The Dangerous Economist: For a Good Job by 30, Do This in Your 20s

Sunday, May 14, 2023

For a Good Job by 30, Do This in Your 20s

New research shows which career paths pay off and why steps made between ages 20 and 26 are so critical

See By Lindsay Ellis of The WSJ. Excerpts:

"earning a four-year degree by your mid-20s is the surest route to a good job by age 30."
"Georgetown researchers examined government data for more than 8,000 Americans born in the early 1980s from adolescence through age 30. They identified 38 decision points that could influence workers’ ability to land what they deemed a good job by age 30—one that pays the minimum for economic self-sufficiency, a median annual salary of $57,000.
Pursuing a bachelor’s degree made more of a difference than any other decision"
"The researchers focused on people who didn’t go directly from high school to college, because the cohort that graduated college in their early 20s had a high rate of good job outcomes.
Millions of people start bachelor’s degrees, but don’t finish them by their mid-20s. Those non-finishers have a 40% chance of getting a good job by 30, Georgetown data show. If they eventually earned a bachelor’s degree by age 26, they would have a higher chance—56%—of getting a good job, Georgetown estimates."
"The expected payoff to getting a bachelor’s degree is higher than it has ever been, Prof. Mabel said [Zack Mabel of Georgetown University], but added, “with the rising cost of college, and the increasing debt that students and families have to take on, the risk of pursuing higher education is higher than it’s ever been.”"
"Salaries for college graduates are higher than those without degrees, but data analyzed by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis shows the gap in net worth between college grads and nongrads has narrowed significantly. One reason is the high cost of college, with many grads’ higher earnings offset by student debt."
"Some companies have eliminated bachelor’s-degree requirements for hires, though almost 70% of the new jobs created in the U.S. between 2012 and 2019 were in occupations that typically require a four-year degree or higher for entry"
"Steady work between the ages of 20 and 22 and avoiding resume gaps in these years can help, researchers said, because hiring managers are more likely to hire experienced people who are actively working."
"Working at age 22 in a blue-collar job or in tech or finance, rather than fields such as education, food services and the arts, also helped raise the chance of getting a higher paying role. Still, workers who took one of those paths had no more than a 25% chance of landing a good job by 30. Those pathways proved more effective when combined with attending college."

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