Recently Republican Presidential Hopeful Marco Rubio took a uneducated crack at Philosophy majors in hopes to answer a question about how he would counter Democrats free or subsided college education proposals. “For the life of me, I don’t don’t know why we stigmatize vocational education … Welders make more money than philosophers. We don’t need more philosophers.”
According to an article by Thought Progress on this very issue, Rubio's claim is a false one.
Though it is disheartening that a potential future leader of the free world can be so clueless, such beliefs are not completely out of the norm; with The American Higher Education System constantly focusing on and pushing what is commonly known as STEM degrees (STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics), there is a push to stop people from entertaining the idea of majoring in subjects such as Philosophy.
I am here to explain the priceless value a degree in Philosophy holds. A lot of people--even presidential candidates--believe philosophy is simply a path to poverty. What they don’t know is by studying philosophy they will acquire highly marketable skills that are immortalized. Whereas the specialized skills that are taught in the majority of STEM degrees will eventually become obsolete, and in a lot of cases result in the need for further education, or a change in career.
There is no doubt the skills that philosophy teaches will always be in high demand: skills such as the ability to think logically, critically, and independently, to communicate clearly, and effectively in both speech, and writing, to both see, and shed light on unnoticed presuppositions, and tease out connections, and implications. Furthermore philosophy grants you more than just knowledge of the world; it gives you a deep understanding of how the world works, and even how it should work. Consequently it gives students a wide variety of marketable skills which can be applied to any line of work.
According to a Forbes article on degrees, people with degrees in philosophy make decent money further into their career. "If you looked at the pay of people 15 years out, philosophy is actually in the top 10%.”
Even though Rubio is living the dream, running for President of the United States, to me it sounds like Marco or anyone for that matter would benefit from majoring in Philosophy. Not sure?
Well If you are thinking of continuing on to Grad School you may want to study philosophy.
Here are some hard facts courtesy of Purdue University:
Philosophy majors rank number one among all majors on both the verbal and analytical section of the Graduate Record Exam (GRE). Philosophy majors rank first among humanities majors and ninth among all majors on the quantitative (mathematical) section of the GRE. With an average score of 636, only students in majors such as engineering, mathematics, physics and economics did better on this portion of the exam.
The GMAT (Graduate Management Admissions Test) is used for admission to MBA programs and, ultimately, to the highest levels of management. One would think business students would be especially well prepared for this test, but they actually do badly on it, scoring below the average for all test takers. The best results are earned by math students, followed by philosophy students, and then engineers.
Thinking of Law School? You will have to take the Law School Admission Test (LSAT).
Philosophy majors rank first among all majors in LSAT scores, and Philosophy majors rank FIRST among all majors in law school acceptance rate: 82.4%.
In addition to being able to do all of the bad ass skills listed above that will set you apart from the pack you will join the ranks of these fine folks.
Still not convinced you should run and not walk to your Philosophy Department to sign up as a Major?
man running in forestPhoto by 
