What the Labor Market Is Actually Telling Us About Career Readiness
"What are your plans after graduation?" Or, if we're talking to someone a little younger, "What are you planning to do after high school?" That can be a hard question to sit with when the honest answer is "I'm not sure," or an uncertain "I'm planning to go to college to study... something."
Parents and students hear a lot about college as the plan for what comes next. But what if we paused, just for a moment, to consider all the other options, and gave students real space to explore a career they might actually want to pursue? Even more importantly, what if that career doesn't require a college degree at all? What if there are other paths that lead to the same goal?
What the BLS Data Actually Shows
The Bureau of Labor Statistics tracks more than 800 detailed occupations, but only about 178 of those require a bachelor's degree for entry into the workforce. Most of the jobs the government tracks were never built around a bachelor's degree requirement in the first place.
This data isn't an argument against college. Consider it, instead, a reframe of perspective. Evidence that a "no degree" pathway is the norm, not the exception. We've been pushing college as the most viable, and often the only, option after high school, when the numbers simply don't support that as the full picture.
What's Happening to the Students Who Do Get the Degree
Here's the part of the conversation that doesn't get nearly enough attention: the New York Fed tracks underemployment among recent college graduates, and right now that rate is sitting around 42%. Underemployment, in this context, means someone is working in a job that doesn't actually require the degree they just spent four years and a considerable amount of money earning.
Think about what that means in practice. Close to half of recent graduates are walking across the stage, degree in hand, and landing in roles that never needed that degree to begin with. That's not a small footnote. That's a significant number of families who followed the advice they were given, and still ended up somewhere they didn't expect.
I want to be clear about what I'm not saying. I'm not saying college is a bad decision. I'm saying it isn't automatically the safe decision, and it hasn't been for a while. The data simply doesn't back up the idea that a degree guarantees the outcome most families assume it does.
So What Does This Mean for a CTE Pathway?
Put these two numbers side by side and the picture gets clearer. Most jobs don't require a bachelor's degree, and a large share of the students who do earn one aren't using it in their current role anyway. That's exactly the gap a strong CTE pathway is built to close.
A student who earns an industry credential in healthcare, a skilled trade, or information technology isn't settling for a fallback option. They're stepping into one of the 622 occupations that never needed a four-year degree in the first place, often with a faster timeline, less debt, and a credential that maps directly to a job that's actually hiring. That's not a consolation prize. That's a legitimate, data-backed first choice.
What This Means for Parents Right Now
If you're a parent sitting across the table from a student who isn't sure what comes next, here's what I'd actually do with this information. Don't use it to scare them away from college, and don't use it to talk them out of a pathway they're genuinely excited about. Use it to widen the table.
Ask what they're curious about before you ask what pays well, the two overlap more often than people assume. Ask what a specific credential or program actually leads to, not just what it's called. And give yourself permission to let "I want to become a dental hygienist" or "I want to work in IT" carry the same weight in that conversation as "I want to go to college." Both are real plans. Only one of them has been treated that way for the last few decades.
A Note for Educators and School Staff
If you're the one standing in front of students every day, you have more influence over this conversation than almost anyone else in a student's life, including, sometimes, their own parents. The way you frame a CTE pathway in your classroom becomes the way that student frames it for themselves.
Here's a simple shift I'd encourage: the next time a student mentions a career goal that doesn't involve a four-year degree, resist the urge to follow up with "but you should still consider college as a backup." That instinct is well-meaning, but it quietly tells the student their first choice wasn't good enough to stand on its own. Instead, ask what the pathway to that goal actually looks like, and help them map it out with the same seriousness you'd give a college application. Do the research, bring real data into the room, the same numbers in this post work well as a discussion starter. Students take a pathway more seriously when they can see it's backed by something more than encouragement.
The Bigger Point
Safety, when it comes to a student's future, has never really been about which single path they choose. It's about whether that path is grounded in something real, actual demand, actual credentials, actual alignment with who that student is and what they're good at. A four-year degree can absolutely be that. So can a CTE pathway. The labor market isn't telling us to abandon one for the other. It's telling us to stop treating one as the default and the other as the exception.
That's the whole shift I'm trying to make with this work, not steering students away from college, and not steering them toward a trade instead. Just making sure every option gets weighed with the same seriousness, using the same real numbers, before a student commits years of their life to any of them.
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*Sources:
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, "Education level and projected openings, 2023–33" (https://www.bls.gov/careeroutlook/2024/article/education-level-and-openings-2023-33.htm);
New York Fed, "The Labor Market for Recent College Graduates" (https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market) figure current as of the source's most recent quarterly update; confirm before publishing).*
