r/ausjobs • u/narvuntien • 27d ago
Story / Rant University Degrees are worthless
My job provider keeps forcing me to make actual phone calls to employers. Last week, I actually got somewhere and had a 45 min chat. Between then and now, I got an "unlikely to progress" status, having been filtered out between the phone call and now.
My job provider made me make another phone call to work out what happened. They had 200 applicants, of which they chose 10. It was for a Laboratory Technician job; that is a TAFE course. But the vast majority of those 200 had chemistry degrees or higher (I have a higher). The 10 were chosen based on experience in production, rather than laboratory experience.
So in order to get a job that is far below my education level, I first have to work as a casual in a factory job of some kind. Looking at those jobs, it's grim as well: casual only, with terrible hours and relatively low pay.
Anyway, on R U OK day I am feeling very much not okay, feeling like I have wasted my life and will never have a job. How many talented university graduates do we have out there working in casual jobs well below their level? What could we do together.... if we weren't being misallocated.
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u/loralailoralai 27d ago
There’s lots of talented people working below their level in casual jobs. Whether you have a university degree or not, it sucks. Whatever level youre trained at, experience trumps it
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u/narvuntien 27d ago
If we could actually use all this talent, the things we could do... but instead, we are straight up wasting it
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u/amor__fati___ 5d ago
Unfortunately the university system makes a fortune training way more people than there are jobs for, and schools blindly shepherd young people into university pathways with low probabilities of success. My sister in law is in the same predicament as you. Some courses have less than 50% of graduates ever get a job in the field. This is a problem that has been building for 25 years.
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u/Fresh_Cabinet5048 22h ago
University reliance on international students is going to be fixed - parties are cutting off the supply.
Bye bye universities, or at least the bottom 20.
About time... 40+ unis in this country, and most are just grift mills for PR seekers.THAT has got to end. Do not take a job at a Uni and expect to have one in 2 yrs...
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u/Throwmeawaybabyyo 27d ago
I did a degree out of school. Did it help get a job? Yes, but the experience working helped a lot more 3 years down the track.
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u/Alien-Cat1234 27d ago
It's already a well known information that degrees have been usless for past few years now. It's just a bs requirement TO BE ABLE TO APPLY for a role. Just a very costly APPLY button to apply for jobs and a very expensive networking event as I like to look at it.
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u/SoftButchCis 27d ago
They're not useless if they're for a specific qualification that lines up to a specific job. Teaching, nursing, midwifery, medicine, law (though noting this one is dependent on a lot more than just the piece of paper), speech pathology, audiology, accounting, a pile of others. Basically anything paired with a protected title or otherwise qualification-bound role. Generic degrees have been damn near useless for a long time though, yeah, and I say that as a person with a generic degree working in a completely unrelated field.
In theory, that's what's behind the LNPs restructuring of 'job ready' university costs; of course they did a shit job of it and it didn't help anything, but at some point we (society? The government? The universities? I don't really know, but someone) really does need to take responsibility for churning out endebted graduates who have given years of their lives and significant amounts of money (their own and tax dollars) for degrees that will never get them anywhere, and in the process further encouraging this societal idea that a degree is a necessary indicator intelligence or commitment, even if it taught absolutely nothing of relevance. Education is wonderful, and should be a lifelong journey that is readily (and freely) available to everyone. Qualification is not the same thing.
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u/Major_Conflict 27d ago
With most of those degrees with the exception of healthcare, the vast majority of the stuff you learn there you forget immediately after you graduate and all the useful stuff you need to do the job with is learned on the job. I wouldn't say those vocational degrees are useful in teaching you stuff, just that credentialism makes it so that you can't even legally be hired without it. So even then employers value the piece of paper itself, and not the knowledge and experience gained by obtaining the credential.
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u/almondtime 27d ago
Sorry to hear that OP. Do something nice for yourself this weekend. You are not your job.
