Editorial: By degree, most jobs don’t require a college diploma

For decades, economic mobility has been elusive for workers without a four-year college degree.

But according to a new study by Burning Glass Institute, an independent nonprofit research center, one in five workers with only a high-school diploma have defied the odds.

Those workers made more than $70,000 a year — above the median income of college graduates — by age 40. And nearly 2 million, or 5% of them, earned six-figure salaries.

Those apparent overachievers often began in jobs that open a door to career paths by helping workers acquire a mix of vocational expertise and communication, teamwork, and problem-solving skills, according to the report, published Thursday.

The researchers identified 73 such promising starter jobs, including bank teller, pharmacy aide, and restaurant host.

The new report adds to a growing body of evidence that shows upward mobility and economic advancement are attainable goals for the 60% of the nation’s labor force without a four-year college degree.

Workforce experts and advocacy groups in recent years have challenged the pervasive narrative that everyone should pursue a higher degree.

“This research provides empirical analysis of career paths and outcomes that contributes to a really important shift in public discourse,’’ Ross Wiener, executive director of the education and society program at the Aspen Institute, told the New York Times.

Burning Glass’s new report examined jobsite profiles, government statistics and surveys to compile career histories of more than 65 million American workers.

The researchers found 2.2 million postings in 2023 for starter jobs that frequently led to higher incomes. Other “launch-pad jobs’’ included telemarketer, computer support specialist, software developer, flight attendant, and procurement clerk.

The Burning Glass Institute study’s conclusions represent the latest evidence that most jobs — in both the public and private sectors — don’t require a four-year college degree.

Technology has also enhanced the ability to earn larger salaries with only a high-school degree. Tech jobs now exist in nearly every industry, with many less degree-dependent than in other professions.

In the workplace, code-writing ability can often trump a college credential.

In an acknowledgement of this employment shift, Gov. Maura Healey filed an executive order in January that eliminated degree requirements for most state government job listings, instructing hiring managers instead to use a “skills-based” approach when picking candidates to fill open positions.

Healey’s decree made exceptions for positions that the Human Resources Division determined demand certain educational requirements. Even with that exclusion, state officials estimate that the executive order covered more than 90% of the state’s upcoming job openings.

Healey noted that career success shouldn’t be limited to the portion of the state’s population — nearly half, per a recent Census count — with a bachelor’s degree.

The order requires state hiring managers to consider a “full set of competencies” that candidates bring to the job beyond educational attainment. Job classifications issued or updated in the future won’t specify a minimum level of education as a requirement.

Nationally, the trend toward “skills-based hiring” is well underway in the private sector.

Many business publications, including Business Insider, have reported on this sea change in the hiring process.

It noted that after the Great Recession of 2008, degree requirements locked out nearly two-thirds of American workers from millions of high-paying jobs that didn’t actually call for a four-year college education.

More companies have come to realize that requirement puts them at a competitive disadvantage as labor shortages shrink their hiring pools.

As of February 2023, the jobless rate for American high-school graduates was 5.8%, compared to 2.9% for those with a bachelor’s degree. That gap represents millions of workers with untapped potential who just don’t happen to have a college degree.

As more companies eliminate degree requirements, Burning Glass Institute previously predicted over the next five years, another 1.4 million jobs will open to these workers.

Corporations adjusting employment requirements include some of this country’s most iconic.

Walmart, IBM, Accenture, Dell, Google, and Bank of America have all eliminated college-degree requirements from many of their employment positions.

Google counts its online certificate program as the equivalent of a four-year degree if students apply for entry-level positions.

These findings should send a chill through the higher-education establishment.

With the ever-escalating cost of a four-year college education, more high-school grads will seek other ways to enter the job market.

And for those pursuing or intending to attain a four-year college degree, it would be wise to select a concentration that actually fills a need in the workplace.

One local university just dropped a subtle hint in that direction.

Boston University announced last week that it won’t accept any new PhD students in a dozen humanities and social sciences programs, including English, history, and philosophy, in the coming academic year.

The Boston Globe noted that graduates of these programs, which are expensive to maintain, experience lean employment prospects, even in an area awash with colleges and universities.

There will always be a need, not only for four-year college graduates, but also those with advanced or specialized degrees, especially in the fields of medicine and science-based industries.

But as this and other studies have shown, most jobs in the workplace don’t require that expensive college degree, and the debt burden that comes with it.