^I'm sure you're right to some extent, but one of the interesting points in the article that kicked this off (backed by employer poll data), was that even for blue collar jobs, substantive trade skills was only one part of the skills gap, and maybe not the biggest part.  And it's not clear sending someone to community college will really help with those other skills.

 

Dig deeper into what employers say, though, and the skills mismatch gets complicated. A 2011 employer survey from the Manufacturing Institute found that the top skill deficiency among manufacturing workers was "inadequate problem-solving skills." No. 3 on the list was "inadequate basic employability skills (attendance timeliness, work ethic, etc.)." In the 2012 Manpower survey, 26% of employers complained about the lack of such "soft skills." If the American workforce doesn't show up on time or think outside the box, that may be a problem -- but probably not one solved by more math, science, and technical training, the go-to remedies.

 

Of course the other interesting related point was that the talent you attract with for an open position is related to the salary you offer, so it may not be a skills gap at all, but rather a wage gap.

There's truth in that. I've spoken to many employers who can't get applicants that pass a basic drug screen, or that want to come in before their remaining X months of unemployment are over. You can't teach certain things, but on the flip side, these problems have always existed with a percentage of the labor pool. I guess with unemployment high, employers can afford to be more choosy with their applicants.

Attendance and work ethic are "skills" now?  Somewhere off in the distance, I can hear Hank Hill's exasperated sigh.

No, they're not skills , but they are a requirement for employment.

Perhaps if American culture didn't spend 40 years telling kids that only undesirables go into blue-collar jobs then the quality of applicants would increase.

I highly recommend this read:

 

Who gets to be a journalist if the route in depends on money and class?

 

I only got into journalism thanks to a surprise inheritance – I'd struggled for years with low-paid jobs as I couldn't afford an internship

Alexandra Kimball

guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 5 September 2012

 

Question: How can you succeed in journalism – or any creative career – when you can't afford an internship?

 

Answer: Hope for an inheritance.

 

Who gets to be a journalist? I do, now, and the fact stuns me. For five years, I worked at a series of marketing companies and non-profits: jobs I wasn't crazy about, but took because they allowed me to withstand the monthly double-penetration of Toronto rent plus student loan payments. I was trying, and largely failing, to write at night, on weekends, and on my two weeks of holidays per year. I'd bought into that old saw about struggling for one's craft, as well as the updated version, Malcolm Gladwell's 10,000 hours rule, but my day jobs paid so little that, more often than not, my free hours had to go to remunerative work – more of the same. This routine produced such a cloud of emotional exhaustion that a whole season could pass before I noticed that I hadn't written a word. Before I went freelance, I was ready to give up.

 

And then I got money. I didn't earn it; in fact, it came as a complete surprise, an inheritance from a money-under-the-mattress relative. Not a large sum by most people's standards, but enough to pay off the remaining balance on my student loans. And while I'm relieved, I still can't shake a feeling of guilt. It's not that I feel like a cheat – I've long realised that money is necessary to launch a creative career. How else does one do an unpaid internship? But the fact that I've proved the rule in my chosen profession makes me wonder just what kind of profession it is.

 

CONTINUED

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/05/journalism-profession-money-class-internships

Word has it all the early Channel One hosts were rich kids. Later on they made an effort to recruit from a variety of backgrounds, but Serena Altschul and Anderson Cooper sure as hell weren't poor either.

Calvin thanks for that post.  It pretty much supports what a bunch of us have been speculating about.

I can say it's like this in the newsrooms I've worked in. That's why I got out. There's no light at the end of this trust-funded tunnel. If you're from a modest background, broken home, or do not have supporting parents/spouse, getting a degree in a field like this is just insane. If you get lucky enough to be offered a paying job on the production side (and a lot of it does come down to luck) and take it, you're even more insane (I was insane to do so). Imagine how hard you'll work when they're paying you. Say goodbye to weekends, holidays, and any quality of life. Even in Toledo, there were a lot of rich kids from outside the area hoping to get their start in a mid market instead of small market like Erie. Lots of Chicagoans work in Toledo hoping they'll make it out before they're 30 and are no longer hirable due to rampant ageism. Age is another huge issue in this business. Age used to be valued as world experience and connection to audience, but now it's the biggest red flag out there. Alexandra Kimball got a job just in time. The deadline was quickly approaching.

