There’s a hard question I find myself pondering and discussing over and over these days—why do some important jobs pay so much less than other important jobs?
Of course, I know the standard economist’s answer: supply and demand. Wages are determined by the intersection of what employers are willing to pay and what employees are willing to accept. But, my questions lie deeper. What makes this intersection lower for some than for others? What factors are contributing to differences in willingness to pay or willingness to accept, especially when job qualifications and duties are similar?
My most recent conversation about this was with a friend during Memorial Day weekend. She is an English professor and lives in another state. When an English professor and an Economics professor compare notes, questions about their salary gap almost always arise.
And the questions and points made are legitimate. In the classroom, the two professors do basically the same job, and outside class, an average English professor almost certainly spends more time grading long papers and projects than an average Economics professor. Yet, in the U.S., the median English professor makes almost $27,000 less per year than the median Economics professor.
The simple answer here is that professors’ salaries reflect salaries in the broader market. Outside academia, the average economist makes about double what the average English major makes. In order to entice someone to teach, a college or university must offer competitive compensation.
The median salary for Liberal Arts BA’s is $5,000 lower than the median for all BA’s. And with little job experience, those with a BS earn substantially more on average than those with a BA.
But why?
As my friend puts it, the skills taught in liberal arts majors—the ability to problem-solve, to ask good questions and to think critically about their answers— are the skills that will change the world. So, why does it seem the market so under-values these majors?
My first thought is that this is likely a supply issue. The market must be flooded with liberal arts majors, driving down their wages. But, that’s not really true. In 2016, only about 23% of all college graduates were in liberal arts majors, and that number is falling pretty rapidly.
If we align this with data from the demand side, it seems even less likely that an over-supply issue is at play. According to a 2014 report by the Association of American Colleges and Universities, 93% of employers rank a candidate’s ability to think critically and communicate and solve problems as more important than that candidate’s college major. These qualities are most focused on in the liberal arts, and I might argue that possession of these qualities makes one well suited, regardless of their college major, to learn the specifics of almost any career.
So, there’s not an “issue” on either side of the market for liberal arts majors; demand is high, and supply is moderate. The best explanation for why other markets have higher equilibrium wages is just super soaring demand in those markets. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects demand for economists to grow 14% over the next decade, while demand for the most popular professions of liberal arts majors will grow by at most 4%.
This is the hardest part of labor economics to me. Market value does not equate to intrinsic or moral value. The liberal arts will change the world. Employers know that. But, and I hate this, world changing isn’t a growth area in our economy right now.
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Dr. Melissa Trussell is a professor in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia who works with the college’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies. Contact her at mtrussell@ccga.edu.
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