IT DOESN’T TAKE A ROCKET SCIENTIST TO SEE MOST COLLEGE DEGREES WILL HAVE A NEGATIVE ROI

Mish calculates that only 17% of the jobs over the next ten years will require a college degree. Emptying piss from bedpans, changing shit stained sheets, flipping burgers, burning fries, and running a vacuum cleaner don’t require an advanced degree.

Guest Post by Mike Shedlock

 

BLS Employment Projections Through 2022: How Many Jobs Require a College Degree?

Inquiring minds are taking a look at the BLS Occupation Forecast Through 2022.

Occupations with the Most Job Growth, 2012 and Projected 2022 (Numbers in Thousands)
2012 National Employment Matrix Title Code Employment Change, 2012-22 Median annual wage, 2012
2012 2022 Number Percent
Total, All Occupations 00-0000 145,355.8 160,983.7 15,628.0 10.8 $34,750
Personal care aides 39-9021 1,190.6 1,771.4 580.8 48.8 19,910
Registered nurses 29-1141 2,711.5 3,238.4 526.8 19.4 65,470
Retail salespersons 41-2031 4,447.0 4,881.7 434.7 9.8 21,110
Home health aides 31-1011 875.1 1,299.3 424.2 48.5 20,820
Combined food preparation and serving workers, including fast food 35-3021 2,969.3 3,391.2 421.9 14.2 18,260
Nursing assistants 31-1014 1,479.8 1,792.0 312.2 21.1 24,420
Secretaries and administrative assistants, except legal, medical, and executive 43-6014 2,324.4 2,632.3 307.8 13.2 32,410
Customer service representatives 43-4051 2,362.8 2,661.4 298.7 12.6 30,580
Janitors and cleaners, except maids and housekeeping cleaners 37-2011 2,324.0 2,604.0 280.0 12.1 22,320
Construction laborers 47-2061 1,071.1 1,331.0 259.8 24.3 29,990
General and operations managers 11-1021 1,972.7 2,216.8 244.1 12.4 95,440
Laborers and freight, stock, and material movers, hand 53-7062 2,197.3 2,439.2 241.9 11.0 23,890
Carpenters 47-2031 901.2 1,119.4 218.2 24.2 39,940
Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks 43-3031 1,799.8 2,004.5 204.6 11.4 35,170
Heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers 53-3032 1,701.5 1,894.1 192.6 11.3 38,200
Medical secretaries 43-6013 525.6 714.9 189.2 36.0 31,350
Childcare workers 39-9011 1,312.7 1,496.8 184.1 14.0 19,510
Office clerks, general 43-9061 2,983.5 3,167.6 184.1 6.2 27,470
Maids and housekeeping cleaners 37-2012 1,434.6 1,618.0 183.4 12.8 19,570
Licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses 29-2061 738.4 921.3 182.9 24.8 41,540
First-line supervisors of office and administrative support workers 43-1011 1,418.1 1,589.6 171.5 12.1 49,330
Elementary school teachers, except special education 25-2021 1,361.2 1,529.1 167.9 12.3 53,400
Accountants and auditors 13-2011 1,275.4 1,442.2 166.7 13.1 63,550
Medical assistants 31-9092 560.8 723.7 162.9 29.0 29,370
Cooks, restaurant 35-2014 1,024.1 1,174.2 150.1 14.7 22,030
Software developers, applications 15-1132 613.0 752.9 139.9 22.8 90,060
Landscaping and groundskeeping workers 37-3011 1,124.9 1,264.0 139.2 12.4 23,570
Receptionists and information clerks 43-4171 1,006.7 1,142.6 135.9 13.5 25,990
Management analysts 13-1111 718.7 852.5 133.8 18.6 78,600
Sales representatives, wholesale and manufacturing, except technical and scientific products 41-4012 1,480.7 1,612.8 132.0 8.9 54,230

The above table is by the BLS. In the following table, I stripped out all the occupations that I believe should not realistically require a college degree. Here are the results.

Degree Requiring Occupations with the Most Job Growth, 2012 and Projected 2022 (Numbers in Thousands)
2012 National Employment Matrix Title Code Employment Change, 2012-22 Median annual wage, 2012
2012 2022 Number Percent
Total, Degree Requiring Occupations 17,500.3 20,231.0 2,730.7 15.6
Registered nurses 29-1141 2,711.5 3,238.4 526.8 19.4 65,470
Secretaries and administrative assistants, except legal, medical, and executive 43-6014 2,324.4 2,632.3 307.8 13.2 32,410
General and operations managers 11-1021 1,972.7 2,216.8 244.1 12.4 95,440
Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks 43-3031 1,799.8 2,004.5 204.6 11.4 35,170
Medical secretaries 43-6013 525.6 714.9 189.2 36.0 31,350
Licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses 29-2061 738.4 921.3 182.9 24.8 41,540
First-line supervisors of office and administrative support workers 43-1011 1,418.1 1,589.6 171.5 12.1 49,330
Elementary school teachers, except special education 25-2021 1,361.2 1,529.1 167.9 12.3 53,400
Accountants and auditors 13-2011 1,275.4 1,442.2 166.7 13.1 63,550
Medical assistants 31-9092 560.8 723.7 162.9 29.0 29,370
Software developers, applications 15-1132 613.0 752.9 139.9 22.8 90,060
Management analysts 13-1111 718.7 852.5 133.8 18.6 78,600
Sales representatives, wholesale and manufacturing, except technical and scientific products 41-4012 1,480.7 1,612.8 132.0 8.9 54,230

