If you want to go back to school to jump start your career, you may be worried, as many are, about choosing the right degree. A new report from Indiana University offers some great guidance on which college majors tend to offer the best protection from unemployment – both in terms of avoiding layoffs and getting re-hired if a layoff occurs.
Possibly the most interesting finding is that engineering, a degree that seems to be constantly hailed as a sure-fire career builder, is actually one of the areas where layoffs occur frequently. Engineering grads can take comfort, however, from the fact that their layoffs tend to be relatively short.
Those who study communication, architecture or arts are likely to have longer periods of unemployment. Grads who studied health, education or life sciences are among the least likely to be laid off.
A truly weird finding of the study: Masters and other post grad degree holders are actually more likely to be laid off than those with lower degrees.
Read a summary of the report here.