More evidence the bachelor’s is the new HS diploma
I suspect that the overall consensus among post-tech boom college grads is that a bachelor’s degree is not enough. It certainly is the case in my circle of friends and classmates, which has recently become overpopulated with lawyers, although MBA’s, doctors, Ph.D.’s, and those of us pursuing other types of master’s degrees with an eye to increasing our marketability are also significantly in evidence.
So it was with little surprise that I read the Wall Street Journal’s confirmation of this conventional wisdom: since 2001, the average earnings of college graduates have stagnated in inflation-adjusted terms. More to the point:
The issue isn’t a lack of economic growth, which was solid for most of the 2000s. Rather, it’s that the fruits of growth are flowing largely to “a relatively small group of people who have a particular set of skills and assets that lots of other people don’t,” says Mr. Bernstein. And that “doesn’t necessarily have that much to do with your education.” In short, a college degree is often necessary, but not sufficient, to get a paycheck that beats inflation.
Translation: if you weren’t doing some type of financial engineering (an actual major a woman once told me she had!), you were SOL when it came to having major salary growth during this period. However, according to the article, the trick is, unless you went to a handful of elite schools, you were probably shut out of that boom. Which is not to say you were doing poorly — you still made about 75% more than a person who only has a HS diploma. That’s a massive gap that says, to me at least, that in order to achieve the middle-class existence that many of us take for granted, it’s necessary to get a four year-degree. And that means that we have to continue making college education more affordable for those who want to go, and do a better job of preparing students to succeed in that realm.
