My May 23 column argued that the Obama administration's goal of having every child graduate from college was out of touch with reality and did a disservice to a great many of our students. I took that position because anywhere from one-sixth to one-half of elementary and secondary students are too far down the bell curve to reasonably be expected to succeed in college.
For that, one anonymous online comment labeled me an "elitist pig" with some sort of "phallic" problem. I suspect that others share that opinion.
So let us come at it from a different approach. What percentage of full-time jobs in the United States requires a college education?
Well, according to the U.S. Department of Labor's Current Population Survey, in 2008 nearly 38 percent of all full-time jobs held by persons ages 25 and older were held by those with no more than a high school diploma. Over 9 percent were held by persons with less than a high school education. That suggests that far fewer than 100 percent of all jobs require a college diploma, does it not?
So what do we gather from that? Does it mean that we need more jobs that demand more than a high school diploma? There are those who would argue that case by placing great emphasis on the need for more "good" jobs. Of course, if every single child is to graduate from college we would need to go well beyond a standard of more good jobs. Rather, we would need all jobs to require more than a high school diploma, would we not? But how achievable is that goal in anything less than several lifetimes (if at all)?
That leads us to another question.
For the sake of argument, what happens if we assume that every single child graduates from college only to find himself or herself unable to land a job worthy of his or her diploma? The answer: money and time wasted, to say nothing of the potentially deep frustration that comes from finding oneself unable to compete despite having a degree that supposedly assures them of the good life.
Not convinced? Let us try another angle.
Did you know that, according to the U.S. Bureau of the Census, in 1999 more than 9 percent of all full-time waiters and waitresses had college degrees?
Or that 21 percent of retail sales persons, 13 percent of file clerks and taxi drivers and 14 percent of postal service mail carriers had college degrees (just to cite a few such occupations)?
Data are updated only every 10 years, but similar results have been reported for a long time.
What does that suggest with respect to the potential for frustration and self-doubt for people in jobs for which they are over-qualified? Sure, some are probably quite satisfied with what they do, but would the fraction of college graduates in these jobs who are satisfied with their jobs be more than half or less than half? Now project that situation into a world where all children graduate from college. How much more money and time would be wasted? How many more frustrated college graduates would we have?
The Obama administration's national education policy might well have been written for Garrison Keillor's Lake Wobegon, where "all of the children are above average."
I prefer that education policy be made for the real world.
In the real world a very substantial percentage of children are not equipped to succeed in college. Those leaders in a position to set policy need to stop pretending otherwise. College is not for everyone. A policy that assumes otherwise fails many of the children who most need an appropriate education.
Yes, I know. That makes me an "elitist pig" with ... .
David M. Reaume is a Washington state-based economist who was based for many years in Juneau. His opinion column appears every fourth Sunday.
David Reaume
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