A recent report indicates that while students might be incurring thousands of dollars in student loan debt due to increasing tuition, the value of a college degree is rising.
The report, “Education Pays: The Benefits of Higher Education for Individuals and Society,” was released Tuesday. The report stated that those in the workforce with a college degree earned more and were also more likely to be employed in comparison to individuals with only a high school education.
Statistics in the report show that the median earnings of workers who had bachelor’s degrees was $55,700 as of 2008 – a whopping $21,900 more than those with only a high school diploma. The numbers also illustrated that those with a bachelor’s degree will earn approximately 66 percent more than high school graduates throughout a 40-year working period.
The report also stated that the unemployment rate in 2009 for college graduates was 4.6 percent, in comparison to a rate of 9.7 percent for high school grads.
“If it wasn’t clear before, it should be abundantly clear now that a college graduate is far more competitive in today’s workplace,” said Gaston Caperton, president of the College Board.
Gaston also addressed the concern of increasing student loan debt accrued by students to pay for tuition
“Even for students who use loans to finance all of their tuition, it would only take about 11 years to recoup the cost plus foregone earnings,” Gaston said. “Over the long run, they would be much better off financially than their counterparts without a degree.”
A correlation between a college degree, community involvement and health was also presented by the report.
“Education pays out more than dollars,” said Sandy Baum, an independent policy analyst for the College Board. “If you have a college degree you are more likely to exercise, volunteer, vote and read to your kids, and less likely to be obese or smoke.”
The report did find that some racial disparities remain. Blacks and Hispanics are less likely to be admitted into college and graduate in comparison to whites, according to the report.