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‘Adult money’ and no college debt: Harris and Trump back alternative routes to good jobs

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‘Adult money’ and no college debt: Harris and Trump back alternative routes to good jobs

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WASHINGTON − Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump disagree – a lot. But, as the 2024 campaign heats up, the candidates appear to have found consensus on at least one topic: the need to get more young Americans into apprenticeships and trade schools.  

Harris announced recently she would cut college degree requirements for some federal jobs and encourage private sector employers to do the same if she is elected in November.  

She told the crowd in the former mining town of Wilkes-Barre, Penn., that “for far too long,” the U.S. has “encouraged only one path to success: four-year college.” 

“Our nation needs to recognize the value of other paths,” Harris said, noting the importance of apprenticeships and trade programs as she spoke in a largely blue-collar district in the most critical swing state.  

Trump has pitched similar policies, too.  

As president, in 2020, he signed an executive order mandating that federal agencies prioritize a job applicant’s skills over college degree requirements when hiring. The policy is among the few Trump-era orders President Joe Biden chose not to axe when he took office.  

The growing bipartisan focus comes as American attitudes toward higher education have shifted during the last decade. 

As the cost of college has skyrocketed, enrollment in undergraduate degree programs has plummeted, and politicians on both sides of the aisle are searching for alternative ways to bolster workforce development. 

Nearly two thirds of Americans over the age of 25 don’t have a bachelor’s degree, according to 2023 Census Bureau numbers. A survey that same year by the think-tank New America found that 66% of respondents believed they could find well-paying, stable jobs with just a high school diploma or GED, compared with just 50% who held the same belief in 2018. 

How did we get here? 

Bipartisan support for apprenticeships isn’t necessarily new. In the late 1980s and 1990s there was widespread interest in scaling and strengthening apprenticeship programs. 

But as the wages of college graduates increased relative to those in trade careers in the early 2000s, high schoolers were pushed into four-year degree programs.  

During his first address to Congress in 2009, former President Barack Obama urged all Americans to seek higher education, and he set a goal for the country to have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world by 2020.  

College enrollment steadily rose. Between 2000 and 2019, the number of Americans attending traditional colleges jumped by roughly 28%.  

The Trump factor

While both Democrats and Republicans expressed support for alternative pathways to college – and even passed the 2015 American Apprenticeship Initiative, giving more than $100 million to expand registered apprenticeships into new sectors – much of the focus remained on higher education.  

Will Marshall, founder and president of the Progressive Policy Institute, a center-left think tank, said he remembers being criticized by more liberal friends for not embracing college-for-all policies. Marshall had advocated for public investment in apprenticeships and non-college career programs.

The tone began to change, he said, shortly after Trump was elected in 2016.  

“People began to look at what I think is the most important development of national politics, which is the polarization of the parties along educational lines,” Marshall said. 

That year, Trump won more support from voters without a college degree, whereas his opponent, Hillary Clinton, garnered more votes from college graduates.

The outcome was a wake-up call for progressives, Marshall said.   

“It dawned on people that the non-college majority, including the hardcore Trump supporters, weren’t looking for college, they were looking for short-term training and accreditation programs, other ways to break into the labor market,” Marshall said.  

The rising cost of college also made apprenticeships, community college and vocational training programs a more worthwhile investment in some cases. The price of tuition at a public 4-year university skyrocketed by more than 35% between 2010 and 2023. Apprenticeship, meanwhile, still cost nothing and many provide earn-while-you-learn training.

‘Adult money’ and no college debt

It’s a big reason Sarah Jones, 21, opted to forgo college in favor of an apprenticeship with the Steamfitters Local 602 in Maryland when she graduated high school in 2022. Jones knew she didn’t want an office job and saw that her father, who drives a garbage truck, made good money without a college degree.

As a third-year apprentice learning how to service HVAC equipment, she now makes more than $30 an hour and says choosing the program is one of the best decisions she’s ever made.

“I’m not gonna have any college debt,” Jones said. “People need to start looking at their college debt to how much money they’re making when they get out of college … I’ll be coming out of my program a year after everybody else is graduating college and I’ll be making adult money at age 23.”

More: Middle class, minus debt: Apprenticeships, certificates offer low-cost option to college

More than 90% of people who complete a registered apprenticeship earn an average starting wage of $77,000 a year, according to the Department of Labor.  

Nitzan Pelman, CEO of Climb Together, an organization that helps low-income adults find well-paying jobs, sees the rising cost and decreasing payoff of a college education as a major driver of the bipartisan support. 

“Republicans value hard work and capitalism. And I think the Democrats recognize that affordability is becoming such a challenge,” she said. “That sort of leads both parties to get a little bit more connected in the middle of those two things.” 

Harris and Trump policies  

Trump and Harris have both suggested they would allow people without four-year college degrees to fill some federal government jobs. They’ve also both proposed programs to increase the number of available apprenticeships.  

When it comes to the nitty-gritty policy details of how they’d do that, though, their bipartisan consensus begins to erode.  

“We’re living at a time where partisanship seems to be off the charts,” Marshall said. “Even issues that aren’t intrinsically ideological or partisan can get caught up in the new imperative of non-cooperation.” 

For instance, the Biden administration in 2021 rescinded a Trump-era rule that allowed industry and trade groups to develop and oversee their own apprenticeship programs. They argued the industry apprenticeships were often inferior to ones approved by the Department of Labor.  

Instead, in 2024, the administration proposed a rule to modernize and expand the National Apprenticeship System. Republican opponents argued the measure would be overly burdensome and impose a one-size-fits-all approach to apprenticeships across the country.  

In Congress, multiple bipartisan bills to expand apprenticeship infrastructure have been proposed. The National Apprenticeship Act, which aims to invest in workforce development programs, has passed the House in multiple sessions of Congress. It has repeatedly stalled in the Senate. 

Like most policy, Marshall said passing workforce solutions under the next president – whether it’s Trump or Harris – will require some give and take.  

“People are looking for alternative pathways,” he said. “It’s the responsibility of our nation’s political leaders to make sure that we have a system for non-degree folks to earn and learn that is as robust as our post-secondary or higher education system.” 

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