ROI by major and college

[sanantone]

Some majors have zero or negative ROI, but this varies by college. For-profit colleges have the most programs with negative ROI. Two types of ROI were calculated: an assumption that the student will finish on time and with data on completion rates. Cost of living was not included in the cost of attendance since students have varying living arrangements and having living expenses is a constant. The cost of attendance only included tuition and opportunity costs. 

https://freopp.org/is-college-worth-it-a...2ad17f84c8

[MNomadic]

These types of studies are great to reference but one thing I noticed before is they sometimes aren't as accurate with online degrees that someone does while working full time in their industry. Since they incorporate opportunity cost, if they assume someone stopped working for a few years, it can have a huge impact on the degree's ROI, but an inexpensive (sometimes employer covered!) degree pursued while still earning a salary (and years of experience) is generally better than some of these studies would indicate.

[sanantone]

These types of studies are great to reference but one thing I noticed before is they sometimes aren't as accurate with online degrees that someone does while working full time in their industry. Since they incorporate opportunity cost, if they assume someone stopped working for a few years, it can have a huge impact on the degree's ROI, but an inexpensive (sometimes employer covered!) degree pursued while still earning a salary (and years of experience) is generally better than some of these studies would indicate.

They used demographics to do counterfactuals - how much the person likely would have made if they didn't go to college. Some groups are probably more likely to go into the trades or take an alternative route to become an IT professional, so they would have started down a career path sooner. For most, going to college is better than the counterfactual before you factor in completion rates and completion time.

[Alpha]

I think these sorts of studies have value and people can use them to help think about their direction in life, etc.  One criticism I have is that they make no real effort to consider factors that are less tangible.  An engineer might make a million dollars, for example and that paints a nice picture of the ROI of that degree.  But it doesn't tell you anything about whether they're happy or otherwise feel good about their life.  You can go to medical school and make a lot of money as an MD but they also have the highest rate of suicide.  That million dollar salary might not look so great after you end up paying 75% of it on alimony and child support.  Making money is nice but is it really the only important thing?

https://choicespsychotherapy.net/jobs-wi...ide-rates/
https://divorce.lovetoknow.com/Divorce_R...Occupation

[sanantone]

I think these sorts of studies have value and people can use them to help think about their direction in life, etc.  One criticism I have is that they make no real effort to consider factors that are less tangible.  An engineer might make a million dollars, for example and that paints a nice picture of the ROI of that degree.  But it doesn't tell you anything about whether they're happy or otherwise feel good about their life.  You can go to medical school and make a lot of money as an MD but they also have the highest rate of suicide.  That million dollar salary might not look so great after you end up paying 75% of it on alimony and child support.  Making money is nice but is it really the only important thing?

https://choicespsychotherapy.net/jobs-wi...ide-rates/
https://divorce.lovetoknow.com/Divorce_R...Occupation

That's not the scope of the study. There are a million different things any study could look at, and the article would be thousands of pages. This study is focused on ROI. There are other studies that look at job satisfaction and burnout rate. Social work, for example, has low pay and a very high burnout rate.

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Your link says that engineers have one of the LOWEST divorce rates.

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While we're on the topic of suicide, high debt and financial problems can increase one's risk of attempting suicide, and it's also one of the main causes of divorce. Did you take that into consideration? Did you not see that low-paying jobs dominate the list of occupations with high divorce rates?

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Hold on! Your link also shows that physicians and surgeons have a relatively low divorce rate. What was the point you were trying to make? What am I missing?

[Alpha]

I'm not sure that you're missing anything.  You can decide if you agree with me or not.  I suppose that what I'm saying is that ROI, in the way that I think about it, is about more than just income.  When you earn a degree you invest more than just money.  You invest time, you invest effort and it could even be said that there's an emotional investment (in the sense that motivation, the occasional frustrating Professor, the occasional annoying cohort member are emotional costs).  There are also the opportunity costs involved, some of which involve things like time with your family, time having fun of different types, etc.  A more complete definition of ROI might yield different results when evaluating which college major one should choose.  I know that potentially, I could have earned a lot more money if I had studied Accounting.  I also think I would have been remarkable unhappy because I just don't like that kind of work.  Fortunately for us all, there are people who like that kind of stuff.  I think the relationships that exist between the various factors are complex.  Income is a part of it, for sure.  I can try to quantify the intangibles by bringing in states re mental health, divorce, etc.  Medical health is clearly a factor in people's lives.  What's the correlation between profession and stroke or college major and heart attacks? How about college major and obesity or diabetes?  It's difficult to quantify intangibles but I believe that intangibles should be included in ROI.  You are free to disagree.

