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I play golf maybe two, three times a year, usually with my brother-in-law. At some point during our haphazard efforts at play, he'll face a particularly difficult lie. Sure, a professional could get the ball over the water, hook over the sand trap, and drop the ball on the green. But it's an impossible shot for a couple-times-a-year hacker. Still, my brother-in-law will look at me and say, "Are we smart, or are we men?"
The same question could be asked about men and college degrees. By now, it's clear that the New Economy rewards higher education. Here's just one of many possible measures: In 1998, the average annual earnings of men from 25 to 34 with a four-year college degree were 56% greater than the earnings of men with a high school diploma or GED. The comparable figure for women was 100%, according to figures complied by the U.S. Education Dept.
RICH REWARDS. In 1980, the earnings gap was 19% for men and 52% for women. The problem is the percentage of men receiving a college education is not growing, especially among blacks. "Men are stuck about where they were in the mid-1970s -- in a time warp that leaves them oblivious to the growing educational needs of the labor market and the rich rewards for those who prepare through education to meet those needs," says economist Tom Mortenson, publisher of the Post-secondary Education Opportunity Newsletter.
Although a fraction more than half of the college-age population is male, men received just 43.9% of bachelor degrees awarded in the U.S. in the 1997-98 academic year. That's the smallest proportion since the 43.1% figure of 1946, when millions of young men went into the military rather than to college, according to Mortenson. From 1975 to 1998, females accounted for 94% of the growth in bachelor degrees. In 1998, women received a majority of bachelor degrees in every state, plus the District of Columbia, and a majority of master's degrees in every state except Utah and the District of Columbia. Three decades ago, a majority of bachelor degrees were awarded to men in every state and in D.C.
To be sure, Mortenson's assessment of the situation could be considered hyperbole. The gender shift in educational achievement is largely a positive story. The women's movement and affirmative action deserve a great deal of credit. So does the rise of the "knowledge economy" or the "creative economy." Corporate profits increasingly depend on the creation and distribution of innovations and information. With most job growth over the past decade coming in the managerial and professional occupations, educated women can just as easily fill these job openings as men. And they are.
FEMALE ADVANTAGE. For instance, in 1999, women held 47% of executive, administrative, and managerial jobs, up from 34% in 1983. Women's share of the professional specialty category increased to 52% from 47% over the same time period. "The returns of a college degree increased more for women than for men," says Alan Krueger, labor economist at Princeton University. "And there are more economic opportunities for women."
Why aren't men doing better in the education sweepstakes? Several long-term economic factors appear to be at work. Perhaps most important, men were disproportionately affected by the shrinking of the goods-producing industries in recent decades. At the same time, many men have been reluctant to expand into the growing private-sector service occupations where women traditionally dominate.
The returns of education for black males haven't been as rich as for other groups, which may be why black males earned a record low 35.1% of bachelor degrees awarded to blacks in 1998, down from 42.9% in 1977. The male prison population has exploded over the past two decades, much of it driven by low-level drug arrests in poverty-stricken neighborhoods.
At this point, it's not clear what should be done to address the problem. But the data leave little doubt that one key message of the New Economy is unchanging: A college education pays. And while no one is proposing undoing the education and occupational gains made by women the past three decades, it may be time to look at what can be done to encourage more men to get the education they need to get ahead.
WHERE ARE THE GUYS?
Bachelor's Degrees Awarded to Males
Year
Percent
1870
85.3%
1900
80.9%
1920
65.8%
1940
58.7%
1946
43.1%
1950
76.1%
1960
64.7%
1970
56.9%
1980
51.0%
1990
46.8%
1998
43.9%
Data: Postsecondary Education Opportunity
Farrell is contributing economics editor for BusinessWeek. His Sound Money radio commentaries are broadcast over National Public Radio on Saturdays in nearly 200 markets nationwide. Follow his weekly Sound Money column, only on BW Online Edited by Beth Belton
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