What did I tell you about majoring in "business?"
Oh, that's right, I told you NOT TO DO IT.
The degree is worthless because every backwards-hat-wearing jock that dislikes math goes into it, and every cheerleader who dislikes math goes into the substudies of HR and "Marketing." The market itself is flooded with them and with corporations cutting out middle and lower management to the bone, all you'll be left with is a bone and a large tuition bill.
But don't believe me, believe the WSJ.
13 comments:
What makes you think a business major reads the Wall Street Journal?
Wait they want business majors to have more cross over with the liberal arts? Seems fishy to me, sounds like businesses are still looking for an excuse to not have to train new hires. They need more education, businesses say, so they can "hit the ground running". Because apparently accounting is too useful, there's not enough brazilian drumming in those transcripts. So go back to school you lazy gen yer's. Or at least don't quit so we don't have to show that almost 50% of you are unemployed. And we are hiding that fact by having you go to college to get useless degrees so you don't start rioting in the streets like they do in Europe or in the Arab nations. You losers are so entitled, you can have our jobs when we finally retire so we can live off you for another 30 years. Also if you are lucky you can finally afford a house after dutifully paying your student loans for 20 years. You should have listened to your parents when we told you that having any college degree would make your life better.
hint: They never were worth anything. business owners got to be successful business owners by starting a business and working their asses off to make it successful. Business teachers have mostly never run a business and have nothing worth knowing.
But when you business gets big enough, you need a way to find and hire assistants, besides nepotism.
What about accounting?
Accounting good.
Business bad.
Accounting is a skill.
Business is common sense stretched over a 4 year degree.
Look at the Top College Degrees sidebar, where are the engineering degrees (or any STEM degrees)? I'm an EE, and I did pull an MBA ~12 years ago. Figured out real fast that I was much better off staying in engineering than 'moving up' to management. My income gain over the last many years has proven me right. The MBA still helps though, helps me manage management.
Humans have been doing business since forever. We have had formal business education for what, 100 years? And in a big way for 40? Humans invented banking, bonds, the joint stock company, international payment systems, stock markets, futures etc etc without the aid of a single MBA degree. Did Henry Ford, JP Morgan, Mr Lloyd of London, JJ Astor, Carnegie, or any of the other really great captains of industry going baCK 1000 or more years have MBA's? I would guess that it is only since we had MBAs that we managed to get things like the creative financing and debased currency systems that we have now that could potentially be the end of our economic system. Business education is a threat to our way of life. - minuteman
Business major checking in, no regrets here for taking this path. By no means is majoring in business some noble, academic pursuit. It is merely one part Liberal Arts education (Freshman/Sophomore) and one part trade school (Junior/Senior).
Accounting is business. Business degree is simply learning a little bit about many different business related topics, including accounting. These are all generally useful skills to work in business, whether for a corporation or to start your own. Is it all you need to learn? Of course not, what degree is?
I find it curious you linked to that article as proof of the uselessness of a business degree. The article seemed to be making the argument that business majors largely lack in critical thinking skills, which is true. Instead they should focus on Liberal Arts, which build critical thinking skills, which is no more true from what I have experienced around Liberal Arts majors.
This entire country is lacking critical thinking skills. I work with many very smart engineers. Yet most of them were blind to the housing bubble. A small group of us were talking about it years ago, but all these smart guys with great math skills couldn’t see how 20% gains in housing was not sustainable. Now these same guys overlook government debt spiraling out of control. If the supposedly intelligent guys with STEM degrees can’t figure out this simple math, well, I suppose we are screwed.
Is this where I sign off with, “ Enjoy the Decline?”
Yes, the timing was good, but the tone was just horribly off.
You need to say it, practically yell it, as if you are confident in it.
Asking "Enjoy the decline?" sounds like you're asking for permission. You need to just state it:
"Enjoy the decline!"
Here's where I call BS:
They say that the problem with business majors isn't that the generic degree is worthless, it's that the students focus too much on accounting and finance. Sorry, what? Accounting and Finance are real and teachable skills grounded in mathematics and established procedures, while management and marketing are not. Higher-level marketing is very stats- and econometrics-based, but that crap the undergrads study isn't.
Furthermore, let's take on their examples: About half of Barclays hires are business majors, despite business majors being only 20% of the student population, which means that the biz kidz are punching about 2.5 times their weight. Because it all has to balance, that means that some people aren't carrying their load. Is that probably the math, CS, and engineering kids? Nah, it's probably the Marxian Feminist Critical Thinking Studies majors.
In sum, I call BS on this article. The generic business degree is worthless, but it's not the accounting and finance kids dragging it down.
If the WSJ is right they are right for the wrong reasons. They say business majors are too focused on real-world skills (finance and accounting) and don't have enough liberal arts knowledge. BULLSHIT BULLSHIT BULLSHIT!
More liberal arts, as the article calls for, will make the degree MORE worthless not less.
I bet it is liberal arts profs who are calling for more liberal arts in the business curriculum not anyone who is actually in business.
Laughing my ass off at this business major. Trying to discredit the engineers because they didn't predict the housing bubble is the worst argument you could make. Engineers happen to be the same people that make most of our daily lives possible, and without STEM fields in general, we would still be living in the Dark Ages! So stick your business degree up your ass, and BTW, many engineering/science majors are BEYOND capable of completing a business degree within 2 years due to them being accustomed to rigorous schedules, something which must be foreign to you business majors.
A generic business degree is the business school's version of a liberal arts degree. My ex-claasmates who switched to accounting and finance all get pretty good jobs, I am the one who ends up working minimum wage (majored in "business strategy", a Captain Obvious degree). Now am switching to computer networking and am prepared to work my a** off to get good results as I screwed up my education.
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