Amanda L. Griffith is an assistant professor of economics at Wake Forest University.

Research has shown that the highest returns in wage premiums go to students who major in engineering, science or business. In times of expansion and technological advances, these fields also grow the quickest.

Someone who decides to major in science solely because of the wage premium may not have the skills to take advantage of it.

The reason that technology and business majors earn a wage premium is because they are scarce, so if we make them less scarce the wage premium will disappear, unless there is a large increase in demand for workers with these degrees.

Perhaps just as important, there's evidence that matching actual skills to a job choice is key in determining wages and wage growth. A talented humanities student who decides to major in science solely because of the wage premium might not receive the full wage premium because his or her skill set may not be well matched to the jobs in that field.

However, data show that students who major in arts or social sciences and double major in a science, engineering or business field can increase their wage premium. The combination of skills learned in the two disparate majors likely creates new job pathways.

Certainly, an increase in funding for science, engineering and business programs would be beneficial for students. But to do this at the expense of the traditional liberal arts fields would be a mistake.

Besides, if more and more students go into technology and business fields, who will write the books or create the artwork to be enjoyed on devices like the Kindle or the iPad?