Is STEM Education a Scam?

This article is my personal opinion and should not be construed as career or education advice. Seek the opinion of a qualified educational or career counselor to evaluate your personal situation.

With the availability of connections to the internet increasing globally each day, technology majors will have to compete with countries whose prevailing wages would not prove to be a living wage in the United States. Major corporations are choosing to hire computer programmers and other technology professionals in India, China, the Philippines, Indonesia, and other developing countries, rather than hire workers who live in the United States. Where once a company might have hired an entire division in the Unites States, now it is more likely that the company will hire one or two supervising programmers locally to manage a team primarily located in another country. 

Engineering majors will face the same problems as technology majors. With the proliferation of excellent higher education in developing countries, along with the ability to study engineering and science courses over the internet, it is profoundly cheaper for companies to hire one or two engineers to supervise a team of engineers in another country than to hire engineers in the United States. 

One of the first things you learn in Latin class is the phrase, "Cui bono?" This translates to "Who benefits?" There are millions of dollars being poured now into lobbying efforts to make the case for STEM education, and $50 million into an effort to introduce legislation to dramatically increase the number of STEM visas. When we look at who is putting the money into lobbying, we see that it is primarily coming from large corporations in software, computers, and information technology.

This is by no means to say that there is not value in STEM; simply that STEM may not be the royal road to a secure career. Rather, I would encourage people to look at the problems with STEM majors: globalization, replacing expensive workers with cheaper workers, the equalization of educational opportunity, and the increasing power of automation and computers. In a recent publication by the United States Department of Labor, only one STEM major made the list of fastest-growing occupations: biomedical engineers. In addition, in a recent survey, nearly one-fifth of scientists polled said they were considering emigration to another country in order to continue their careers (link opens PDF file).

So what is left? Promising careers are those that are local in nature, where one cannot be replaced by a cheaper worker overseas; careers requiring individual creativity, where one's work is unique; and careers that cannot be taken over by a computer. Where does one find such careers? The answers may surprise you!

• The Arts

  A career in the arts requires individual creativity, and often localization. Artists cannot be replaced by some other, cheaper artist. Videographers must be local.

• Craftsmen

  While there are factories that turn out furniture, musical instruments, and other items, there will always be a local need for repair and maintenance of these items.

• Tradesmen

  There's no foreseeable substitute for plumbers, electricians, automobile mechanics, and similar trades. No-one in India is going to come to your house to repair your wiring or snake your drain.

• Musicians, Dancers, and Actors

  As with the arts, one is not replaceable by another, and people will always appreciate live performances. In addition, the performing arts require dozens of other professions as support professions: publishing, editing, and manufacturing among them.

• Inventors

  Where a STEM education may be useful is in a career as an inventor, whether it is a new type of paint, or a new formula to describe behavior, or some other application. The world will always respond to new inventions!

• Writers

  As education becomes more standardized, people who search for creativity will still need the works of novelists, playwrights, scriptwriters, and poets. Language will still continue to be used for communication, and the clearer and more polished the language, the better.

• Designers

  Whether one designs clothing, cars, interiors, furniture, or anything else, no computer has the imagination to create an original design, and, in many cases, designers must be local.

• Teachers

  There will always be a need for good teachers, whether in public school, university, private school, independent instructors, or even in private companies. While Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) may replace some courses, people are always willing to pay for private or advanced instruction or mentoring services.

• Personal Services

  Massage therapists, hairstylists, house cleaners, interior decorators, alterations (at least until the advance of 3-d printing), nurses, and other services that must be performed locally will continue to be needed, at least until robots get much better than they are.

• Researchers

  No matter how clever computers become at aggregating data, it takes the personal touch of interpretation to understand what data tells us. While scientific research may be in decline, other kinds of research may become more in demand. Fact-checkers will also always be in demand.

• Journalism

  On-site reporters will always be needed. Of course, you may not be able to choose where you live; large urban areas will have more news than rural communities, unless you have exceptional investigative reporting skills.