It is predicted that within a decade, having a university degree in humanities will be more valuable than a degree in computer programming.
The ability to adapt to change and the ability to solve problems will be more important than deep knowledge.
Throughout their lives, most parents have preferred their children to study engineering or law rather than painting, theatre or psychology . This has been the case because australia email list 7.6 millions contact leads the chances of having a more consistent career and a better-paid job have always been greater in the field of technical studies than in the humanities.
Today, little has changed. According to recent data from the employment agency Randstad , the university courses with the highest employment rates are electronics, computer science and telecommunications engineering , as well as courses related to the health sector, such as medicine. In these studies, the unemployment rate is always below 10%. At the opposite end of the spectrum are French Philology, Fine Arts and History, with unemployment rates of around 40%.
The greatest value of humanities careers
However, things could change a lot in the coming years, as the wave of automation that artificial intelligence will bring takes hold and spreads to all areas of the productive fabric.
In a talk earlier this year , tech investor and billionaire Mark Cuban , who also owns the Dallas Mavericks professional basketball team, made a provocative prediction: Within a decade, having a college degree in the humanities — or what the US calls “liberal arts” — will be more valuable than a degree in computer programming .
According to Cuban, artificial intelligence will completely change the job market. “Artificial intelligence will not need this or that profile, but will be able to learn to automate tasks on its own ,” said the investor. Jobs that are currently in high demand and socially recognized, such as those linked to programming or finance, will be completely transformed. And those who aspire to excel in these professions will no longer need to be good mathematicians and designers, have experience or know the latest version of the software better than anyone else ; they will need something more.
The work skills revolution
Human resources experts are talking about a “skills revolution” or revolution in the skills at work. In his book 'The Jobs of the Future', Professor Manuel Hidalgo rules out the possibility that the wave of automation and robotisation we are experiencing will cause a tsunami of unemployment , but he does warn that there will be a profound change in the tasks to be performed .
To be attractive in this changing world, the ability to adapt precisely to change and the ability to solve problems will be more important than deep knowledge of a subject.
In this work, Manuel Hidalgo presents an interesting statistic from the United States Department of Labor about the skills that will be most valued in the next decade and those that will be least. At the top of the table are inductive reasoning, sensitivity to problems, fluidity of ideas and originality . At the bottom, and as aspects that will be least valued in the future, are manual dexterity, peripheral vision and spatial orientation, important aspects in the workplace practically since the agricultural revolution of the Neolithic, but irrelevant in factories or workplaces where machines will definitely become the only protagonists.
Soft skills , which are always linked to communication, teamwork and emotional intelligence, are therefore more important than hard skills, or deep but static knowledge or ability. The report 'The soft skills: jobseekers need now' , which is actually a survey of more than 400 human resources professionals in the United States, reveals a compelling fact: 94% of candidates with good "soft skills" have more opportunities to be promoted in companies than others who have more experience .
