Dazed & confused

In the AI economy, parents — and even counsellors — are at a loss when it comes to career advice

IF YOU GAZE upon the current economic landscape and the jobs market, trying to see which way the winds are blowing, what do you tell your children who are looking for career advice?

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No, seriously. What do you tell them? We really don’t know — and nobody else seems to, either.

“The AI boom’s effect on the job market for young adults is creating new anxiety for parents. Many don’t know how to advise teens on what to study in college — or whether to even go,” reads a new report from The Wall Street Journal. They quote the director of college counseling at a private school, who reports that “there’s a panic over careers and employment. Everyone is looking for a guarantee.”

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Indeed, everyone seems fully caught out by the moment. Twenty years ago, maybe you could say that computer science or some kind of STEM degree would be the safest bet, but career experts say those markets have become oversaturated and are seeing the biggest damage from AI.

On the flipside, parents everywhere have long groaned (hopefully silently) when their kids say they want to get a philosophy degree, but there are plenty of career coaches who think that in the age of AI, we might see a resurgence in the value of liberal arts education. But the point is, nobody knows for sure right now.

That extends most obviously to young people themselves. Gallup poll data found that 90 per cent of Gen Z students are turning to their parents, but “parents say they don’t know enough about the vast majority of valuable education and training options,” and “they’re especially in the dark about anything that isn’t either pursuing a career directly or getting a bachelor’s degree,” reads a report in Time Magazine. “Even school counselors — professionals specifically tasked with providing this kind of guidance — say they feel unprepared to help students adapt to the future labour landscape.”

That has helped contribute to a growing gulf when it comes to views of college or university education. With nobody making a solid case that pursuing higher ed will improve your outlook, younger generations hold an increasingly dim view of it.

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“Students are becoming more aware of the times when college doesn’t pay off,” researcher Preston Cooper told Fortune. “It’s front of mind for universities today in a way that it was not necessarily 15, 20 years ago.”

And so, faced with this conundrum, many parents are reverting to the basics — and that might be the best they can do right now. The pendulum is swinging back to something like ‘follow your heart.’

“I said you better fill up your bucket with a ton of experience this summer with whatever you can,” one parent told their child. “And you have to network, network, network.”

It’s as good advice as any these days. Kieran Delamont