 

*The only good jobs are in sales and marketing. The best way to work in news is to get a solid business degree from a well-connected school. And there are lots of stories of financial reporters entering the news business after stints on Wall Street. This raises the question on why does the journalism degree exist? A good writer, researcher, editor, photographer, or interviewer can come from any background.

My brother edits cable channel shows -- reality, documentaries, etc.  He was insanely lucky to get that job.  If he had graduated a month earlier or month later it never would have happened and he would have never used his degree professionaly.  The technology advances too quickly to fall behind by even a year. 

This may be especially true in journalism, but it's pretty much true for all professions.  Wealthy people can pursue career avenues that are inaccessible to working people.  I had to forgo a number of opportunities during law school in order to pay for it.  More than once, the school expected me and others in my situation to contribute funds toward special opportunities for wealthier students. 

My brother edits cable channel shows -- reality, documentaries, etc.  He was insanely lucky to get that job.  If he had graduated a month earlier or month later it never would have happened and he would have never used his degree professionaly.  The technology advances too quickly to fall behind by even a year.

 

Technology changes, but real skills and talent do not change. You can't fall behind, but it is possible to still learn on the job since every company is constantly updating to compete for audience. I think location, timing, family support, talent, and connections are everything. Family support is now probably the biggest factor, and this is why the quality of our programming sucks and most people see the news as biased. If it feels like news outlets ignore the working class, it's because there are hardly any working class people still working in news.

 

And again, I can't stress enough that just working in this industry does not mean success. Being able to raise a family defines success, and the vast majority of real professionals are struggling to survive. The recession did serious damage, but not as much damage as the universities pumping out way too many kids doing unpaid internships and suppressing wages for a decade or more. The job losses were bad, but it's nothing compared to what the unpaid internship market has done to the median incomes of news professionals over the last five years. The desperation of kids goes up substantially with each graduating class. That's why I just don't see this becoming a good job ever again. Desperate hires are hires willing to work for pennies. That's your competition- a wealthy Chicago kid who graduated from Northwestern willing to work for free in Ohio.

 

It's not the internet that's to blame, and it's not the recession. It's the glut of college kids willing to work for free. Recessions are cyclical, the internet transition was a one-time deal (and news outlets have successfully transitioned), but the massive oversupply of college students getting these degrees is structural.

This may be especially true in journalism, but it's pretty much true for all professions.  Wealthy people can pursue career avenues that are inaccessible to working people.

 

True. Journalism, film, art, music, fashion, etc. are the most extreme examples of this, but it's spreading to other industries as well. I've heard law and architecture are becoming bloodbaths too. I know tons of kids who are in law school right now to avoid the job market. I wonder what it will be like when they graduate?

I know tons of kids who are in law school right now to avoid the job market. I wonder what it will be like when they graduate?

 

Unless they have serious connections, they should stop right now.  No sense throwing good money after bad.

 

There's one more Unless:  If that's what they really want to be, they know what their only choice is.  I'm in that boat and so are others.  But not everyone.  The ROI of law school has probably never been lower than it is right now.  If that's the main goal, that's when my first Unless applies.   

I think instead of following passions, it makes a lot more sense to follow connections.

On a lighter note:

 

The biggest financial scam in history is revealed

 

 

This may be especially true in journalism, but it's pretty much true for all professions. Wealthy people can pursue career avenues that are inaccessible to working people.

 

This was my mothers opinion when I said I wanted to go to architecture school.  In fact she had that opinion of college in general, saying I should "learn a trade" and then maybe go to college. 

