A paycheck matters. But it’s not the only measure of a good career. A federal wage data analysis of non-college occupations argues that those pathways don’t pay off compared to college. The findings are accurate. But what do they actually tell us?
This isn’t about whether career pathway programs work or how to measure outcomes. It’s about wages, who’s being compared when non-college wages are held up against a four-year degree, and whether that comparison is as straightforward as it looks.
Community colleges have a particular stake in getting that comparison right, since they sit at the center of both the problem and the solution.
The data isn’t in dispute. Six-figure salaries for non-college jobs are the exception, not the rule. In many high-profile trades, only the top 10% or fewer of workers actually reach that threshold. And the better-paid non-college occupations are overwhelmingly male. In some cases, fewer than 10% of workers are women, with the largest, lower-paid non-college fields, like home healthcare, dominated by women. That pattern must be taken seriously.
