Houston, we have a problem.
Half of recent college graduates are either unemployed or underemployed.
You don't want well-intentioned platitudes about reaching for the stars. You want to know:
* Should you go to college?
* What should you major in...
He went to college right after high school, to the most exclusive place he could get into—a big-name research university with Nobel laureates on the faculty. He had heard about the crisis-level shortage of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) majors [1], so he chose to major in environmental science.
John wanted to graduate in four years, so he concentrated on his schoolwork. He turned down opportunities for internships and study abroad, as they would have lengthened his time to degree. He never met any of those Nobel laureates on the faculty. They worked mainly with graduate students, it turned out; undergraduates like John never saw them.
John graduated with a decent GPA, and expected to earn enough to pay off his student loans quickly. Unfortunately, competition for the few desirable jobs was fierce, and many available positions were in remote areas. They offered no moving allowance or job security, and the pay was disappointingly low. He looked into it a little more, and found that while politicians and education pundits were still banging on about the supposed STEM shortage, 29% of graduates in his field were working part-time, and over half were in jobs that didn't require a college degree at all [2].
After a few months of job-hunting, he was out of money and options. He now works two part-time jobs. Both employers limit his hours to avoid paying benefits. Fortunately, his parents are keeping him on their health insurance...for now.
John's story is not unusual. Although fewer than five percent of recent college graduates are unemployed, an additional 45 percent work in jobs that typically don't require a college degree [3]. And as he found, it's not just the much-maligned art history (52%) or ethnic studies (51%) majors who are taking your coffee order or folding shirts at the mall. 75% of criminal justice majors and 60% of business management majors are underemployed. And it turns out there really wasn't a shortage of STEM workers after all. "Every year U.S. schools grant more STEM degrees than there are available jobs [1]."
What went wrong?
The college degree used to be rare. In 1950, only six percent of U.S. adults over 25 had a four-year degree or higher. It was a credential that really stood out. But today, around one-third of U.S. adults over 25 have a four-year degree or higher. The college degree today is exactly as "rare" as a high school diploma was in 1950 [4].
Some philanthropists and policymakers are pushing to get even more people to go to college, aiming to have up to 60% of the population holding a postsecondary degree [5]. To support this goal, they often cite a 2011 study titled The Undereducated American [6] that projected that by 2018 33% of all job openings would require a bachelor's degree or higher, while an additional 30% would require some postsecondary education. The study was published by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, a think tank funded by the Lumina Foundation for Education, The Joyce Foundation, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation [7].
That prediction turned out to be wrong. The U.S. Department of Labor projects that the percentage of positions requiring a bachelor's degree or higher will increase from 22.34% in 2012 to 22.8% in 2022, ten percentage points lower than the 33% claimed by the Georgetown researchers. The percentage of positions requiring any postsecondary education will increase from 33.69% in 2012 to 34.66% in 2022 [8].
There are too many educated Americansrelative to the number of available jobs.
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