Results

Of the projected 15,628,000 jobs that will be filled by 2022, only 2,731,000 of the jobs in the first table should require a college degree.

However, given the emphasis on getting a degree (and brutally overpaying for it), and given the sheer number of people with degrees who are jobless, many employers will only hire those with degrees simply because they have ability to be picky.

There is another gotcha for the unemployed. Other employers do not want overqualified applicants fearing they will leave at the first opportunity.

Thus, applicants need to correctly figure out whether to dumb-down or trump-up their resume to improve their own chances, even though overall chances for higher paying jobs is poor.

Those who don’t make good use of their college degree will be stuck competing for low-wage jobs as personal care aids, retail sales clerks, food prep workers, and as various assistants.

Education for Education’s Sake

My friend “BC” explains …

In effect, the US is “educating”/socializing a large share of our young people coming of age to be hopelessly indebted and unemployed or unemployable.

With record debt to wages and GDP, withering costs of “health care”, and fully mature and costly urban/suburban/penturban infrastructure build out and associated high fixed costs, a growing majority of millennials simply cannot afford to begin or sustain the urban/suburban, auto-, oil-, and debt-based lives as “consumer units”.

And neither will a majority of Boomers be able to sustain their lifestyles into late life. The situation is made worse in that the US economy has not created a net new full-time private sector job per capita in 30-35 years.

Automation of services sector employment now occurring at an accelerating rate will exacerbate conditions for paid employment and purchasing power, especially for women who make up a disproportionately larger share of employment in medical services (80-85%), “education” (80%), gov’t (60%), and financial services (60%).

Consequently, women face loss of paid employment as a share of the work force and population on a scale that men have experienced in the goods-producing sector since the 1970s-80s.

The relative payoff to a bachelor’s degree peaked in the 1990s and will continue to decline hereafter for the rest of millennials’ lifetimes, especially those in the bottom 90% of households who cannot actually afford a post-secondary credential.

Many argue that the jobs lost in the aforementioned sectors will be replaced by even better jobs in the helping, human touch, and other occupations that we cannot predict; but this presupposes, incorrectly in my view, that the loss of tens of millions of jobs will allow an economy that still produces sufficient level and growth of after-tax, real purchasing power, discretionary income, and tax receipts to support what are more often than not public sector or costly private sector services for the top 1-10% .

Education Model Broken

The US education model is fatally broken because the cost of education is far too high. Soaring student debt with no way to pay it back is one consequence.

In turn, high student debt guarantees low family formation rates with kids moving back in with their parents. Here is a shocking chart that shows what I mean.

The above chart was part of my Wine Country Conference II presentation, which will be out shortly.

Note that approximately 12% of women and 17% of men aged 25-34 now live with their parents. The implications on household formation, child raising, and home buying are obvious.

Mike “Mish” Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

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Stucky

‘Murika needs 2.3 Million janitors? Really? Cleaning all those empty malls must be really labor intensive.

Eddie
Eddie

And the solution is….GRAD SCHOOL!

LOL.

My son starts grad school in the fall. Tuition of about 80K for a two year program at a top school. Fortunately he’s getting a partial ride. He’s going in debt free, but he’ll have to take out some loans to finish. Hope he ends up in the 17 percent.

yahsure
yahsure

I know from family that many would be nurses can’t get a job. A degree and experience is needed. One of those catch 22 things.
Trucking seems to be a job people assume they can do. After going to a trucking school,they find out the job sucks and quit. Owing several grand to a school. Trucking has a giant turn over rate.

Stucky

Cupcake Salespersons and Lemonade Salespersons will take a big hit in Illinois …. home of HNIC Oreo who just yesterday indicated he loves small business …. via the Cupcake Bill.

Little girls who want to sell cupcakes, and little boys who want to sell lemonade in the sad state of Illinois must;

—— take an 8 hour food service sanitation course costing $145,
—— obtain a county health department permit costing $25
—— label the food products to indicate ingredients and the fact that they are homemade
—— plus another $35 fee

I’m betting they have to pay corporate taxes as well. Why AWD hasn’t yet committed suicide remains a mystery to me.

bb

Trade schools are a good choice. The schools near me teach anything from welding , pipe fitting to computer science at reasonable costs. Any young person working part time could probably afford to go.

