Education Premium On The Rise
It may not come as much comfort to those recent college graduates who are dealing with big education loans while struggling to find a job, but a new study by the College Board says people with a college degree have been far less likely to experience unemployment over the last few years than those with less education.
The study, “Education Pays: 2010,” found that the unemployment rate for workers with a bachelor’s degree is about half that for those with just a high-school diploma.
By 2008, four-year college graduates earned a median $55,700 for full-time work, compared with $33,800 for high-school graduates. The higher educated group’s earnings rose faster than the other’s.
The College Board said that even after using loans to finance all their tuition and putting off work to go to school, it would take the typical college graduate just 11 years to recoup the cost of the loans plus the foregone earnings.
Over 40 years of work, the study found, the typical college graduate can expect to earn 66 percent more than the typical worker with just a high school education.
Real pay for high-school graduates, particularly men, has been on the decline for decades. In 2008 dollars, male high school graduates ages 25 to 34 earned $49,700 in 1978, compared with $32,500 in 2008.
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