MISER and NELLIE MAE Look BEYOND 2000

Synopsis

If present educational and demographic trends continue, New England will face a shortage of qualified workers in the labor force. This is one of the main conclusions of "BEYOND 2000: Demographic Change, Education and the Work Force", a 51-page report produced by MISER with funding from the New England Educational Loan Management Association (Nellie Mae).

Nellie Mae is a private, non-profit corporation that assures access to higher education by providing education loan capital for students. Their interest in identifying the barriers to higher education access in New England was the motivation for "BEYOND 2000."

The study identified the need for increasing the level of educational attainment in the labor force, with research focusing on how the labor market puts a premium on educational attainment beyond high school.

People without some level of higher education continue to lag in earning power. This trend is likely to continue as the region's economy becomes increasingly based on services and high technology. At present, about half of the adults in the region have a high school diploma or less.

The study found that while substantial improvements have been made in higher educational attainment in New England over the past two decades, the pace of change appears to have slowed down in more recent years. Access to higher education has continued to improve, but college completions have not increased at the same rate.

The study analyzed completion rates from Kindergarten to Bachelors Degree by race and ethnicity. What emerged was a comprehensive picture of the changing size and ethnic composition of the region's labor force. There is a need for increased attention to minority educational attainment in the region. In Massachusetts, for example, 22% of the new entrants to the labor force today are minority, up from 12% in 1985 (see graph on pg. 1). This will increase to more than 30% by the year 2007. The labor force in the region is becoming ethnically diverse at an accelerated rate, and there is room for improvements in minority access and attainment in higher education. As an example, Hispanics will soon become the largest minority component of new entrants to the labor force. At present, however, over two-thirds of adult Hispanics have at most a high school diploma.

The challenge for New England is to continue to achieve high rates of educational attainment in its labor force in the face of these demographic changes.

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