Wyoming Mike
Wyoming Mike

My town doesn’t even have a qualified auto mechanic. You’re as busy as you want to be even if you do more harm than good.

bb

Wyoming Mike , I like Wyoming.Good place to be when our world falls apart.I have arthritis in my knees From old football injuries and that cold winter makes it worse. I would move there or Montana but the arthritis is to Damn painful. Anyway, nice place to visit.

Tommy
Tommy

Trucking is a miserable way to make a buck, but as the CSA rules continue to clamp down harder and harder giving the DOT an even wider latitude of interpretation with rules that rank a burnt our marker light on par with low inflation, cracked pads, out of range slacks or even a cracked frame…a defective ‘fifth-wheel’ (the thing that the heavy loaded trailer is secured to) is deemed to be less of an issue than a brake light (of which there are usually several if not a simply back up) – they’ll be significantly fewer drivers able to and willing to do the work. OOIDA has proven conclusively that the smaller the firm, A) the more frequent the inspections and B) the more intensive the inspections are. Get it?….the bigger you are the more untouchable you are – sound familiar? Except, the foreign drivers who can’t speak English and think a standard bunk tractor is a personal paradise will work for shit all day long. The American professional truck driver is now competing directly with the most desperate of shit hole nations right here on American soil. So, the net effect will be even scarier truckers, more accidents – higher rates, and on and on. Don’t hang out next to these big rigs folks – not just blind spots – get around ’em and stay away from them or better, stay behind them.

AWD

“Why AWD hasn’t yet committed suicide remains a mystery to me.”

Don’t tempt me Stuck. I’m only suicidal in the morning. It usually clears after I do my spiritual reading and then meditate. The spirit of the universe helps me fight the socialist state of Illinois. One of these days, people are going to get tired of the socialists, the government, and their ridiculous rules and regulations.

Looking at the job market, I have to say that unless you learned computers, it’s still better to be on welfare. Being on welfare pays the equivalent of $57,000 a year, tax free. It’s the choice of 100 million Americans. They didn’t have to go to school, the didn’t have to listen to liberal commies brainwashing them, they didn’t have to take finals, or worry about grades. They didn’t have to compete for good grades, didn’t have to burn the midnight oil studying. All they had to do was grab a baby daddy, have sex, get pregnant. They take their positive results and head down to the welfare office and sign up for the good life. Free prenatal care, free labor and delivery, free healthcare and meds for at least 18 years; free housing, free food, $10k in cash a year from the earned income tax credit, free phones.

I wonder what the government is going to do when they lose $1 trillion in student loan defaults. I also wonder how high they’ll let the student loan bubble inflate? This article is the next ten years, how much student loan debt will there be 10 years from now? $4 trillion? $6 trillion? When will it end? Not until every single young person is a debt slave to the government, owned by the government, indebted up to their eyeballs with little or no chance of paying it back. Student loan debt is going to weigh on the economy, young debt slaves can’t buy homes, start families, buy furniture. They’re lucky if they can find a job and make their student loan payments. Getting paid to wipe shit off boomer’s asses and change their depends won’t pay off student loans. Kids are screwed, and I’ll bet many wish they’d just got on welfare like everyone else.

Llpoh
Llpoh

AWD – not all kids are screwed. Good, smart hard working kids are going to reap rewards. The entitled masses are fucked. Too bad for them.

Put the Igizmo down and start hustling is my advice to the young. But mostly, they are stone deaf.

AWD

Certainly not all kids are screwed, but it’s only fun to make sweeping generalizations.

We’re heading into a recession, or never left one. The slots for hard working kids is getting smaller all the time. Tech companies are even laying off workers. Countries that are growing, like China, are banning buying and using American tech and hardware (Microsoft, IBM, Cisco et al). Same for Brazil and the rest of the BRICS. Turns out people don’t like the NSA, and the incompetence of the Obama administration. I’d like to know one career field where anythings a sure thing anymore.

And would I tell my kids to go to medical school? Or law school? By the time they get done, Obamacare will have wiped out medicine. Look what socialized medicine did to the VA. Everyone I know is getting out of medicine, it’s not a career field with a future anymore. People don’t seem to understand the toll taken by socialism in this country. It destroys productive capital and people, and rewards the lazy and incompetent. They have a majority now, so socialism it is, until they run out of other people’s money, and everyone else’s money.

ThePessimisticChemist

@Eddie – The only way I was willing to go to grad school was if I got an assistantship.

Full ride, with a little scratch on the side. Still had to take out loans, but only about 10 grand. Which I wouldn’t have needed if unpaid internships weren’t a thing these days. 🙁

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