Are Master’s Degrees in the humanities worth it?

In today’s relentlessly capitalist society, value is often measured in financial terms: salary brackets, property portfolios, and investment potential. Our culture prizes productivity, innovation, and entrepreneurialism above almost everything else. Hobbies must be monetised, passions turned into startups, and even rest seems to be branded as “strategic recovery.” Within this framework, the pursuit of knowledge for the deep, personal engagement with ideas, history, and culture has become an almost radical act.

This shift is especially evident in how we view education. Increasingly, traditional academic routes are being dismissed or devalued in favour of more "practical" alternatives: apprenticeships, internships, and entry-level schemes. These can be excellent options, especially in industries where hands-on experience trumps theoretical study. But this growing preference for direct-to-job pipelines is having a knock-on effect, particularly on postgraduate education.

Master’s degrees, especially in the humanities, are now often seen as indulgent, unnecessary, or worse, a waste of time and money. In a society obsessed with speed and outcome, the idea of spending another year or two studying literature, philosophy, history, or the arts, with no guaranteed return on investment, seems almost countercultural. Why “waste” time dissecting 18th-century poetry or exploring theories of identity when your peers are securing salaries, climbing career ladders, and posting LinkedIn updates about their latest achievements?

But this utilitarian view of education is short-sighted. It reduces learning to a transaction and equates worth with economic return. What it fails to account for is the immeasurable value of intellectual curiosity, the richness of academic exploration, and the personal growth that comes from studying something you truly care about.

A master’s degree in the humanities is not always about career advancement, and that’s okay. It can be about depth rather than direction. It can be about asking better questions, sharpening your critical thinking, or learning to see the world in more complex and nuanced ways. It can be about joy.

And yes, there is joy in rigorous thought. Joy in devoting yourself to a subject that has captured your interest, whether that’s classical philosophy, feminist theory, or medieval literature. For many, the act of studying is itself a fulfilling experience, one that feeds the mind and spirit in ways that a paycheck simply cannot.

Of course, we should be honest about the realities. A postgraduate degree comes with a significant financial cost, and in many cases, it won’t catapult you into a higher income bracket. The return is often not immediate, nor is it always tangible. But if it is a subject you are passionate about, and you can reasonably afford to do so, then the investment is far from wasted.

We need to push back against the narrative that all education must be instrumental, that it must lead directly to a job, a promotion, or a salary increase. We are not robots programmed to produce endlessly. We are, fundamentally, curious beings. We are thinkers, readers, creators, and questioners. The humanities remind us of that. They reconnect us with the complexity of human experience and the beauty of thought.

So, are master’s degrees in the humanities worth it? They are, if you love what you’re studying. 

And perhaps most importantly, they are worth it because not everything in life needs to be “useful” in the capitalist sense. Some things are simply worthwhile.