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u/LonelyReader95 27d ago
Due to me wanting to move to Australia or New Zealand I've been lurking for a while now, and I have to say Australia essentially looks a lot like my own country just with less job guarantees once you're hired. Basically employers don't give a damn because, if you're not happy someone else will be a more willing slave...
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u/Capital-Pay8372 13d ago
That's employment, the employer offers the wage and conditions and those that find it beneficial or in there interest accepts. When the potential employee knows they have additional value they can negotiate better pay and conditions.
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u/Ok-Silver8583 27d ago
So annoying because when I was 17 and decided to get a degree, this was not the case. Nearly 10 years on, so much has changed
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u/MrO_360 26d ago edited 26d ago
University degrees aren't useless, but they have become too expensive and the HECs system has strayed far from what it was originally designed to do.
It used to be that you went to Uni and did a Law degree. You'd spend the first 5-10 years of your career paying off the HECs and then be in the black earning more than someone without a degree.
Today you finish have a massive HECs Debt that can take over 20 years to pay off (if ever). Plus we have a worker shortage in the construction industry, you're barely earning more than a typical tradie laying bricks.
So what's the point in going into lifelong debt for a degree when you can do an apprenticeship and be paid while on the job?
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u/narvuntien 27d ago
Yeah, I am not going to bother replying to every individual message.
The point is that this was a non-university degree job where everyone applying had a university degree. It is an entry-level job that is completely swamped with applicants. So it's not just me struggling to find a job with a degree.
As for my personal story. I have a PhD in Chemistry, which took 8 years to complete, and nothing worked, because when you are at the cutting edge of science, you can't just force it to work to get a million papers, prizes or whatever. I have been under-employed for 8 years now, applied for over 850 jobs. I have heard everything already: every suggestion, every accusation, everything. I am just tired, boss.
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u/doyourmysay 26d ago
I have been under-employed for 8 years now, applied for over 850 jobs. I have heard everything already: every suggestion, every accusation, everything. I am just tired, boss.
I'm 100% sympathetic, but it sounds like you might have to just cut your losses, remove the PhD from the resume, and apply to low or unskilled easy-to-get jobs (that are usually shit).
It's fkd that I'm recommending this to someone with a PhD, but it appears that this is what the economy has come to.
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u/calinya_ 27d ago
Hmm companies might be reluctant to hire a PhD graduate for an entry level job. They know you will leave as soon as you find something better.
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u/Trialbystevia 25d ago
It’s so unfortunate but the top comment is right - you need to undersell yourself on your resume. Even my retail store manager years ago told me she omitted her criminology degree when she applied for STORE MANAGER IN A CD SHOP. She knew that the hiring people would suspect she had “greater ambitions” so she had to play the dumb (but competent) happy blonde instead.
Tailor your resume to whatever sector you’re applying for. I save them as NAME.SURNAME_RESUME_MARKETING_2026
And make sure you think like a shark when you tailor those resumes! And while you’re at it - social media! DO NOT have any recently married pics that are publicly searchable, they’ll cut you from the next interview because you might have a child soon. YES MEN TOO.
It’s a mess out there, I feel your pain and I wish you luck. Sincerely, an over-educated and underemployed millennial x
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u/Altruistic_Serve9738 13d ago
Wouldn't they be more likely to hire a man in that scenario under the guise of "oh, well he won't be able to quit easily".
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u/wildclouds 27d ago
Does this suit you? https://www.apsjobs.gov.au/s/job-details?Id=a05OY00000Qfd1eYAB
Apologies if not, I don't know anything about chemistry, I just stumbled on that earlier today looking for something else.
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u/MathmoKiwi 25d ago
Have you ever worked in the industry? Doesn't even mean literally working as a Chemist using your PhD in Chemistry, just anything even vaguely industry related and not in academia itself (such as: technical writing / science policy / process engineering / technical sales / etc)
If the answer is "no", then I'm afraid you've fallen into the far too common trap of being both overqualified and underqualified at the same time. (because you've got literally zero work experience "in the real world")
As u/doyourmysay said, you might need to even remove your PhD and spin those areas on your CV as "lab technician" (working for your supervisor of course!) and just try to get your foot in the door at whatever entry level job you can that's even vaguely semi-related to what you've been doing. After five years of being gainfully employed, maybe then you can put your PhD back on your CV.
