Who is going to employ all the economics majors?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are lots of general business jobs out there. Most of these kids won't be doing anything academic with economics, but they absolutely can be working in the business world.

Not true. They will be competing with kids who have completed BS degrees in Accounting, Finance, Marketing, Intl. Business, Human Resources, Investor Relations, Sports Mgmt., and on. Econ degree - then plan for a MBA to make yourself marketable or you better have a hook such as an Econ. degree from a T20. Econ degree on its own is only marginally better than Sociology/Psychology, African/Asian/Gender Studies, etc for a retail manager job at Walmart. Don't fool yourselves or your kids. Econ. degree is great as a stepping stone up (along with GMAT, LSAT) but not for an entry level position post BA degree.

[Anonymous]

Last year at my kids college graduation it appeared that like forty percent of the class was getting a degree in psychology and ai had the same question. What does one do with a BA in psychology?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Last year at my kids college graduation it appeared that like forty percent of the class was getting a degree in psychology and ai had the same question. What does one do with a BA in psychology?

DC's 1995 degree in Psych and minor in biology. No jobs in Colo. at that time - degree was only good if one wanted to move on to Masters in Counseling. Had to go get an AAS in Network Infrastructure to become employable and works in that field today. And that was 30+ years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Its the same as a generic business degree, you can do the same things.

Really, who is going to employ all the Whatever majors, at this point with AI. They might as well study something that interests them.

Above is the correct answer. Economics is the business major at schools that don't have undergrad business. And a close substitute at schools that have limited access to business programs/colleges.

Sadly, people have stigmatized non-STEM liberal arts majors even further than when I graduated in the 1990s. A lot of it does tie to the omnipresent fear of being unemployable. I can show you references from the 1980s commenting on the illusory practicality of being an economics major.

The truth is that economics majors and English majors and political science majors who are good students can all do the same kinds of jobs. But employers get lazy and want the most relevant keyword matches, etc. So economics still has momentum as a practical major.

At the heart of everything, it really comes down to quantitative aptitude and ability to interpret data. Economics more clearly signals the practice of those skills than anthropology or English majors. Yet there's no concrete reason why that has to be the case for any individual person. Most liberal arts programs allow students to continue in math and take data science and research classes.

There are many sub-disciplines in economics. So lots of angles to catch students' interest. I became an economics major after giving up on dualed psychology and business majors. It was similar to those two majors but staying in the liberal arts college vs. business degree allowed me to study topics that were less job-focused and more humanities oriented. For example, an Art History class instead of Organizational Behavior.

I ended up getting a GS-7 economist job through a twist of fate. I had planned to go into business but I graduated during a recession similar to current conditions. It was a good experience and I would select it again. My older DC is similar to me and his choice is political science. I think he's also getting a good education in a classic liberal arts way.

As an economist I agree with most of this, but I think it is a bit too quick to write off econ as just a way to signal quantitative and data aptitude. There are far more actual economist jobs than anthropologist or English jobs (even PP mentioned the GS-7 economist job). Thats part of how these students have been able to be absorbed by the job market over time, in addition to them getting jobs in consulting, finance, Fortune 500s, etc.

It’s been a very popular major for a good 15 years now, if not more, and the job stats have been good. But I agree it keeps expanding. Curious to see how that changes things going forward.

[Anonymous]

Right now, government isn't really hiring entry level economists, only limited at the higher level. Even before 2025, where I am in the last decade hiring was lower, and most already had a masters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was talking about this today.

seeing so many internships and jobs go to "connections" - that econ degree from a T20 won't get you there alone.....

And the people with connections getting those covetted finance jobs have art history degrees. Truth.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was talking about this today.

seeing so many internships and jobs go to "connections" - that econ degree from a T20 won't get you there alone.....

And the people with connections getting those covetted finance jobs have art history degrees. Truth.

That's what I'm seeing from my Ivy kids' friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was talking about this today.

seeing so many internships and jobs go to "connections" - that econ degree from a T20 won't get you there alone.....

And the people with connections getting those covetted finance jobs have art history degrees. Truth.

Art History is a major known to be associated with wealth.

The only person I know who majored in it was a semi-famous curator at the National Gallery.

It's been associated with high finance for decades. Michael Lewis was an art history major when he interviewed for Wall Street. He wrote about the popularity of economics as a major in Liar's Poker. That was about the 1980s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was talking about this today.

seeing so many internships and jobs go to "connections" - that econ degree from a T20 won't get you there alone.....

And the people with connections getting those covetted finance jobs have art history degrees. Truth.

not necessarily art history, but truthfully its not econ either. all of the internships i see are going to the "connected" kids.

[Anonymous]

The number of kids intending to major in “business” at a public university is astounding

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was talking about this today.

seeing so many internships and jobs go to "connections" - that econ degree from a T20 won't get you there alone.....

And the people with connections getting those covetted finance jobs have art history degrees. Truth.

not necessarily art history, but truthfully its not econ either. all of the internships i see are going to the "connected" kids.

Yes. Current sophonore at an Ivy. It's 80% nepo connections for the top internships. And the last 20% is kids with perfect grades in hard majors who are also super outgoing with high EQ.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are lots of general business jobs out there. Most of these kids won't be doing anything academic with economics, but they absolutely can be working in the business world.

Not true. They will be competing with kids who have completed BS degrees in Accounting, Finance, Marketing, Intl. Business, Human Resources, Investor Relations, Sports Mgmt., and on. Econ degree - then plan for a MBA to make yourself marketable or you better have a hook such as an Econ. degree from a T20. Econ degree on its own is only marginally better than Sociology/Psychology, African/Asian/Gender Studies, etc for a retail manager job at Walmart. Don't fool yourselves or your kids. Econ. degree is great as a stepping stone up (along with GMAT, LSAT) but not for an entry level position post BA degree.

Retail Mgr at Walmart is many times high school graduate who was promoted from within. The discount retail industry prefers to hire college grads into their management training programs but there is more turnover of the college grads. Walmart Managers pull in around $250,000 per year depending upon the sales performance of their unit which is not bad for someone with a high school degree.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they are at an ivy or private in the T10-15 they will have no trouble getting a job with econ as a concentration or practically anything else. These schools have top companies recruiting all the time on campus

Def not true these days. Ask around.

It’s def still true these days. On campus recruiting has not dried up at top schools for traditional econ fields (finance and consulting).

[Anonymous]

Well, if you have an econ degree from an econ pioneer like Chicago, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, then landing a job will be quite easy. From a vocational school like UGA or UTK? Nordstrom Rack needs employees, too.

[Anonymous]

Good idea for an Econ major or any non-biz major to take a few core biz courses such as accounting and finance.