Out of your Parents Basement: Tell me about going from Goon to Great

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Out of your Parents Basement: Tell me about going from Goon to Great

Jeb Bush 2012: Apr 4, 2007; A mathematician, like a painter or poet, is a maker of patterns. If his patterns are more permanent than theirs, it is because they are made with ideas.

chemosh6969 posted:

Whatever you say, Corky.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_1980s_recession
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/21/business/economy/21leonhardt.html

Maybe if you were older and had more life experience you would realise that an article from the start of 2009 is not actually a very good guide to the severity of a recession that was a) not even over by that point and b) was characterised by a particularly slow recovery.

# ¿ Sep 6, 2016 04:35

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 20:45

Jeb Bush 2012: Apr 4, 2007; A mathematician, like a painter or poet, is a maker of patterns. If his patterns are more permanent than theirs, it is because they are made with ideas.

adorai posted:

You probably suffer from imposter syndrome. It may sound cliche, but luck is often just the intersection of preparation and opportunity. While there is often some element of randomness to opportunity, 'dumb luck' is often credited where it should not. The fact is you had something in you that someone else saw and you attribute that to luck. Stop selling yourself short and feel good about the fact that you made some good choices in life.

Imposter syndrome is a thing, and tbp is probably underrating themself a bit, but no, luck is far more important than people (especially successful wealthy people) acknowledge. It's good to know that at least one person in finance isn't deluding themselves into thinking that their success comes from being a genius �bermensch.

adorai posted:

The early 80's sucked rear end with very high interest rates, high unemployment, high inflation, and no economic growth. Google 'stagflation'.

The last recession was substantially more severe than the 1980s recession, this isn't even a close-run thing.

photomikey posted:

I was spewing the crap I expected the angry underemployed to start spewing. 2016 is a hard time to get a job straight out of school. So was 2008, 2005, 2000, 1995, 1985, 1980.... there was never a good time to get a first job. They always want to hand you a broom and have you do poo poo they won't do. That's life.

you show those unemployed fuckers, champ

# ¿ Sep 6, 2016 04:57

Jeb Bush 2012: Apr 4, 2007; A mathematician, like a painter or poet, is a maker of patterns. If his patterns are more permanent than theirs, it is because they are made with ideas.

WampaLord posted:

This mentality is self defeating. There are literally thousands of jobs you can get with an English degree, and "underpaid freelancer" is not the holy grail of them.

As people always seem to ignore in these kinds of discussions, the vast majority of "degree required/preferred" jobs do not require any specific degree, and so English majors can do them just like everyone else.

# ¿ Feb 20, 2017 21:37

Jeb Bush 2012: Apr 4, 2007; A mathematician, like a painter or poet, is a maker of patterns. If his patterns are more permanent than theirs, it is because they are made with ideas.

A White Guy posted:

Yes, if you're hell-bent on a career path that is definitely not included in your English degree, you can probably overcome it. Volunteer programs/various national programs are availed for recent college grads (regardless of what their degree was actually in) that can get you experience doing all kinds of stuff. Americorp (which unfortunately, president fuckface is cutting the budget on) offered me, a guy with a degree in environmental science, opportunities to interview for disaster relief organizations, and non-profits that fed school kids. I had no interest in those things, but if I was hell-bent on doing FEMA type stuff, I would've found a way to make it work. Even after President Fuckface gets finished loving millions of Americans over, there are still hundreds of state programs that offer youngin's with degrees opportunities doing stuff. Most of the Western States have a Conservation Corp, which looks really, really good if you're looking for a state/federal job doing environmental stuff in state/national parks.

Basically, we're not saying that you shouldn't pursue what you love. But unless what you love is engineering or science, you're really making it difficult for yourself down the road in regards to actually achieving something beyond Dollar Tree Sales Associate. It's not impossible to overcome a degree in Philosophy to do something like Ecology, but you've basically guaranteed that at some point, you're going to have to go back to school for yet another bachelor's degree in something actually useful, which may not be ideal. Hell, I have a degree in the thing I want to do, and I still have to get more schooling down the road at some point.

You're still missing the point. Most career paths aren't included in *any* degree, and yet many of them require *a* degree anyway. An English degree is as good for those as anything else. A fairly small proportion of degree-requiring jobs have strong preferences with regard to major.

# ¿ Feb 21, 2017 05:23

Jeb Bush 2012: Apr 4, 2007; A mathematician, like a painter or poet, is a maker of patterns. If his patterns are more permanent than theirs, it is because they are made with ideas.

Imaduck posted:

I think a lot of the pushback you're getting here is coming from a generation that repeatedly got the advice "it doesn't matter what you major in; all you need is any college degree and there will be tons of good, well-paying jobs for you on the other side!" Lots of people my age were told this, and it's just not true. There are certain degrees that have a track record of high placement in well-paying jobs, and then there are the other degrees.

Nobody is saying that you can't get a great job with an English degree. What we're saying is that your pathway to that great job is probably going to be a lot harder. You can't just say "oh I have a college degree, I'll take my $70k/year please." Instead, you're probably going to have to spend many years moving from job to job, trying to distinguish yourself, trying to pick up new skills, trying to find a good in to a higher role, and really grind your way up. You might have to go back to school. You might have to luck into connections that happen to have the right opportunity for you at the right time. You're probably going to spend many years being relatively poor. You might not ever make it.

Or you can get a degree in a high demand field like Computer Science and be offered a good, high-paying job a year before you graduate. I'm not saying that that pathway is easier, or that it's for everyone, but it's just not the same thing as getting a Philosophy degree.

I also kind of take issue with you saying there are lots of jobs out there that require just any degree. We're talking in generalities here, but I think that's becoming less and less true, and more and more jobs are going back to "a degree or 4 years experience." Even jobs that say they require a degree will often hire someone who can demonstrate the skills they need without the degree.

You seem to be imagining a lot of things no-one has actually said here. No-one is saying that the job market for college grads is all sunshine and rainbows (but it's way better than the job market for high school grads!). No-one is saying that people with, say, CS degrees don't make a good bit more on average (if you're interested in and capable of studying both CS and English, you may well want to choose the former!)

That does not change the fact that a) most people with BAs will not work a job that "needs" their major in any strong sense and b) they make significantly more money on average than people without BAs nonetheless.

# ¿ Feb 22, 2017 08:10

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 20:45

Jeb Bush 2012: Apr 4, 2007; A mathematician, like a painter or poet, is a maker of patterns. If his patterns are more permanent than theirs, it is because they are made with ideas.

chemosh6969 posted:

He's not making it up. I remember seeing that change through schools when my kids went.

did you also notice that kids these days don't respect their elders, and don't appreciate real music and

# ¿ Mar 4, 2017 16:30

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Out of your Parents Basement: Tell me about going from Goon to Great