填志愿选专业还是选学校？「经济学人」告诉你答案
高考结束了，成绩出来了，又该填志愿了，你家的七大姑八大姨们开始咨询你的学校、专业等等情况了吗？
开个玩笑，哈哈哈，但确实应该具体情况具体分析：D
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那么，志愿究竟怎么选？选学校还是选专业呢？今天，我们就一起来看看《经济学人》2015年的这篇文章。
虽然文章非常简短，只有两段话配上两张图，但信息量还是比较丰富的，从中我们也能学到不少精彩表达，特别是数值图表写作相关的。
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Is your degree worth it?
It depends what you study, not where
○ be worth it: 是值得的，物有所值；
其实文章大标题就告诉了你答案“It depends what you study, not where”。你的学历有价值吗？取决于你所学的(专业)，而非学校。
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下面看文章第一段，
◉ 第一句，A new report from PayScale, a research firm, calculates the returns to a college degree.
这份报告来源于PayScale，这是一家薪酬统计调查公司，尤以发布美国大学毕业生的薪水排行闻名。
○ return 很好理解，作为名词，返回，回报；报答，这里指“收益；利润；收入”(the profit that you get from an investment)
举个🌰
The return on the money we invested was very low.
我们投资获得的收益很低。
◉ 第二句，Its authors compare the career earnings of graduates with the present-day cost of a degree at their alma maters, net of financial aid.
○ present-day 就是“现在的，当前的，当今的”
举个🌰：当今的观点 present-day attitudes
○ alma maters: [ˌælmə 'mɑ:tə(r)]“母校”的意思(the school, college, or university where you studied)，此外还可以指“校歌”(the official song of a school, college, or university)
◉ 第三句，College is usually worth it, but not always, it transpires. And what you study matters far more than where you study it.
○ transpire: 指的是“（秘密或未知事实）暴露，公开，为人所知”(it transpires that something has happened, this previously secret or unknown fact becomes known.)
举个🌰
It may yet transpire that ministers knew more than they are admitting at the moment.
但有一天人们或许会发现，部长们当时知道的比他们现在承认的要多。
此外，它还可以表示“发生”，一个可以替换“happen”的更高级说法。
举个🌰
We had to watch the replay to figure out what had transpired.
我们得看回放才能知道究竟发生了什么。
○“And (what you study) matters far more than (where you study it)”这句跟标题呼应，统计报告指出，你所学的专业远比你在哪里就读更重要(matters far more than)。
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下面看文章的另一段：
◉ 前两句，Engineers and computer scientists do best, earning an impressive 20-year annualised return of 12% on their college fees (the S&P 500 yielded just 7.8%). Engineering graduates from run-of-the-mill colleges do only slightly worse than those from highly selective ones.
○ annualised 表示“按年计算的”(of an amount or number) calculated over a year)
举个🌰
Exports fell at an annualized rate of 12.3 percent, while imports rose at a 7.5 percent pace.
从年度总额来看，出口下降了12.3%，而进口上升了7.5%。
○ yield: “产生；出产；得出”(to supply or produce something positive such as a profit, an amount of food or information)
举个🌰：提高利润的努力 an attempt to yield increased profits
○ run-of-the-mill: 表示“普普通通的；平淡无奇的；乏味的”(ordinary and not special or exciting in any way)，与后文说的“highly selective”形成鲜明对比，指不同院校。
举个🌰
He gave a fairly run-of-the-mill speech.
他的演讲很乏味。
◉ 第三句，Business and economics degrees also pay well, delivering a solid 8.7% average return.
○ 前面说工程师和计算机科学家最赚钱，用do best；这里说金融类专业待遇也不错，用also pay well，都非常简洁明了。
◉ 最后，Courses in the arts or the humanities offer vast spiritual rewards, of course, but less impressive material ones. Some yield negative returns. An arts degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art had a hefty 20-year net negative return of $92,000, for example.
○ 这里还不忘调侃人文艺术类专业，虽然精神回报、精神奖励之类的蛮多，但物质上的就没有像理工科专业那么impressive了，哈哈哈，有些甚至还负回报，亏了(negative returns)
○ hefty: 指的是“（数额、尺寸、力量等）大的，可观的”(large in amount, size, force, etc.)
举个🌰：a hefty bill/fine 巨额账单／罚款
顺便对比下文中一些数值的相关表述，如deliver和earn、什么时候用of以及百分比数字放的位置等等，这些都可以自己归纳和积累起来：
delivering a solid 8.7% average return;
earning an impressive 20-year annualised return of 12%;
a hefty 20-year net negative return of $92,000;
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最后，我们一起看下文中的配图，红点表示工程师/计算机科学家/数学，就是理工科类专业，蓝点表示艺术/人文学，就是文科之类的专业。横坐标是大学录取率(University Admission Rate)，纵坐标为20年平均年收入。可以看出，与院校没有多大关系，红点基本都高于蓝点。
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最后的最后，留言里一起聊一聊呀
选专业，选学校的那些事
你的专业有什么坑？