UNITED STATES: Why graduates are underemployed and overeducated

When Barack Obama first became president, he set the goal of increasing America’s college graduation rate to 60% by 2020. But the idea of working towards becoming a nation of college graduates has a major problem, according to a report by the Center for College Affordability and Productivity, writes Michael De Groote for Deseret News. There are not enough jobs that require a college degree.


Analysing 2010 data from the US Department of Labor, the report finds that of the 41.7 million working college graduates, barely half (51.9%) are working in jobs that require a bachelor degree or higher. Thirty-seven percent are in jobs that require a high school diploma or less. The rest (11.1%) are in jobs that require some post-secondary training such as an associate's degree.

In other words, there are 13 million college graduates working in jobs that don't require a bachelor degree or more.