| Now, Get a Job |
2 June 2003
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Congratulations, Class of 2003 -- The Unemployed
Back in the good old days of male chauvinism, the Cold War and Jim Crow laws, getting a college degree was a passport to the middle class. For those who had the grades, decent pay awaited for an honest day's wage slavery. The Class of 2003, those who just a few days ago walked proudly in cap and gown to collect their diplomas, now need to figure out how to earn their keep. Good luck to them, with unemployment at its highest levels in years.
A college education, a liberal arts one in particular, was never meant to confer economic success on the student. Its purpose was to give a young man or woman time to study the civilization in which he or she lived, to ponder its achievements and shortcomings, and to discover the self through reflection. Somewhere around the Great Depression, the Big Lie was told, "Get a degree and a good job follows."
Education is mankind's greatest accomplishment and, indeed, its purpose. That every child now knows that the earth goes round the sun has no economic value, but it is so, and knowing that it is so is worthwhile. What western industrial society has failed to do is teach its people skills to make themselves valuable to the economy. For this reason, there is an expansion of business and law students; these fields have some relevance to the economy.
What is missing from the educational system are the things one can do that are needed. Private computer skills have cropped up all over to address the shortage of compupter literate workers -- but not enough, and not to any measurable national standard. Electricians, mechanics, plumbers, carpenters do not have bachelor's degrees in their useful fields. Yet a great many unions teach these crafts at various levels of skills. More must be done.
So, congratulations to those who are entering the most unpromising job market of their young lives. May they realize that what one does is distinct from who one is; may they know the worth of things with no economic value; may they remember what the degree merely represents what they learned but it is not the sum of their educations.