What would you advised a teen who is looking for a college major with good earning potential?

[Anonymous]

IMHO, anything besides STEM is a crapshoot. If he's looking for the conservative play I would go finance, accounting, business, IT, or engineering (basically anything in the business school or the engineering school). I would avoid the hard sciences and definitely avoid anything in the liberal arts, social sciences, etc. That will get him a solid job right out of school with good earning potential AND a good backup plan if he ends up going to law school or med school or something and then decides he doesn't like it. He could always fall back on his undergrad degree and get a job in that field. The hard sciences are a bit more risky because if you don't go to med school there aren't a whole lot of great options. Most of them are unemployable with just a BS (same with any of the social science majors) and even with a graduate degree most don't have what I would call "good earning potential". Any undergrad degree can make the jump to law, but you are in a much better spot to make that jump with one of the STEM undergrads vs. international affairs or psychology and you also have that built in backup plan of having a useful undergrad. You can't count on law or MBA degrees like you could before either. Sure, if you can get into a top 10 school for either then you are good to go, but if not then these can end up being nothing more than a waste of money potentially on top of an already unemployable undergrad degree.

As far as insurance against outsourcing there have been a lot of good posts so far. I would recommend the trades as well, but you already said he's going to college so I assume he doesn't want to go into plumbing, HVAC, etc. It is true that engineering (particularly software development and IT) are being outsourced a lot these days and we all know plenty of underemployed or unemployed engineers in their 40s and 50s. That being said, there are specializations you can pursue that make you less likely to be outsourced/offshored and the game changes if he ends up going into management. You can be an older engineer and still in the workforce, but I'm too risk averse for that so I went into management early and then into senior management when the opportunity arose. Now my engineering skills don't matter much, but I get to use them enough that I enjoy what I do. A fellow engineer went to law school and became a patent attorney and that works for him as well. He puts it better than I do when he says, "as an engineer, the older I got the less respected I was since people assume that I won't know the latest language/technology, etc. As an attorney the older I get the more respected I am and the more experience/knowledge people think I have."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Any kind of engineering job will give you decent income. Chemical engineering would probably be the highest paying, especially if you work for an oil or gas company. Software engineers have the most flexibility because you can live anywhere. FPGA designers are in high demand too.

Second previous posters who mentioned finance, but you do need the background in accounting as well. If you don't have the math, accounting, or computer science background you would need the old boys network to break in. It's very difficult to get an i-banking job without the right contacts and background. Read the book Pedigree).

Pharmacists also make decent money. If you don't mind being blue collar but do well for yourself, become a plumber. Female engineer here, and sometimes I think I should take up plumbing and work for myself

This is good advice, though the bolded seems outdated to me. Like advising someone to go into journalism in 2001.

http://www.mtu.edu/engineering/outreach/welcome/salary/

I know energy is down now but if you can manage to find a job in that sector you would be doing pretty well.

[Anonymous]

Define good money.

If he wants consistent >300k, medicine is the only way to go.

I wouldn't recommend medicine unless the kid is a superstar. Only a few of the top specialties will provide a high, stable income in the future.

[Anonymous]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned construction - I know managers in construction management making over $700k. I'm new to the field and am making $170k, including all healthcare, vehicle (can be used as personal), etc. paid for.

[Anonymous]

Artificial intelligence - lots of jobs are going to be done by robots in the next 20 years and many industries will look totally different because of it.

[Anonymous]

Commercial pilot and then study to be an actuary on the side since pilots have significant free time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Any kind of engineering job will give you decent income. Chemical engineering would probably be the highest paying, especially if you work for an oil or gas company. Software engineers have the most flexibility because you can live anywhere. FPGA designers are in high demand too.

Second previous posters who mentioned finance, but you do need the background in accounting as well. If you don't have the math, accounting, or computer science background you would need the old boys network to break in. It's very difficult to get an i-banking job without the right contacts and background. Read the book Pedigree).

Pharmacists also make decent money. If you don't mind being blue collar but do well for yourself, become a plumber. Female engineer here, and sometimes I think I should take up plumbing and work for myself

This is good advice, though the bolded seems outdated to me. Like advising someone to go into journalism in 2001.

http://www.mtu.edu/engineering/outreach/welcome/salary/

I know energy is down now but if you can manage to find a job in that sector you would be doing pretty well.

I'm not talking about a current dip, I'm talking about long-term trends. If the field will be greatly changed/shrunk/disappeared in 40 years, it's not a great bet. And even in the US, where people chant about wanting to drill and act like coal jobs were the height of aspirational employment, the trend is away from oil and gas.

[Anonymous]

Major in political science - work on Capitol Hill for a few years and become a lobbyist for big $$$. No STEM Required. Half our neighborhood is lobbyists with giant houses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would advise him that college is not about maximizing your earning potential. To work on his writing skills and make the most of the experience.

