up and get much better.

Not really; unless we actually find a way to keep members of congress from picking their rather than the reverse the games will continue. The incentives are poorly aligned.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Income is more well correlated to IQ than it is to education. Education was serving as a proxy for IQ for a couple generations, but then we started making college available to everyone (and I mean freaking everyone). So the correlation between education and IQ was diminished, and therefore the usefulness of education as a proxy for IQ, which is in turn a predictor of income, was lost.

I appreciate your idealism, but in the real world income is more related to connections than either IQ (LOL) or education (LOL!!!).

I'm the PP, and I agree. You are missing the point, though, which is that the correlation between education and income that we once thought existed was really more a correlation between IQ and income. I certainly don't discount the roles of connections and luck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The top 30ish universities (ie USNews pre-2023) and 15 LACs do not show the same trends. Unemployment is very low and salaries are significantly higher than those with a HS degree.

The best schools still payoff in spades.

Not by next year.

What do you not understand about Project 2025 and our economy and unemployment?

This is not a blip, it is foreshadowing the devastation that is going to happen with Trump's policies. There will be no jobs for college students. There will be jobs for 10 year olds males working in factories and 10 year old girls breeding.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Income is more well correlated to IQ than it is to education. Education was serving as a proxy for IQ for a couple generations, but then we started making college available to everyone (and I mean freaking everyone). So the correlation between education and IQ was diminished, and therefore the usefulness of education as a proxy for IQ, which is in turn a predictor of income, was lost.

I appreciate your idealism, but in the real world income is more related to connections than either IQ (LOL) or education (LOL!!!).

To the extent parental SES is a proxy for "connections," IQ is a better predictor of income than parental SES.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The top 30ish universities (ie USNews pre-2023) and 15 LACs do not show the same trends. Unemployment is very low and salaries are significantly higher than those with a HS degree.

The best schools still payoff in spades.

Not by next year.

What do you not understand about Project 2025 and our economy and unemployment?

This is not a blip, it is foreshadowing the devastation that is going to happen with Trump's policies. There will be no jobs for college students. There will be jobs for 10 year olds males working in factories and 10 year old girls breeding.

Oh come on you can’t really believe that

[Anonymous]

May 2025 unemployment rate for 20-24 years olds:

With bachelor’s: 6.1%
High school degree, no college: 8.6%

6.1% is slightly elevated but not far off its May average in the 21st century.

But definitely feel free to skip college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Krugman recently wrote about the same:

https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/bad-times-for-college-graduates

Lol that was so Gen X. Right down to the Peter Gabriel "Don't Give Up" coda.

The job market suuuuuucked when I got out of college in 1990.

Most people eventually found their way.

I plan to use the life lessons learned then to coach my Class of 2028 college kid through whatever comes.

I agree with "Trump-related uncertainty" for freezing the job market and displaying some workers.

[Anonymous]

^displacing.

Also Samsung needs more CS majors ASAP to fix its rogue autocorrect.