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Welcome to 2014. U.S. economic growth finally appears to be accelerating, and the future is brightening. Unemployment rates look like they will be dropping back down to around 6.5 percent, inflation will stay low and the stock market will stumble early but yield positive annual returns.
To ring in the New Year, however, I have decided to avoid discussion about markets or investments and provide a more general overview of what us, as college students, are up against going into 2014.
The first item of interest involves our dearly beloved professors. Most of us can agree our professors tend to display bias towards one political party or another through their lectures and discussions. With that said, be sure to adequately research the mainstream propaganda thrown at you in the classroom.
Regardless of your political affiliation, it will be your responsibility to utilize critical thinking skills to sift through the ideological discrepancies and arrive at fact-based conclusions. Leave the status quo behind. Don’t follow the pack.
I fully support that what you learn in class is vastly more important than your letter grade. However, even if you slack off a little in class this quarter, you should still expect to receive higher grades. According to the graph below, the average grade point average has been steadily on the rise since 1970..
The dramatic upswing in grades beginning in the late 1960s can be accredited to the sudden shift from GPA representing a motivator for individual students to being an assessment for professor evaluations. As many students have witnessed, tough-grading teachers typically receive lower evaluations and ultimately go extinct.
As GPA continues to rise, the job market seems to be responding appropriately. The National Association of Colleges and Employers’ Job Outlook 2013 Survey assessed the significance of GPA among a pool of businesses and corporations, and came to the conclusion that GPA importance is at an all-time high in America. 78 percent of employers in the U.S. screen candidates based on GPA.
Before you permanently select a major, be weary of how technology is affecting the job market. Currently, the majors that have the lowest unemployment rates and highest salaries are computer, electrical and mechanical engineering; physics and math; and economics. An art history or drama major almost guarantees you’ll be shacked up with your parents for a while after college.
As technology continues to advance, research and development in robotics and artificial intelligence are causing many jobs to be computerized. A recent study from Oxford predicts that computers will consume at least 47 percent of the U.S. workforce in the future.
Be wise when choosing your major and profession because “eventually a computer might be able to do it too, or reduce the economic value of you doing it,” says Michael Cembalest, Chairman of Market and Investment Strategy for J.P. Morgan. Not all jobs will be lost to the machines, so do not fret if you are stuck with a financially worthless degree. History has proven to us numerous times that new technologies and opportunities will arise, and new jobs will eventually be created.
I have only grazed the top of the pyramid in regards to the obstacles we are up against in 2014, but do not give up hope. We are a generation that needs to continue seeking those sources of creativity and innovation that separate us from our elderly counterparts. Happy New Year, and study hard.
