Taking a Hard Look at the Education = Employment Formula

The Count isn’t always in a humorous mood.

Today is one of those days. Here we are in 21st Century America with financial pain ratcheting the civilian consciousness down into the bowels of despair. With modest encouragement, I can explain the shenanigans in DC and make the partisan idiocy look like a Mexican drug cartel vendetta.

But I’ll do that another day. 

What’s bothering me today is the jobs issue and the loud, loud demands for more attention to the dire status of the unemployed.

My theory on American jobs is as follows: This is not a jobs issue, but an education issue.

 Consider the following:

• National unemployment is currently 9.1%
• The unemployment rate for citizens (18 and older) without a high school diploma is 15%
• The unemployment rate for citizens with a high school diploma is 9%
• Even more impressive, the unemployment rate forcollege graduates is less than 5%
• Logic allows us to surmise that as education levels increase, unemployment levels decrease.

 Now consider this:

• The State of Georgia graduates only 65% of our high school students
• The State of Nebraska graduates 83% of their students
• Nebraska’s state unemployment is currently 4% vs. 10% in Georgia
• Pennsylvania, a state similar in size to Georgia, has two large urban centers and a depressed manufacturing base. Yet, they graduate 77% of their students and have an unemployment rate of 7.5%.
• Similar comparisons are available for almost all states relating to graduation rates and unemployment 

In the simplest terms, states that graduate more young people from high school have fewer unemployed people!

Now, the Count knows there are certainly additional factorsthat influence unemployment, and there are certainly exceptions to the rule here. Considering the oil boom in the Dakota’s for example, they have very low unemployment even with a modest high school graduation rate. But that is part of the problem. 

America has changed. Undereducated Americans in the past had opportunities to work in mines, factories and agriculture, knowing the upside was limited, but at least the paychecks were regular. America has lost those jobs.

To summarize the June 2008 report on Labor Force Trends by the Population Reference Bureau, more than 50% loss of manufacturing jobs in the past 50 years has been obscenely detrimental to the high school dropout as technology and service jobs have taken their place. And by service jobs, they don’t mean fast food servers. They mean good jobs as in call centers, medical offices, the military and telecommunications technology. These are all fields where a high school diploma is the minimum standard for employment.

So what can we do? What can the State of Georgia and the Obama Administration do to help people get back to work? 

It may take time, but we must keep our kids in school. At a later date I will offer some suggestions on how we can do that, but first let's ask: Why are young people allowed to drop out of high school at age 16? That’s such an anachronistic rule. Keeping kids in school until they graduate and teaching them a modern trade will promote higher employment and income. 

Am I missing something here?