Philosophy is simply worth studying for its own sake. But philosophy is not just about philosophy and it can be applied in many non‐academic careers and personal pursuits.
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Philosophy provides great academic preparation for advance study in graduate school;
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Philosophy is of great value, especially when coupled with a secondary major, for a variety of non‐academic careers (with very good lifetime earning potential!)
Philosophy focuses on questions that are fundamental for all people: How should we live? What gives our lives meaning and purpose? Philosophy seeks to give rigorous, well thought out answers to these questions, or, at least, to help us frame the right approaches in the search for truth. Philosophy has this basic value regardless of the career we pursue. Although college and university teaching have been the primary career options for philosophers, they are not the only options!
The Value of a Philosophy Degree
Philosophy, What Can it Do for You?
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Valuable Skills
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Big Questions
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High Scores
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Careers and Salaries
Your parents might have worried when you chose philosophy as a major. But graduates in philosophy earned 103.5% more about 10 years post-commencement.
"What a continuously giving gift philosophy has been... If you can extract, and abstract, underlying assumptions or superordinate principles, or reason through to the implications of arguments, you can identify and address issues in a myriad of fields."
Information is easy to acquire, and much will soon be obsolete. What is valuable is not the content of a major, but rather the ability to think with and through that information.
The discipline teaches you how to think clearly, a gift that can be applied to any line of work.
If you're getting a liberal arts degree, you're actually in more demand than those who are getting finance and accounting degrees.
Ever wondered if...
So have we! Believe it or not, we've made progress and we have answers—lots of them—backed up with reasons. Come join humanity's conversation before life gets in the way and you die wondering.
Consider this question: "What Do I Desire?"
Bertrand Russell: "The Value of Philosophy"
Thinking about graduate school? Add up the three sections: Philosophy majors have the highest score on the GRE.
How about business school? Philosophy majors outperform majors in economics, statistics, finance, accounting, etc.
Need that J.D.? Philosophy is a better bet than political science, pre-law, and anything starting with "business."
Philosophers enjoy the best chance of admission to medical school of any major.
Figures from the Higher Education Statistics Agency show philosophy graduates are in growing demand from employers.
Most of management theory is inane, writes the founder of a consulting firm. If you want to succeed in business, don’t get an M.B.A. Study philosophy instead.
Courses like "Why Capitalism?" push students to ponder business in a broader context, and address a common complaint of employers, who say recent graduates are trained to solve single problems but miss the big picture.
Compiled by Tomás Bogardus
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