[sanantone]

I'm not sure that you're missing anything.  You can decide if you agree with me or not.  I suppose that what I'm saying is that ROI, in the way that I think about it, is about more than just income.  When you earn a degree you invest more than just money.  You invest time, you invest effort and it could even be said that there's an emotional investment (in the sense that motivation, the occasional frustrating Professor, the occasional annoying cohort member are emotional costs).  There are also the opportunity costs involved, some of which involve things like time with your family, time having fun of different types, etc.  A more complete definition of ROI might yield different results when evaluating which college major one should choose.  I know that potentially, I could have earned a lot more money if I had studied Accounting.  I also think I would have been remarkable unhappy because I just don't like that kind of work.  Fortunately for us all, there are people who like that kind of stuff.  I think the relationships that exist between the various factors are complex.  Income is a part of it, for sure.  I can try to quantify the intangibles by bringing in states re mental health, divorce, etc.  Medical health is clearly a factor in people's lives.  What's the correlation between profession and stroke or college major and heart attacks? How about college major and obesity or diabetes?  It's difficult to quantify intangibles but I believe that intangibles should be included in ROI.  You are free to disagree.

I'm just saying that your link didn't support your argument about divorces because physicians and engineers are less likely to get divorced. Also, the article you posted on suicides doesn't source its information. They linked to the main page of CDC/NIOSH. According to the CDC, construction and extraction workers have the highest suicide rate. As a matter of fact, blue collar jobs, in general, account for most of the occupations with high suicide rates. Physicians have a higher than average suicide rate, but it's not as high as many blue collar jobs. Low-paying and high-paying jobs in the medical field have higher than average suicide rates for obvious reasons, but they're not dropping dead left and right from suicide. The article I posted is about bachelor's programs, so the ROI for medical school is irrelevant. Some medical specialties have a low ROI, especially in comparison to other six figure professions that only require a bachelor's or master's degree. Even a PhD is usually cheaper than going to medical school.  

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6903a1.htm

Construction and agriculture jobs have low life expectancies due to accidents, injuries, and the toll the physical labor takes on their bodies. Public safety jobs have low life expectancies because of the high stress, which leads to chronic health issues. They're also more likely to get into accidents because they drive more than the average person. Truck drivers also have lower life expectancies because of the nature of their job. In general, white collar professionals live longer than unskilled laborers. Blue collar workers also have more issues with obesity, diabetes, heart disease, etc. Some blue collar jobs expose people to chemicals and pollutants that can lead to cancer and respiratory issues. Additionally, income affects one's access to quality healthcare and one's ability to live in safer neighborhoods.

https://gizmodo.com/jobs-that-kill-what-...on-5857406

It's ironic that you used the medical field for your example because medical professionals tend to have higher than average job satisfaction because they feel like their work has a purpose and helps others. 

https://www.thebalancecareers.com/what-a...bs-4163539

[bluebooger]

> because medical professionals tend to have higher than average job satisfaction because they feel like their work has a purpose and helps others.

that's pretty much the only sentence I've read in this whole thread,
I just wanted to say that while the above is true I know many doctors and nurses that don't like their job because its become more about the paper work than it is about helping people -- insurance, tracking drug usage (waste, returns and possible diversions) and other stuff -- so much paper work

[sanantone]

> because medical professionals tend to have higher than average job satisfaction because they feel like their work has a purpose and helps others.

that's pretty much the only sentence I've read in this whole thread,                  
I just wanted to say that while the above is true I know many doctors and nurses that don't like their job because its become more about the paper work than it is about helping people -- insurance, tracking drug usage (waste, returns and possible diversions) and other stuff -- so much paper work

True, but that can happen with any profession either because of new government regulations, an employer cutting support staff, or an employer requiring more administrative work. I had a tax enforcement job that saw an increase in turnover when the officers had to focus more on administrative stuff than enforcing the law.