 

She was actually correct (though I think she didnt know it at the time) since architecture is sort of a playground of the elite and upper middle class...you have to be "connected" to get the good/interesting commissions.    It was pretty obvious when I was in college, even at a lowley place like UofK, that my classmates came from a different world than I did.  I can imagine what a bubble top-flight schools like Harvard GSD, Princeton, etc are like.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

....but not as much damage as the universities pumping out way too many kids doing unpaid internships and suppressing wages for a decade or more.

 

How about if YOU pay THEM to intern?  Back in the early 1980s there was a big-name architectural office in Chicago that required you pay them to work for them (or intern with them).  They considered working for their firm such a career boost that it was worth your money, and they called their little scam a sort of grad seminar or insitutue or something (they had some sort of term they used..dont recall the details).  When the interviewer told me this I started laughing...I was so shocked that my reaction was to laugh in her face..."You want ME to pay YOU to work for you?" HAHAHAHA!"

 

 

I know tons of kids who are in law school right now to avoid the job market. I wonder what it will be like when they graduate?

 

Unless they have serious connections, they should stop right now.  No sense throwing good money after bad.

 

There's one more Unless:  If that's what they really want to be, they know what their only choice is.  I'm in that boat and so are others.  But not everyone.  The ROI of law school has probably never been lower than it is right now.  If that's the main goal, that's when my first Unless applies.   

 

I wouldn't be quite that cynical, but I'd still be quite cynical.  The only cynicism dilution that I'd offer is that I'd say unless they have connections or are good at making them, it's unlikely to be the right career path for them.  Firms, at least in middle and smaller markets, generally don't expect entry-level associates to come in with a stable of preexisting connections.  Certainly very few of my fellow associates here did, and I came in with even fewer since I'm not from northeast Ohio.

By "connections" I meant having a job essentially waiting for you.  Some of my classmates have found steady work without that, but it appears that the majority have not.  Many of them got jobs they mistakenly believed to be steady.

Ah.  It's true, the market for entry-level hires out there is murderous, though I went to a school where the credentialism of the profession worked in our favor, so dozens of the top shops came and recruited actively, if not aggressively, there.

 

The real problem is the one you mentioned earlier about ROI on a law degree, though, especially for those who end up going into more commoditized practice fields where work is routine and entry-level pay is often under $50,000.  There is nothing so intellectually intricate about a lot of that work as to put it beyond the capability of a reasonably capable undergraduate (i.e., someone who could get into law school), yet they still need to waste $120,000 and three years of their lives (valuable time in terms of opportunity cost) getting the degree.

 

She was actually correct (though I think she didnt know it at the time) since architecture is sort of a playground of the elite and upper middle class...you have to be "connected" to get the good/interesting commissions.    It was pretty obvious when I was in college, even at a lowley place like UofK, that my classmates came from a different world than I did.  I can imagine what a bubble top-flight schools like Harvard GSD, Princeton, etc are like.

 

Hmmm, I didn't really think about it at the time, but when I was in grad school at UC (not architecture) I did have classmates in my program that had vastly different backgrounds than mine. Yeah, there were a few guys from the West Side and a girl from Kentucky that came from average backgrounds, but there were also doctor's kids, a guy who had made millions in real estate, an M.D., some Germans and other wealthy people from overseas in my classes. I don't get to hang around people like that very often now that I've been in the work work a while, I'll tell you that.

Not sure where to post this..but here goes:

 

Where Illinois freshmen go

 

Story:

 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-students-leaving-illlinois-20121129,0,2315720.story

 

Table:

 

http://media.apps.chicagotribune.com/tables/illinois-college-students.html

 

 

 

More than 30,000 Illinois freshmen left the state to attend a college or university for the 2010 fall semester; many enrolled in neighboring midwestern states like Iowa, Missouri, Indiana and Wisconsin. While University of Iowa has been a top destination for first-time Illinois students for the past decade, University of Missouri-Columbia has been steadily growing its freshmen contingent. In Fall 2011, almost 18 percent of the entering class came from Illinois, and this year, statistics from the university show that that number has grown to 21 percent.

