“Everyone’s here to make money,” an upperclassman, nonchalantly chowing down on a Late Meal quesadilla, declared to me the first Thursday of freshman week, “Premeds want to make money. Engineers want to make money. And, of course, econ kids want to make bucket loads of money.”
A murmuring of approval from our table at Frist Campus Center accompanied this assertion. And even though his candor was startling, I nodded along.
The facts certainly seem to support his hypothesis; the most popular degree at the University is, indeed, economics. Courses like ECO 100: Introduction to Macroeconomics and COS 126: General Computer Science, classes many students feel will have practical applications in the job market, attract over 300 students.
And why shouldn’t students expect their hard work at the University to have a monetary pay-off? College is an expensive investment; as my microeconomics professor might say, there’s a high opportunity cost for pursuing a degree without a stable economic future.
Besides, the University isn’t alone in this trend: even at Brown, which many consider the Ivy League haven for alternative thought, 17% of the graduating class of 2013 chose to concentrate in some form of economics. Additionally, the ability to make more money was listed by 81% of students as an important reason to attend college in 2012, an all-time national high.
In recent years anxiety about post-graduation employment has surged due to an increasingly challenging job market provoked by the 2008 financial crisis. Is it time to hammer down on those math textbooks and turn to job markets we know have stability, stamina and space for newcomers? Or do we still have the luxury to ask existential questions when selecting our careers, or pursue degrees solely for the pleasure of the study?
I think so. And the University seems to agree.
For those unfamiliar with this year’s freshman summer reading book, the University made a pretty bold choice — a 143 page philosophical lecture titled, “Meaning in Life and Why it Matters,” by Susan Wolf, aphilosophy professor at theUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The premise can be summed up simply: engage in projects of objective worth. Wolf would advise students to consider finding a passion that in some way promotes the well-being of those outside of one-self.
The University’s decision to assign Wolf’s inspection of meaning to every incoming freshman points to the institution’s intent to challenge cultural norms that prioritize money making. This is a valiant effort.
Recent financial history brands our obsession with wealth as particularly alarming. The 2008 financial crisis was a product of, among many other factors, greed. The University, in order to live up to its claim to be “in the Nation’s service” has a responsibility to equip students with the courage to explore passions independent of pure financial gain.
Now, I don’t believe you have to dedicate your life to spoon-feeding every impoverished orphan to live a full life, but I do wonder when “making bucket loads of money” became synonymous with success and gained stature as a kosher, even celebrated, career goal.
Maybe valuing money for money’s sake is deeply ingrained in our culture, but maybe there’s also room during these four years to explore what else interests and engages us. We don’t all have to be Mother Teresa or volunteer for every community outreach program. But from a purely selfish standpoint, we owe it to ourselves to explore passions that fulfill and enrich us.
The big secret is that we’re already here. We’re the truly lucky ones because we have the luxury to not only find jobs that support us financially but also deeply interest us. It’s actually those impoverished orphans (the ones you’re not spoon-feeding) that have to spend their lives obsessed with making money.
At the best university in the country we have the luxury to explore, wander and actively hunt for what captivates us. We can be comforted by the knowledge that once we have found our passion, career opportunities abound.
One of the biggest the pay-offs of going to the University isn’t that it offers a route to get rich quick, but that it affords the opportunity to think a little, to get introspective and maybe read a little Susan Wolf, before we determine how we’re going to approach our futures.
Julia Case-Levine is a freshman from New York, N.Y. She can be reached at juliacc@princeton.edu.
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