Learning a second language may or may not be beneficial

A week or so ago Market Watch ran an article claiming that learning a second language can help boost your earning ability. While I agree that high demand skills can be fiscally lucrative I believe the author not only understates the challenge of becoming truly fluent in a second language, but overlooks the social implications of doing so. She also ignores the competitive advantage that native speakers have over non-native speakers.

I base my opinion on several facts. First we as children in the United States are not exposed to secondary languages which from the start makes the task more difficult.Second even though many of the children who grow up in bilingual homes they typically learn a second language out of necessity not choice. And third a second language will only help if it's the right second language, but the task of predicting what is in demand is a difficult one.

For years the education system has tried to teach children language skills from an early age but to date these have had little impact. Growing up I can remember hearing Spanish on TV and in the classroom and I was forced to take two semesters of it in college yet as an adult I can neither read or write the language. It's great that we desire to expose our children to other cultures and languages but it's unrealistic to believe that kids can learn a second language without being consistently exposed to it.

Which leads into my second point that children who are exposed to multiple languages as children often do so out of necessity. In Europe many countries have more than one official language and it's often necessary to be fluent in both to secure the most lucrative jobs. For example in Belgium workers who speak both French and Dutch are more desirable than those who speak only one language. Of course a Belgian's bi-lingual capacity would be less beneficial if say one was working abroad in Asia or the United States.

Much fuss has been made about the need for American's to learn a second language in order to compete in the global economy. Given our geographic neighbors the obvious choice would be Spanish since nearly all of Central and South America speak it. However since the United States is both a favored destination for immigrants as well as a global economic power house other languages could also be valuable. Of course you must be careful as the fortunes of foreign nations wax and wane. It can take many years to learn a second language, especially as an adult, and you want to make sure that such a long term investment remains a favorable selling point to an employer.

Finally though it's possible, yet more difficult, to learn a second language as an adult it's a hard fact that bi-lingual native speakers will always be more desirable if they are otherwise qualified. Native speakers have the distinct advantage of knowing local customs, laws and practices as well as subtle nuances of local dialects. Often times these are important in business as are raw linguistic skills.

Of course the value of knowing and understanding a second language can not be understated if only for the cultural exposure it provides to students. Simply being able to read a second language can open up a host of possibilities for those who love to read books or foreign news sources. Holistically learning a second language can be a very fulfilling endeavor regardless of its value in the workplace.

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