Payscale.com analyzed the data in its online salary database and has revealed the college degrees that go along with the jobs that have the lowest median pay for their respective career professionals in its 2012-13 College Salary Report. Note - these figures represent the typical annual combination of pay, bonuses, commissions and profit sharing earned by people who have been successful in working in these fields for at least 10 years and were willing to participate in Payscale.com's survey, which means the reported median incomes will likely be inflated above each field's actual median incomes....
| College Degree | Median Annual Salary |
|---|---|
| Child and Family Studies | $37,700 |
| Social Work | $45,300 |
| Elementary Education | $46,000 |
| Human Development | $47,800 |
| Special Education | $48,900 |
| Culinary Arts | $49,700 |
| Athletic Training | $49,800 |
So what possesses people to take out big student loans to go into professions like these that offer such little compensation? Payscale.com offers the following insight:
"According to our research, people in these majors typically believe their work makes the world a better place," says PayScale’s lead analyst Katie Bardaro.
To translate, the people in these majors are perhaps so disconnected from reality that they do not recognize that the reason their trades provide so little return on their educational investment is because they really do not require unique ability, which is why society does not reward them with greater compensation.
These people are then exploited by the higher education establishment, which really does know better, but can't help noticing that these same people are willing to pay nearly the same amount of money for their college degrees as do people in careers that society values a lot more.
And let's not forget the role of the U.S. federal government in guaranteeing and issuing student loans, which has its own ulterior motives for pushing higher education that offers little real benefit to society.
Elsewhere on the Web
Say what you will about the careers that go with the degrees above, but at least many of the people who pursue these degrees might actually get jobs in their fields of study, if only low paying ones. Kiplinger's Caitlin Dewey takes things several steps further and identifies the college degrees in Payscale.com's database that combine low pay with high rates of unemployment for their graduates!
Also, this isn't just an American phenomenon. Don't miss this perspective by a recent PhD graduate in Britain who complains that the "real world" doesn't understand or appreciate their skills.
Image Source: Global Elites.
Via Squidoo's Kimberly Dawn Wells, a working list (you can add to it and vote on the comparative ranking) of the most boring jobs, ever! Our list below summarizes the current ranking from least to most boring for the list as of this morning....
| The Most Boring Jobs, Ever | |
|---|---|
| The Job | About the Work |
| Bank Teller | As a bank teller, you process customers' deposits, withdrawals, transfers and bill payments. Our take: Whee!!! |
| M&M Quality Control | Toss the "W"s, "3"s and "E"s. Our take: The upside? Eating the mistakes! |
| Actuarial Scientist | Zzzzzzzzzzzzz.... Our take: Zzzzzzzzzzz.... |
| Mail Sorter | Can you 'sort it out'? Our take: It sounds better if you imagine Jack Nicholson saying it. |
| Bank Proof Operator | Been there. Done that. Hated it. Our take: Been there. Saw it once. Sounds about right. |
| Order Entry | It's not really a 'hot job.' Our take: Don't we have machines for that now? |
| Wal-Mart Greeter | Welcome. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome. Our take: Back off, old dude! You're a little too happy to see me! |
| Envelope Stuffing | Take this job and stuff it. Our take: But you get to really 'push the envelope' in this career! |
| What the Guy in the Video Below Does | Our take: We don't know either.... |
Can you believe you just spent 2 minutes and 53 seconds of your life watching that?
Previously on Political Calculations
The Worst Job, Ever
Here at Political Calculations, we often track what the best and worst paying jobs are out there, but until now, we haven't paid much attention to how good, or how bad, a job is.
Until today, we had thought the worst job in the world was Mexico City sewer diver, but obviously, we were wrong as this video clearly shows (very rough, not necessarily work-safe language!):
"Big jobs that pay badly" was the headline of a recent story on CNN/Money, which shone a spotlight on the careers that require above average amounts of education, yet somehow lead to careers that fail to provide a proportional level of income compared to other professions that require much less education.
The following table illustrates the median income and time required to achieve the level of education and training needed to gain the needed professional pedigree:
| High Investment, Low Payoff Jobs | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Profession | Post Graduation Income ($USD) | Time Required (years) | Education Cost ($USD) |
| Architect | 34,000 | 7 | 50-80,000 |
| Chef | 32,000 | 2-4 | 20-40,000 |
| Academic Research Scientist | 43,000 | 10-12 | 100,000+ |
The article notes the plight of the academic research scientist (links and emphasis mine):
A Ph.D. program and dissertation are requirements for the job, which can take between six and eight years to complete. (Note: the time for the basic bachelor's degree has been added to these figures in the table above. - ed.) Add to that several years in the postdoctoral phase of one's career to qualify for much coveted tenure-track positions. (Note: Given the amount of variability involved, this time has not been added to the time required figure in the table above. - ed.)
During the postdoc phase, you are likely to teach, run a lab with experiments that require you to check in at all hours, publish research and write grants – for a salary that may not exceed $43,000.
The length of the postdoc career has doubled in the past 10 years, said Phil Gardner, director of the Collegiate Employment Research Institute at Michigan State University. "It's taking longer and longer to get there. You can't start a family. It's really tough."
And it's made tougher still by the fact that in many disciplines, there aren't nearly as many tenure-track positions as there are candidates.
It would seem, at least from this report, that the simple law of supply and demand goes a long way in explaining why the U.S. isn't turning out science and engineering graduates like it used to.
Update: InstaPundit has published several charts showing the growth in the number of engineering and science doctoral degrees being awarded in various Asian nations compared against the decline in the number of degrees awarded to U.S. citizens at the end of his interview with Ray Kurzweil.
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