+100

If he is chasing money and only money, be a plumber. He will never get out-sourced, And he can own his own business after awhile.

Otherwise, he needs to learn and grow and figure out what he wants from life. Chasing money if he is from modest means will only make him unhappy given that social mobility is down in the US. Maybe he should consider moving/going to college in a country with better social mobility now that I think of it.

Writing skills are highly over rated.

The kids wants a stable job... accounting, Information Technology, Engineering will get him a stable job.

Finance is a who you know not what you know path.

People skills help much more than writing skills.

Not they are not.

Yes. They are. There are many, many, many jobs that don't require writing skills. Most need very little to no writing skills. Actually I can't really think of many jobs that require writing.

Here are some fields with which I am intimately acquainted and they all require high degrees of literacy. Not that this kid can't get it from reading tons of books, but I've seen people discredited in their field because their communication and writing is so sub par.

- economic
- engineering
- architecture
- design
- marketing
- public health
- project management in any field
- teaching (any subject, including math)
- and of course the obvious lawyer, journalist, professor, etc.

I am also intimately acquainted with all but economics.

None above need writing except marketing, lawyers, journalists and professors.

I would not suggest any of those as valuable jobs to recommend. Also Marketing is more web design than writing now so ... writing is less needed in that area.

engeineers write design documents, technical writers do all other documentation.

public health, only need writing if you are writing policy and you might as well stick forks in your eyes.

[Anonymous]

OP wants recommendations for good stable jobs not jobs making >300K.

[Anonymous]

Whatever major they decide make sure they have a liberal arts minor or take classes that require writing. I find that employees who can actually write a decent memo and string together sentences do best. I am amazed by how many adults cannot write.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm surprised nobody has mentioned construction - I know managers in construction management making over $700k. I'm new to the field and am making $170k, including all healthcare, vehicle (can be used as personal), etc. paid for.

ExH is in construction. He makes over $500K. But he is the exception not the rule. He's very good at what he does because he is one of the few people that came up through the field. He can go out onto a project, assess a problem, develop and implement a creative solution, and talk to the owners, subs, and workers. He is well respected because if he is asking his guys to work overtime to get something done he's right next to them, banging nails, cutting boards, welding pipes etc. On a day to day basis, he is in the office. It's his field experience though that allows him to come up with creative solutions and negotiate contracts outside of the norm.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm surprised nobody has mentioned construction - I know managers in construction management making over $700k. I'm new to the field and am making $170k, including all healthcare, vehicle (can be used as personal), etc. paid for.

How did you start in the field? My DH is a civil engineer and works for a construction firm. Wondering if he could/should go the management route?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If the kid just wants a comfortable life with a stable income, STEM is the way to go. But if he wants to be Richie Rich rich, school is not the answer.

I don't understand the obsession with STEM. Yes - they do start off doing well at age 22; a 22 yr old making 80k is a solid start. But am I the only one who knows engineer after engineer whose job was outsourced once they got into their 40-50s? It happens in every engineering field from mech to electrical to IT; there are countries where there are a lot of grads with very solid math skills -- companies like GE and many small players move entire projects to those companies bc they pay engineers there 30k/yr, instead of 100k to a 50 yr old here. Sure when an entire project requiring 50 engineers is outsource, only about 35-45 jobs will go and 5-15 will be retained here to "manage" the project -- but you're still playing a numbers game.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If the kid just wants a comfortable life with a stable income, STEM is the way to go. But if he wants to be Richie Rich rich, school is not the answer.

I don't understand the obsession with STEM. Yes - they do start off doing well at age 22; a 22 yr old making 80k is a solid start. But am I the only one who knows engineer after engineer whose job was outsourced once they got into their 40-50s? It happens in every engineering field from mech to electrical to IT; there are countries where there are a lot of grads with very solid math skills -- companies like GE and many small players move entire projects to those companies bc they pay engineers there 30k/yr, instead of 100k to a 50 yr old here. Sure when an entire project requiring 50 engineers is outsource, only about 35-45 jobs will go and 5-15 will be retained here to "manage" the project -- but you're still playing a numbers game.

I think you are ill informed. Most engineers graduating in the US have excellent career prospects. It has always been this way. There is currently a shortage and always will be of US educated engineers, who can speak and write, and obtain a security clearance. Who do you think all of the govt contractors and the feds themselves hire? I am an BSEE VT graduate and have never had an issue with finding work...going on almost 50 now. Most of us with just the original BS EE, BS ME average annual salary close to $175K. I have several friends who own engineering/IT firms in the area and have approached colleges like VT, UVA, etc and have pledged they will hire every graduate of theirs with an engineering or computer science degree. In addition, if you are a girl pursuing an engineering degree, your are highly likely to secure the the most merit aid, particularly at private colleges.