These days, there may be something more valuable to job seekers than a four-year college degree: a two-year college degree.
Employment for Americans with an associate's degree or some college
has increased by 578,000 the past six months to 35.2 million, while
payrolls for those with at least a bachelor's are up by just 314,000 to
46.5 million, Labor Department figures show.
The trend underlines
that some of the midskill jobs that disappeared in the recession are
coming back and it may signal more lasting growth in such occupations.
They include operators of computerized factory machines, heating and air
conditioning repair people, X-ray technicians, medical records
specialists and low- to midlevel managers.
In
recent years, "The share of these jobs has not grown (sharply) relative
to (those requiring a bachelor's)," says Anthony Carnevale, head of the
Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce. "But they
may have begun to do that."
By contrast, employment for
people with a high school diploma or less has been stagnant since 2010,
after plummeting in the downturn.
After the recession began
almost five years ago, many factory, construction and other midskill
jobs were eliminated even as employment for those with bachelor's
degrees or higher dipped only slightly. In the recovery in 2010 and
2011, payrolls for four-year college graduates increased at more than
twice the rate of those who attended community college.
That
follows a typical pattern. In recessions, employers lay off lower-skill
workers first and in recoveries, they initially hire higher-skill
workers, Carnevale says. Eventually, those higher-level managers bring
on low- to midlevel managers. That's happening now, and so community
college graduates are recouping jobs lost in the downturn - a sign of an
advancing recovery.
The trend also points to growing demand for
skilled workers who can be trained relatively quickly, Carnevale says.
Many laid-off workers have turned to community colleges and vocational
schools in recent years to rapidly retool for new careers. That has
helped boost enrollment by 14.6% since 2007, vs. 1.3% the previous five
years, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.
By contrast, many recent four-year college graduates have
struggled to find work. "I think the two-year schools are offering more
of an applicable, practical value," says Thomas Ruhe, vice president of
the Kauffman Foundation, which studies entrepreneurship. Many community
colleges, he says, have better ties to local employers.
It's unlikely an associate degree will become more coveted than a
bachelor's, Carnevale says, but the disparity between the two could
narrow.
Krystal Manke, an electrical engineering major at
Gateway Technical College in Kenosha, Wis., considered more-expensive
four-year schools. But, "I felt that even if I didn't learn the same
amount of material (at Gateway), the quality of education would still be
very high and it would give me the opportunity to enter the workforce
very quickly," she says.
USA Today