The most regretted college majors (2024)

People regret their study choice

A surprising number of people regret the college major they chose, with different majors leading to higher levels of regret. Can you guess which graduates have the highest level of regret?

According to data from the Federal Reserve Survey¹ Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences graduates report the highest level of regret. Almost half, or 50%, of all graduates in the Humanities or Arts, regret their choice. STEM fields and Computer Science graduates, on the other hand, report the lowest level of regret, with only 1 in 3 or less than 30% regretting their choice. I would argue these results are not surprising. But why exactly do Humanities and Art degrees lead to dissatisfaction and regret?

Reasons for regret

One way to find out is to just ask the graduates. That's exactly what ZipRecruiter did in an internal survey a few years ago². Their results align pretty well with the FED data: Languages, Humanities have the most regret (40%+) and Computer Science and Engineering the least (~15%). They went one step further and asked the graduates the reasons for their regret. Languages and Humanities report that their major is "impractical, with limited job opportunities". CS majors mostly report their regret to be because of "high stress".

The issue: low job prospects. If you study liberal arts or humanities you have to be realistic about your chances of getting a job later on. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for letting your interests guide your study choice but you have to balance that with a pragmatic strategy. This applies even more to students in the US where tuition fees are rising to unprecedented levels. The costs of choosing the 'wrong' college major are much higher in the US compared to Europe for instance.

New students seem to have caught on to these economic facts. Enrollment in humanities degrees is down by over 50% since 2000³, while the numbers for CS have doubled. The US has shifted away from the Humanities and towards STEM and CS.

Money talks

The difference in income across different majors is another cause of regret. A typical history or humanities major can expect to earn about $3.4 Million over their entire lifetime. While a typical STEM or economics major expects to earn around $4.6 Million altogether (US data)⁴. All of this is adjusted for inflation.

The 2008 financial crisis has scarred many graduates who went looking for a job and found their skills and degree to be worth less than they have hoped. Not all of this can be attributed to their degree of course, the financial crisis hit many people hard and left many people without a job. With all of this in mind, how should you choose the right college major for you?

How to choose your major

My own journey through the higher education system was full of uncertainty and a lack of direction. At least in the beginning. I started out in the Humanities with a degree in History and then moved into the Sciences with Biology and Neuroscience. I had the good fortunate of studying in a country with extremely low college tuition, which allowed me the time to figure out what I truly wanted to do - without these detours costing me tens of thousands in student loans.

Looking back at my own experience and taking the realities of the modern economy into account I think you have to optimize for two different variables:

Talents & interests

While lifetime income and job prospects matter, I still think that you should start with your talents and interests. What are you good at and what do you care about? This is your foundation. This is you swimming with the current and not against it. You want to align your life with your strengths and with things you feel an emotional connection to. This will make everything else easier downstream.

I wrote in much more detail about how to find your strengths and interests. The bottom line is that you will be naturally better at certain things than others. You will also, naturally, find certain things more interesting than others. Both will be connected to your personality profile. Finding out what you are good at and what you care about is basically your job after high school.

If you don't know your strengths or interests go figure it out. Expose yourself to as many new situations, new jobs, and new people as possible. Pay close attention to how your mind reacts to these. Some will pull you in and give you energy others will be a drag. Get to know your mind.

Job prospects down the line

Your talents and interests have to be balanced against the realities of the job market. You might be in love with Medieval English literature but will such a degree open more future paths or will it paint you in a corner? Unfortunately, the data and the regrets of graduates seem to be clear: it drastically reduces your future options - it does not widen them.

I'm not suggesting that everyone should study CS or engineering. That would be a boring world to live in. Don't study something just because everybody says it is the right thing to do. Your personal agency is important. You have to find an optimum between talents & interests and realistic job prospects on the other.

Maximize for future options

Another way to conceptualize this idea is to choose a major that maximizes your future options. You want to choose a path that at its end (graduation) leads to many more new paths. The difficult truth is that some degrees leave you at the trailhead of many potential paths, while others leave you with very few options. Every choice has opportunity costs.

Opportunity cost is a law of life. The sooner you understand this mental model and its implications the better. For every choice you make you irrevocably exclude all other potential choices you could have made. There is a real cost to every decision you make. Small choices like what to eat for dinner are easy to understand. If you go for pizza you probably won't eat lasagna. The costs are much higher for big decisions in life.

In our case, the choice of a college major is such a dilemma of opportunity cost. If you spend 3 to 4 years studying History those years are gone and the cost of your choice is high. All possible alternative choices are now gone. You did not spend these years studying economics, chemical engineering, or nursing. Chances are you never will - those doors have closed.

The cost of college

Rising tuition and student debt have increased not just the literal costs but also the opportunity costs. Should you really spent $50,000 on a liberal arts degree when you can learn coding, web development, design, or video animations online for free - with the latter opening many more paths for future careers? High tuition fees in the US definitely change the equation. The situation is somewhat different in other countries.

College just doesn't pay off for everyone anymore, like it did a generation ago. You have to think strategically about your choice.

Most valuable college degrees

Having discussed the most important points in choosing a college major can we definitely say which ones are better? No, obviously not. There are many smaller factors at play; which country you are in, which college you go to, what you pay for it, and of course your specific degree.

What we can do is talk globally. Which career paths show the most promise over the next decade? Here are the top three according to ZipRecruiter's Data⁵:

Computer Science

Computer Science is the new degree for people who want to build the world. Job opportunities are plenty with strong growth over the next decade. It opens a lot of different potential career paths with a strong salary outlook. If you can hack the workload and the mathematics of it chances are you won't regret your choice.

Economics

The business & management sector is adding a lot of jobs and is expected to do so over the coming years (recession notwithstanding). Most people report lower levels of regret with studying economics and business and median levels if income is above average. If you're interested in economics and business management this track might be for you.

Nursing & Health care

The health care sector is adding jobs at a rapid pace and will continue to do so. The median income is far above the average worker in the US economy. Even during the recession of 2008, the sector was adding jobs. If you are interested in health care this might be a good career path for you.