Photo: Daniel Griffin
Remember Napoleon Dynamite? That movie was phenomenal, and Uncle Rico was my favorite character by far. A completely deluded and self-involved loser, Uncle Rico spent the whole movie obsessing about going back in time to play high school football again. His claims that “[if] coach woulda put me in, fourth quarter, we’da been state champions. No doubt, no doubt in my mind. I believe things woulda been different. I’da gone pro…” were sad and pathetic and awesome. You should watch, even if you’ve seen it.
Hopefully you’re not as bad as good ol’ Rico, but I’m sure you’ve spent some time thinking about the things you’d change if you could. I know I have – grad school comes to mind, so does my internship-free undergrad and total lack of computer programming classes. Believe me, there are more.
One thing that comes up in a lot of regretful, hindsight-is-20-20 conversations is college major. I had lunch with a recruiter yesterday who mainly targets accounting professionals, and I told her that if I had to recommend a really useful, versatile, and potentially lucrative major, I’d put accounting near the top. It offers fantastic preparation for business and entrepreneurship, there’s always demand (our tax code isn’t getting any smaller, though its growth is slowing), and, with the right career trajectory, you can make good money. Now, being an accountant sounds pretty terrible to me, but some people love it. And, as I mentioned above, you don’t have to be an accountant just because that’s your degree (I know plently of non-lawyer JD holders, including my lunchtime companion).
A major or any degree is worth what you make of it. In the now very famous Stanford commencement speech, Steve Jobs talks about how valuable his typography classes were. As long as you are learning and learning how to leverage or apply that new knowledge, you can study just about anything.
Of course there are trends, and some majors correlate to lower unemployment and higher salaries. Here’s a really cool interactive chart the Wall Street Journal put together using 2010 Census data. As the chart notes, “Nursing and finance, do particularly well, with unemployment under 5% and high salaries during the course of their careers.” Accounting is the 3rd most popular major, so my idea of accounting being worthwhile is hardly groundbreaking. Business Management and Admin is the most popular, but only has a top 75% earning point of about $85,000, compared with $94K for accounting or public policy which is at $101K (public policy majors have 2.2% unemployment – ridiculously and, to me, shockingly low. Looks like there are plenty of jobs in politics…).
Ah, what could have been! I do wish I’d have focused on more quantitative disciplines when I was in school. But don’t worry, I don’t assume I would have been Bill Gates if only I’d taken that C++ programming class (ala our friend Uncle Rico). If you’re someone still considering a major, think about it in the most macro sense. What will position you to be successful in the most fields, through the most recessions and trends? It’s easy to just study what you like, but a lot of times that will leave you ill-prepared to enter the job market. You might have to take some classes you don’t enjoy now, but it beats kicking yourself while you look for a job for 6-12 months.
Any big regrets you have with your choice of major? Any words of caution for those who still have time? Let’s hear ‘em in the comments.
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