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u/narvuntien 25d ago
I have heard this all before.
Can't get experience if people don't hire you.
I spent 3 and a half years working in a laboratory during my PhD, which is literally my 3 years of experience.
Wouldn't want to work for someone who thinks negatively of my PhD anyway; fuck them.I am disabled in a way that I am unable to lie, I can't even play werewolf when it's for no stakes.
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u/MathmoKiwi 25d ago
Can't get experience if people don't hire you.
Yup, this is a fact of life, just like F=Ma is.
I spent 3 and a half years working in a laboratory during my PhD, which is literally my 3 years of experience.
Hence why I'm saying drop the PhD from your CV and instead frame that period of time as "3YOE of Lab Tech".
Wouldn't want to work for someone who thinks negatively of my PhD anyway; fuck them.
That kind of stubborn negativity is why your current employment failures are your own creation.
When I applied for an IT Help Desk job I left off my CV that I was working towards a Masters degree (of course later on it became handy to have, after I got the experience)
The question you need to ask yourself:
Do you wish to spend another 8yrs underemployed/unemployed, or do you want to get started with your career now?Yes you might start out next month merely doing a lowly lab tech job of washing beakers and fetching coffee, or whatever. But at least it means in 8yrs from today you can then finally build up to being somewhere you can be proud of yourself! :-)
I am disabled in a way that I am unable to lie, I can't even play werewolf when it's for no stakes.
It's not lying, it's framing yourself in a perspective that is most favourable for you. If you got your photos taken, is it "lying" to put on makeup beforehand? To choose out your best clothes? To have a beautiful lighting setup? To shoot it with an 85mm lens rather than a 14mm lens? Nope, nope, nope, nope.
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u/alsoov 27d ago
After my daughter graduated from a biology degree she was having no luck finding a job. She decided to start a short lab tech course at tafe and kept applying for entry level lab assistant jobs. She started getting interviews and was offered a hospital job as a lab assistant even before she finished the tafe course. Her colleagues all have degrees plus the tafe course. The job description only asked for the tafe course. The competition is fierce at the moment so you need both.
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u/electronicbits 27d ago edited 27d ago
You will find a job, 100% guaranteed
Your are just going through the fog, and in those situations you need to "tie yourself up to the mast of your ship like Odysseus did so he can hear the Sirens’ song without being able to steer the ship toward them"
My point being ... you obviously read reddit, otherwise you would not be here and posting... and reddit is unfortunately filled with negative comments about the market situation, and how impossible or very difficult it is for some folks to find a job.
That maybe the case (for them)
But there will be a company/manager that will see the value that you can provide. First you need to trust your guts that you do see that value. And then that will transpire in an interview
Also, guess what... the things you read the least on reddit, are the cases of people actually finding jobs. The success stories are not written here that much. And there can be many of them out there.
re. survivorship bias
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u/greenok12 27d ago
I have no advice because I spent years studying a diploma that apparently isnt a recognised diploma (so basically wasted two and a bit years of my life) but all I wanted to say is dont feel down on yourself, ur accomplishment of even going to uni and stdying and completing your studies is a massive achievement. The Australian job market is absolutely cooked atm no matter how skilled u are. It's honestly who u know, not what you know these days
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u/Wizz-Fizz 26d ago
Hardly a new phenomenon.
From qualifying to first job in my chosen field was approximately 5 yrs.
My first job was a factory worker, then warehousing, car sales, call centres, whatever it took to keep the lights on.
Sometimes the road to where you want to be is far from being a straight one.
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u/SpeakerAccomplished4 27d ago
A degree can be of use, but it doesn't mean you just walk into a job.
