Half of College Grads Are Working Jobs That Don’t Use Their Degrees
Roughly half of college graduates end up in jobs where their degrees aren’t needed, and that underemployment has lasting implications for workers’ earnings and career paths. That is the key finding of a new study tracking the career paths of more than 10 million people who entered the job market over the past decade.
It suggests that the number of graduates in jobs that don’t make use of their skills or credentials—52%—is greater than previously thought, and underscores the lasting importance of that first job after graduation. Of the graduates in non-college-level jobs a year after leaving college, the vast majority remained underemployed a decade later, according to researchers at labor analytics firm Burning Glass Institute and nonprofit Strada Education Foundation, which analyzed the résumés of workers who graduated between 2012 and 2021.
More than any other factor analyzed—including race, gender and choice of university—what a person studies determines their odds of getting on a college-level career track. Internships are also critical.
The findings add fuel to the debate over the value of a college education as its cost has soared—and whether universities are producing the kind of knowledge workers that employers say they need. “You’re told your entire life, ‘Go to college, get a bachelor’s degree and your life is gonna be gravy after that,’" said Alexander Wolfe, 29 years old, a 2018 graduate from Northern Kentucky University who currently works security at a corporate facility in the Cincinnati area.
“In reality, it hasn’t really helped me that much." The past decade’s hot labor market doesn’t appear to have dented the vast pool of underemployed, college-educated workers. Getting stuck early on in such jobs can
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