 

Ohio stats by percent high to low:

 

 

Not at all surprised to see UD high on that list.  I am curious, though, where is Miami University?  I think they also get a large portion of their students from Illinois, so much so that I recall when I visited Miami as a prospective student they told us that they sold the Chicago Tribune on campus because so many of their students were from that area.

Well this is a bunch of bs:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/first-person-debt-free-college-degree-182800696--finance.html

 

There aren't many college *graduates* out there making $15/hr, let alone college students!  This whole thing depends on not only getting some exceptionally high-paying job during college, but being able to work 15-20 hours overtime, and somehow getting good grades while working 60 hours per week and going to school 30-40 hours. 

She's from that really high energy 5% of people that doesn't go batshit insane from a schedule like that. That's how they want us all to be, but we just can't.

With college costs having risen 3X or whatever faster than the cost of living, at some time in the past 10-15 years we passed the point where it was possible to "work your way" through college.  And as I have mentioned already on this thread, no future employers give a damn if you did.  They don't care if you unloaded shipping containers or did commercial fishing during the summer, they care if you kept the water cooler filled and built a professional network at some white collar internship in a big city where your parents had to pay for your $1400/mo apartment. 

 

 

 

If they had worked that kind of stuff themselves, they'd know how much worse work can suck than at a 9-5 desk job and how grateful people who have done that work would be to work at a job where you don't have to constantly worry about getting badly injured, have to work every night and weekend or be considered work peers of men who are taking a short break from prison.

Honestly, if I were interviewing, I'd be impressed by someone who was able to keep decent grades while working 60 hours a week at any job, however menial.  Energy itself is a job qualification.  Not the chief one, perhaps, but not an irrelevant one by any stretch of the imagination.

Mark Cuban weighs in:

http://blogmaverick.com/2013/01/26/will-your-college-go-out-of-business-before-you-graduate/

 

 

>work would be to work at a job where you don't have to constantly worry about getting badly injured, have to work every night and weekend or be considered work peers of men who are taking a short break from prison.

 

Yeah I've done all that stuff but I don't think I've learned all that much from it.  Highly accomplished people who haven't done that blue collar stuff didn't have to because they "got it" at an early age and didn't make the same mistakes that a lot of people do.  I learned a lot more talking and working with top people than with guys who sell off their Cialis prescription to the whole warehouse as their side job.  Although admittedly I probably spend more time worrying about people who don't understand scratch-off tickets are a bad investment than I should. 

 

 

 

A great comment from that article:

 

Mr. Cuban brings up a point about obsolescence that drives me crazy. If a college educated professional, such as a dentist, might have their practice overtaken by new technology that might obsolete many aspects of their practice, they GET NO BREAK on the interest rate charges on their student loan debt, and I don’t think that is fair.

 

Several months ago during Jimmy Kimmel’s opening show monologue he mentioned that there may be a medical breakthrough in the field of dentistry that can basically kill cavities via a drug or pill. This discovery could revolutionize how dentistry is practiced and theoretically cut income for most dentists dramatically.

 

If such a cavity destroying discovery is made available to the public, at the very least, should not dentists who still have student loan debt have interest rate charges waived? They played by the book and all of that investment in education and loans and time they made may never pay off they way it was presented when they decided to become a dentist?

 

I’m not talking student loan forgiveness, but what about forgiving the interest rate charges, penalties and fees going forward so they can at least eventually pay off the debt?

A great comment from that article:

 

Mr. Cuban brings up a point about obsolescence that drives me crazy. If a college educated professional, such as a dentist, might have their practice overtaken by new technology that might obsolete many aspects of their practice, they GET NO BREAK on the interest rate charges on their student loan debt, and I don’t think that is fair.

 

Several months ago during Jimmy Kimmel’s opening show monologue he mentioned that there may be a medical breakthrough in the field of dentistry that can basically kill cavities via a drug or pill. This discovery could revolutionize how dentistry is practiced and theoretically cut income for most dentists dramatically.