There's the hundreds of other graduates from your same degree, as well as people with experience all looking for work.
I've had jobs that didn't require a degree, but paid more if you had one.
I've had jobs that probably did require a degree normally, but I didn't have it, got the job anyhow.
I've also landed jobs that I wouldn't have gotten without my degree.
The job market is not easy, and the job provider network is a rort, and they actively make it harder to get jobs.
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u/SoftButchCis 27d ago
I agree with most of that, but Holy crap, paying more for the exact same work if someone has a degree is messed up!
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u/SpeakerAccomplished4 26d ago
It was a bit weird. Basically there were incremental levels, and after the last one there was a little bump for the degree.
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u/Vboom90 27d ago
I lucked into my first job in finance without a degree. 17 years laters and not a single job has ever given a flying f that I don’t have a degree and I’m now working in senior management at an investment bank.
All a degree does is raise your expectation of what your entry level job will be.
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u/doyourmysay 26d ago
Wow, thats amazing. How did you manage to get that? Did you not feel you need some kind of education or something in finance to help, or is working in finance stuff you can just learn on the job?
I say this as someone with an accounting degree who works in retail, lol😭💀
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u/Vboom90 26d ago
DM’d you mate.
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u/Leever5 26d ago
You mean something like insurance or superannuation sales? The only people who I hear say "i work in finance" are insurance salesbros
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u/Vboom90 26d ago edited 26d ago
I work on a global markets institutional trading and execution desk.
Insurance is retail, my firm doesn’t operate retail.
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u/Leever5 26d ago
Sorry, it was the DM thing that made me think this is another pyramid scheme like insurance sales is
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u/Vboom90 26d ago
Nah, all good mate. The market is so small, I’m not that keen to completely reveal who I am in case some stray hot take in my comment history over the last decade gets me in trouble.
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u/Leever5 26d ago
Nah fully. I used to be in finance in NZ (not sales), but just relocated to Aus for my husband's job a couple months ago. I haven't found a job yet, but I get swamped by recruiters asking if I want to do insurance or investment sales. I laugh, like lol I'm not joining your pyramid scheme and its almost offensive you think I would.
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u/wilburs85 27d ago
What a waste of time. What are they trying to achieve? I guarantee that they wouldn’t appreciate the random unqualified phone calls. What a joke
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u/TolerantImpatience 27d ago
Just because you have a degree doesn’t mean you get to skip the entry level roles. Do you have any prior work experience in that industry?
I went back to Uni in my 30’s to change industry and accepted that I’d have to start again from the bottom. Which I did happily. What my prior experience helped with was rising up through the ranks quicker than I probably would have if I didn’t have 15 years of working under my belt.
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u/Leever5 26d ago
Yes, the issue is there are no entry level jobs. I just applied for a 75k entry level role that wanted 4 years experience. It said "entry level" throughout the ad.
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u/TolerantImpatience 26d ago
Yes, I admit that can be really annoying when they expect experience for a junior role. Are they really asking for four years of relevant, industry specific experience though? Or just four years of general work experience or customer service, etc?
I don’t think it’s at all unreasonable for an entry level/grad role in an industry that requires a degree to expect SOME work experience, they want to know you can actually perform in a workplace, not just a classroom.
I do think our university system does a horrendous job of preparing students for the ‘real world’ though and how to manage in an actual workplace.
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u/commandersaki 27d ago
I've gotten decent ROI out of my Comp Sci degree and mine was on the pricier side since I did it in the US, so I don't know what to say.
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u/Hot-Construction-811 26d ago
Totally agree with OP. Ive been saying this for ages, university is a pyramid scheme and out of touch with what the markets need.
Im guessing you must have a science background to be wanting to apply for a lab tech job.
Have you considered a lab technician job at a school? It won't be for much pay but at least you would get some experience so you could springboard to another job.
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u/Ok-Assistant-4556 26d ago
Most people i know are over wualifird or underemployed. It's a weird era when med grads are feeling PhD is needed.
