But not everyone is feeling gains, particularly in the wage department According to a recent report from the Economic Policy Institute, the bottom half of wage earners with college degrees have lower wages than they did in 2000 or 2007.
So how is it that many college grads are making less than they were over 10 years ago?
“What we’ve seen is a pulling away of the very top, and that’s been growing wage inequality, income inequality, wealth inequality,” said Elise Gould, an EPI senior economist and author of the report. “By any measure of economics, we’ve seen this growing inequality happen. And what that means is that the vast majority of workers have really not seen gains in wages over the last several years, and that affects college grads too.”
Breaking down wage growth by degree
From 2000 to 2016, those with advanced degrees saw the strongest wage growth at 8.5 percent. Those with college degrees did see overall wage growth of 6.9 percent, even though half earned lower wages than in 2000 and 2007. And those in the “some college” category, which includes people who have an associate degree or completed part of a four-year college degree, saw their overall wages dip by 1.7 percent since the turn of the century.