 

If such a cavity destroying discovery is made available to the public, at the very least, should not dentists who still have student loan debt have interest rate charges waived? They played by the book and all of that investment in education and loans and time they made may never pay off they way it was presented when they decided to become a dentist?

 

I’m not talking student loan forgiveness, but what about forgiving the interest rate charges, penalties and fees going forward so they can at least eventually pay off the debt?

 

Kind of opens a can of worms....different rates for different majors?  That comparative literature degree won't suddenly go obsolete, but....

If such a cavity destroying discovery is made available to the public, at the very least, should not dentists who still have student loan debt have interest rate charges waived? They played by the book and all of that investment in education and loans and time they made may never pay off they way it was presented when they decided to become a dentist?

 

I’m not talking student loan forgiveness, but what about forgiving the interest rate charges, penalties and fees going forward so they can at least eventually pay off the debt?

 

That has to be the stupidest idea I've ever heard. You go to school. You takes your chances.  Like many decisions one makes in life, college is a gamble.

Also, while the current-day practice of dentistry may involve a lot of cavity-filling, is it really the case that there are no other problems with teeth that we could switch to focusing on if cavities became treatable with OTC medication?  The industry would adapt.  Neither American culture nor nature itself is running short on ways to abuse teeth.

I think you guys might be commenting from the luxurious position of a career path that hasn't been destroyed by the total disappearance of your particular industry or occupation.  It's easy to sit back, like I remember George H.W. Bush doing back in 1988 in a campaign speech, and laughing at the candle makers who didn't transition to making light bulbs.  But look around your office or home at things we imagine will never go away, and in 20 years they might very well be gone, and those who went into debt educating themselves for that industry will have their lives destroyed.

 

 

I think you guys might be commenting from the luxurious position of a career path that hasn't been destroyed by the total disappearance of your particular industry or occupation.  It's easy to sit back, like I remember George H.W. Bush doing back in 1988 in a campaign speech, and laughing at the candle makers who didn't transition to making light bulbs.  But look around your office or home at things we imagine will never go away, and in 20 years they might very well be gone, and those who went into debt educating themselves for that industry will have their lives destroyed.

 

 

 

All part of the gamble of life, my friend.  The good news for those folks in future obsolete fields of employment is that thanks to the NRA they will have ready access to the tools that will allow for an easy transition to another field of employment, that of course being targeted armed robbery of the gilded elite.

I think you guys might be commenting from the luxurious position of a career path that hasn't been destroyed by the total disappearance of your particular industry or occupation.  It's easy to sit back, like I remember George H.W. Bush doing back in 1988 in a campaign speech, and laughing at the candle makers who didn't transition to making light bulbs.  But look around your office or home at things we imagine will never go away, and in 20 years they might very well be gone, and those who went into debt educating themselves for that industry will have their lives destroyed.

 

I'm in machining, and I've been in metalcasting.  So as to the first part:  not exactly.

 

Most colleges still provide the basics that apply to several areas.  Trade schools may be somewhat different. 

 

Selecting a major involves some risks, and some degree of sense.  If you're going to reduce interest and perhaps even principal for the CompE major whose career track went down the wrong path, are you going to do the same for the womens' studies major who can't get a good paying job?

In 30 years technology could conceivably greatly reduce the number of lawyers, doctors, and engineers the economy currently supports.  There is absolutely no way to know right now what technology is going to arrive that unintentionally eliminates an entire industry.   

There is nothing luxurious about me working my ass off to keep from being replaced by a software developer in China or India that can do my job for less money. I don't expect handouts for the decisions I made in life, no matter how good or bad. That is a loser's mentality. Countless industries have come and gone over the last century. Supporting people that make bad decisions -- even ones that weren't entirely in their control -- only encourages people to be lazy.

 

Now the education bubble is going to pop some day. Tuition costs have gone through the roof in my lifetime. I just hope I'm not around when it does...

