Saturday morning cartoons will come next, but this is just funny on its own:
On a related note, your Ole Captain will be on the Peter Schiff Show! Monday, Nov. 26th 1033AM EST. Let's all tune in and see if we can't send enough traffic to show up on his radar! I mean, DON'T ALL CALL IN just for "shout outs" unless you have a great story or point, just tune in.
22 comments:
I remember a very funny single-panel cartoon I saw in The New Yorker during the 1980s recession. It was a cornfield with two scarecrows. The scarecrows were young guys (actual people). One says to the other, "English major. And you?"
Quite a few STEM majors in there. Kind of surprising given the paucity of those majors in college these days. I expected the video would make the same case "Worthless" did where college majors are concerned.
But, it actually looks more like the economy is the principle driver of underemployment now.
It is frightening that so many of the degrees listed are not degrees that would appear in Worthless.
We can try to take comfort that the mechanical engineers, for example, did not graduate at the top of their class, but I don't know if that is the case.
How about a variation on an old joke?
What do you call the medical student who graduated at the bottom of his class?
Doctor.
What do you call the mechanical engineer who graduated at the bottom of his class?
Pedicab Boy! (Because bartenders need some experience in human interaction)
That was so very depressing, I was wondering how many of them want leave there confirm zone, pack up and move, especially the engineers, and find work.
"especially the engineers, and find work."
The economy does not need engineers, and after a couple of years doing anything else you are no longer hire-able as one.
Really sad actually.
On the other hand: Bourbon Street! You expected something different there?
Seriously as a engineer recycled as a programmer, I can tell you back when I graduated I quickly found out that there were no jobs unless you had that "magical" experience which you were somehow supposed to acquire while a student. God forbid you hire on an engineer/student for trivial wages for 6 months just to see if they could learn something in real life too.
I suppose part of the issue was there was a recession on.
Who knows, all I know is I sent our 100's of resumes and got no where, so I smartened up and learned some more programming.
The strip club bartenders probably do better at the bar than they would working in their respective degree fields.
I know one and the only people I've met bring in more unmarked cash a night are coke dealers.
I have a colleague, whose brother left high school and moved to Orlando, where he got a job as a waiter in Disney. he moved over to one of the nicer restaurants there and and has worked there the last 25 years.
My Colleagues comments: He lives in a nice place, owns his own home & car outright, funded 401K, gets great (mostly tax free) tips, zero stress ( other than occasional jerky customer) and often has a cute co-ed waitress living with him until she goes back to school in a few months...
And has the day to himself, where he as exercised, written, studied, worked on his house, held other jobs, etc...
"Quite a few STEM majors in there. Kind of surprising given the paucity of those majors in college these days"
The overwhelming majority of engineering jobs require a few years of experience in the field. There are very few jobs for new grads, especially in this economy. Nobody wants to train these new guys, hiring experienced guys is better for the bottom line in the short term.
The 'engineer shortage' is a fiction. There are plenty of engineers. There are not enough engineers meeting very specific guidelines - usually, 2-5 years experience in a particular industry, willing to take crap pay for a job in a crap part of the country (one with no women at all) with a 80 hour workweek. They will not take a guy with no prior experience in the industry, or some experience elsewhere (AKA me). Every box must be checked - and the guy that could qualify for all of them has better options.
Here's a nice article going into detail:
http://www.tbp.org/pages/publications/Bent/Features/Su09Brown.pdf
Glad my e-mail to The Peter Schiff Show payed off. Looking forward to hearing you and Peter on that Monday.
I have to laugh when this site concludes STEM degrees are the key to financial prosperity. Do you know where all the engineers in my area hang out? Best Buy. Trust me, they're not there because they're the nerdy customers obsessed with gizmos, but they'll be sure to help you ring up your purchase or stock the shelves.
I myself was a victim of bad timing, got a computer science degree just after the tech bubble. When I went to school in 1998, it was THE degree to get. . .
After a few years of working a slew of jobs not related to my degree, I was considered damaged goods by employers. Since then my skills have decayed past the point of no recovery. I'm unemployable in my given field. The only code I can now write is HTML that makes my websites seems like a scene in the 1990's.
Meanwhile, employers are whining they can't find enough IT people in Canada and that we need to loosen immigration regulations, *sigh*.
By the way, I'm age 31, I've never worked a day in the field my degree says I'm supposedly qualified to do. In fact, the only job I ever had in my field was when I was age 16, before I even got my degree (I’m laughing right now as I’ve finished that sentence). I made websites for small non-profit organizations, so I could have a little spending money to work on my car.
Fortunately, I had my student loans paid off long ago. Tuitions were cheaper in 1998. I also received numerous scholarships by submitting my web work and programs to many organizations. I was supposed to be the next "big name in tech," many in my backwater community heralded me as such, goodness in the end did I ever disappoint them. . .