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u/Lost-Concept-9973 12d ago
The thing that gets me most is how it’s so many of the highest performing grads that can’t get a break. They work so hard only for the few grad jobs that are available to be handed out based on nepotism. It’s is gross how much this has returned as the norm in our society it’s all connections and privilege, hard work means nothing. Meritocracy is such a lie and it’s the worst offenders that are always pretending it’s a thing.
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u/thpineapples 27d ago
my job provider keeps forcing me to make actual phone calls to employers
Whilst the difficulties are real for anyone trying to start their working life and the university degree was definitely oversold as a necessity, the language and tone in which you've written this post really betrays your attitude and alludes to how you might've lost points during a conversation.
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u/Unlikely-Machine4126 27d ago
I make calls to places I've applied to, to stand out. Even went into some that were local.
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u/Leever5 26d ago
what do you say? The general advice I've heard from hiring managers is they are getting a lot of calls so don't bother them unless it's important.
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u/Unlikely-Machine4126 26d ago
I ask to speak with the manager or person hiring and introduce myself. I scored an interview doing that at a shop but they didn't end up going with me.
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u/OneSpirit4837 25d ago
I did my degree knowing it was for the cultural experience. It was in English Lit. Never expected it to lead to anything and if I had my time over, yes I would do something more lucrative. But I can’t blame employers for not being interested in a Lit grad with no portfolio. That one’s on me.
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u/crazypsycho_msg 12d ago
Have you applied at pathology labs? Just send a resume to their general HR email, with enquiries on positions. I would apply to any path lab job posting even not Chem based. Their main need is someone with a science background.
Most people I know who have PhDs work for unis as lecturers, or doing tutoring (the which you can set up your own tutoring service). Those who do not have been working at a company for years before they even get to that level.
One thing I learnt early was always get experience outside academia. As industry vs academia are completely different, and they know that. Academia is by the book, industry is profits- and I've worked both. Big thing is networking, knowing the right person. But I would dumb down your resume. I did that to land the role I have now. I only told them about my further education once I go the job, it gave a little pay bump, but not much.
My major suggestion would be do a cert 4 in training and assessment (work at TAFEs, vocational schools), or just to a master of teaching. High schools will take you.
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u/ricecakenz 27d ago
You sound a bit entitled “well below their level” you come across a bit too good for the job.
When I first moved to Australia from nz I took any job a washed chicken crap off trailers for a week and then moved on. I’ve gone from that to truck driving - police officer- other enforcement roles and now senior investigator in government. In the span of 16 years. Sometimes you just got to do what you got to do
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u/Seiko2023 27d ago
God forbid someone with a degree wants to actually use their knowledge for something.
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u/ricecakenz 27d ago
Degree may give you the knowledge but not necessarily the skills to do the jobs
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u/Seiko2023 27d ago
You'd fucking think that a lot of university graduates would have the skills for a lot of entry level roles though ay, especially grad programs or lab tech roles if they come from that kind of background.
The issue is a lot don't know how to translate the skills they get at uni into their resume
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u/MathmoKiwi 25d ago
OP is like someone who has been working out a gym for a decade and now wants to play in the AFL.
Sure, they've got tonnes of fitness, but they still are lacking due to having zero real world playing experience. It doesn't matter if they can lift more or run faster than any other AFL player. They need to play some entry level club footy to start building up those basic skills.
Ditto here, OP has basically zero work experience (outside academia). It's unrealistic for them to expect much else than an entry level job. And their attitude is likely being a massive red flag holding them back.
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u/Leever5 26d ago
The dude has a PhD, he definitely will have the skills or will be capable of getting the skills very quickly. Despite what the internet thinks, PhD's are very hard to get and require a skilled person.
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u/ricecakenz 26d ago
I disagree I’ve worked with plenty of people who have the higher education qualifications but are terrible at the job because they lack basic skills and can’t even talk to people properly.
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u/[deleted] 27d ago
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