In 30 years technology could conceivably greatly reduce the number of lawyers, doctors, and engineers the economy currently supports.  There is absolutely no way to know right now what technology is going to arrive that unintentionally eliminates an entire industry.

 

Maybe (though I think some educated guesses are at least possible), but more importantly, you never know what entire new industries technology will create.  The IT field was tiny 30 years ago and all but nonexistent 50 years ago.

In 30 years technology could conceivably greatly reduce the number of lawyers, doctors, and engineers the economy currently supports.  There is absolutely no way to know right now what technology is going to arrive that unintentionally eliminates an entire industry.

 

Maybe (though I think some educated guesses are at least possible), but more importantly, you never know what entire new industries technology will create.  The IT field was tiny 30 years ago and all but nonexistent 50 years ago.

 

If technology's rate of job replacement equalled or exceeded its rate of job destruction, we'd all be talking about how great the economy is.  We have spent at least two generations seeking ways to use tech to eliminate people from the economy.  Mission accomplished.  Time for a new mission.  That mission doesn't have to be anti-tech, but it absolutely cannot be anti-people.

In 30 years technology could conceivably greatly reduce the number of lawyers, doctors, and engineers the economy currently supports.  There is absolutely no way to know right now what technology is going to arrive that unintentionally eliminates an entire industry.

 

Maybe (though I think some educated guesses are at least possible), but more importantly, you never know what entire new industries technology will create.  The IT field was tiny 30 years ago and all but nonexistent 50 years ago.

 

If technology's rate of job replacement equalled or exceeded its rate of job destruction, we'd all be talking about how great the economy is.  We have spent at least two generations seeking ways to use tech to eliminate people from the economy.  Mission accomplished.  Time for a new mission.  That mission doesn't have to be anti-tech, but it absolutely cannot be anti-people.

 

Meaning what, exactly?  Deliberately make people do things more inefficiently if they do business here?  How quickly will that send jobs abroad?

 

We have not been "eliminating people from the economy."  We have been eliminating certain jobs from the economy.  The labor force participation rate has declined over the past decade from around 67% to around 64% (most of that decline since 2008).  But the overall workforce has not changed much because our population has been increasing.  If anything, old age is what has been eliminating people from the economy, since we have increasingly large numbers of people retiring and increasingly small families.

Expecting people to constantly re-educate themselves is the opposite of efficiency.  When someone is forced to switch careers, much of their accumulated education and experience becomes a waste.  That cost must be counted against whatever is gained in exchange for it.  Shunting that cost to individuals doesn't work, because the sum total of those individuals is your economy.  Every day that we force them to spend on retraining is lost productivity, and every dollar is one less (plus interest) for them to invest or trade with.  It's a destructive spiral. 

Expecting the economy to remain frozen in place and time is the opposite of efficiency.  People will be forced to switch careers when certain activities become less needed than they previously were, which is necessary for longer term economic gains for the economy as a whole.  And there is no "shunting" of that cost to individuals because that implies that the cost lies elsewhere initially.  You cannot shunt something to where it is.

When an economy is a collection of individuals, it does no good to say the economy's over here and the individuals are over there, for purposes of assigning costs.  A cost to any individual is a cost to the economy as a whole and to all the other individuals therein.

 

There's a lot of distance between an economy that resembles ice and one that resembles a waterfall.  What I'm advocating is a balanced approach where we recognize the need for change as well as the cost of it.  The purpose of an economy is to efficiently utilize people and resources-- but primarily people, because inanimate resources do not engage in economic policy.  So an economic plan that has people spend their lives running in circles paying for multiple educations is a fundamental failure.  Each iteration of that cycle removes them from trade and denies the rest of the world their contributions, while they're fumbling around seeking yet another way to be of any use to anyone. 

 

When you're driving, you're trying to get somewhere.  But that doesn't mean you drive as fast as your car possibly can go.  Getting there expediently is a value, but there are other mitigating values that cannot be ignored.