If I could suddenly afford to have children - I would tell them to avoid engineering, IT, science, etc. like the plague. This is Canada/America; image over substance is the name of the game. Nobody wants or respects a geeky tech person; leave that to the Indians and Chinese.
My advice? Work out, get attractive, expand your English vocabulary, become a party girl/boy, and seek advice from the best car salesperson in the area. Salesmanship is where it's at. . .
Holy crap! I didn't think it would be possible, sir. I actually sent Peter a comment on the YouTube video telling him about you and a message to him and his producer weeks ago. I didn't think he'd actually read it, but apparently he did or he took Anonymous' suggestion. Peter's producer contacted you or something? Congratulations! Very well deserved. Now you get to talk and debate with one of the main champions of REALITY based economics and gold/silver investments.
Yep, looks like the e-mail got through and he was interested!
@Anonymous 5:36AM
http://www.itv.com/news/anglia/2012-10-07/graduates-job-as-norfolk-scarecrow/
This is just up the road from me.
That was incredibly depressing. I've been reading your blog for years. I personally know a guy who's been screwed over by student loans. I would like to think that I'm more informed about the problem than 99% of the population.
And my jaw literally fell open like something out of an old gag comic strip when I heard that woman say she owed $90,000. NINETY THOUSAND DOLLARS. That's a small house!
You know what this reminded me of? Pinocchio. Do you remember that scene in Pinocchio where all the boys go to "Pleasure Island" and have the time of their lives playing pool, drinking, and smoking? Then the next day they're turned into donkeys and sent off to the salt mines for the rest of their lives?
That's what this is, but on a nationwide scale. Our entire society is convincing kids to take four years of their lives to drink, screw, and slack off, and then shipping them off to the salt mines. It's nothing more than a disgusting con.
I went to college in the mid-2000s, and I was very frugal. I lived at home and commuted, took a part-time job, and had a 50$ a week allowance for food, gas, and any other expenses. I remember one day I had to scramble to Gamestops all over the city trying to sell my Xbox 360 so I could pay for insurance. It wrecked havoc on my social life, and my grades. I was angry and miserable, and I didn't understand why my parents wouldn't let me take out any student loans so life could get a little easier.
God, they were smarter than I was.
Are you kidding, bartender in a strip club is my dream career! - minuteman
The Mech Engs in that video are really troubling.
@Anonymous 10:40
The problem is that you can only "code" in HTML, the issue is that HTML is not even a real programming language and the bar nowadays is higher than that.
My advice: you should probably learn some web framework like django or ruby, also javascript and there is a high chance that you can get a well paid job if you are good.
@Anonymous 3:39 PM
Of course I didn't know just HTML at the time I graduated. That's all I remember due to years of skills decay.
I kept up with my skills three years after college, but seeing that it was three years later and I still didn't have work in my own field, it became depressing and I stopped. Basically, I was working two jobs for the price of just one.
All of this was during the years outsourcing to India was rampant. I have concluded that IT isn't a good career. While some of my friends in the field may have occasionally got work, none of it truly led to anything significant. Often they were bouncing around between jobs until eventually they too became underemployed.
The problem is if the job can be done across the Internet - it's far too vulnerable to being outsourced. The last thing I want to do is waste yet another 4-5 years of time/money to study the material all over again.
Fair warning - a lot of STEM jobs can be done across the Internet and are vulnerable to outsourcing. Chemistry, mathematics, physics, etc. are UNIVERSAL LANGUAGES.
Make sure to post a link to the podcast, if possible.
I love Schiff. He consistently gets these people to answer questions and you know not a one will have the capacity to get the point he's making.
More likely they're all just thinking "gosh I wish someone would help pay my $90,000 student debt"
IT IS a good career; your skills have atrophied tremendously, but im a 30 year vet in IT, and it's godly...
Coding to start, then become an architect/analyst.
bar is relatively low, need like 1-2 years in a college like place, not university, skills college
1- database coders, in SQL, either MS, Oracle or DB2 ar ein demand.
2- Java coders, and then developpers sky's the limit..
3- dreamweaver, and other things liek that, good openings
this is BASIC entry level and moves up faaaast. We have shortages everywhere, too many people retiring and not enough coming out of schoold; actually, almost all are men, women are as rare as hen's teeth
So basically, with IT, with modest or normal expectations, teh sjy's the limit, both entry level and medium ranged..
Just my 2c, but with 30 years exp. I make 160K + easy.
Saw this. More proof.
http://www.twincitiesnewstalk.com/cc-common/news/sections/newsarticle.html?feed=104668&article=10737220
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