I agree that the purpose of an economy is to efficiently use people and resources, but I can see no practical reason why making an economy less dynamic and innovative would foster such a goal--and it is dynamism and innovation that are at the core of the phenomenon that you resist, i.e., the need for job retraining.  I'd also add that it is generally individuals' choice not to prepare for another career until their existing one has completely vanished, but it would be in people's best interests to start preparing before the walls come crashing down on obsolescent industries.  And those shifts are seldom so sudden and unexpected that no one can see the writing on the wall until after it's happened.

 

I have no problem recognizing the need for change and the cost of it.  I have a problem socializing it, which is where I gather you're really headed with that.  And I have a problem with any "economic plan" that actually purports to plan the economy.  As you noted yourself, the economy is a collection of individuals.  Planning the economy means planning people's lives for them.  Not only does that inevitably fail (the only issue is whether the failure is slow and grinding or more abrupt), but the attempt is generally resented and resisted by the economic actors that don't get to be the planners.

 

Also--to return to the topic of the thread--going back to school to prepare for a new job looks less and less attractive when so many of those coming out of school for the first time are deeper in debt and less prepared for productive work.

There is nothing luxurious about me working my ass off to keep from being replaced by a software developer in China or India that can do my job for less money. I don't expect handouts for the decisions I made in life, no matter how good or bad. That is a loser's mentality. Countless industries have come and gone over the last century. Supporting people that make bad decisions -- even ones that weren't entirely in their control -- only encourages people to be lazy.

 

Now the education bubble is going to pop some day. Tuition costs have gone through the roof in my lifetime. I just hope I'm not around when it does...

 

I don't understand how going into a career that appears lucrative now can be regarded as being a bad decision a decade or two down the road.  There's a great chance that technology could make a great number of careers obsolete (or nearly so) in the very near future.  This would concentrate wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer people.  The only folks who are safe would be those that have the capital to fund new ventures, those that are doing the grunt-work behind new ventures (which will be an increasingly smaller portion of people), and those guilds that have the influence to ensure that any decisions that governments make are beneficial to their line of work, even if these decisions encourage inefficiency (and I'm not even talking about traditional labor unions with that last one, just referring to the professional guilds that have cornered monopolies for themselves even when the information age makes their services less necessary).

>I don't understand how going into a career that appears lucrative now can be regarded as being a bad decision a decade or two down the road.

 

I do.  People in your life -- relatives, old acquaintances, etc. -- might have been lucky with work and having never gone through this are often dismissive of your plight, as if you did something wrong (not trying hard enough, not being "smart with your money", etc.).  And if you're in Mitt Romney's dream world where everyone has a relative eager to lend them $20,000, that relative might be hesitant to lend you the money versus another relative who has the appearance of being wiser for having chosen a career path that still exists.

 

Meanwhile there is the growing "non-traditional" term for job candidates who have jumped genres, and hopefully a hiring manager who is sympathetic.  Otherwise you're screwed unless you've been given a very strong personal recommendation. 

Now the education bubble is going to pop some day. Tuition costs have gone through the roof in my lifetime. I just hope I'm not around when it does...

 

Oh, big time. 

 

The causes are similar to the housing bubble, too.    The perception builds that everyone needs/has a right to something, be it owning their own home or a college degree.  The government starts to dump large amounts of money into it, increasing demand without a corresponding increase in supply.  The laws of economics are a lot more like the laws of physics than they are like the laws of governments:  they can't really be circumvented.  As available money increases, so do prices. 

Expecting people to constantly re-educate themselves is the opposite of efficiency.  When someone is forced to switch careers, much of their accumulated education and experience becomes a waste.  That cost must be counted against whatever is gained in exchange for it.  Shunting that cost to individuals doesn't work, because the sum total of those individuals is your economy.  Every day that we force them to spend on retraining is lost productivity, and every dollar is one less (plus interest) for them to invest or trade with.  It's a destructive spiral. 

 

Most professions these days require almost constant retraining just to keep up.