If the Supreme Court bans race-conscious affirmative action, as expected, selective higher education institutions almost certainly will become less diverse, reducing the rates of degree attainment among students from historically underrepresented racial/ethnic groups. "Race, Elite College Admissions, and the Courts: The Pursuit of Racial…

Americans share a strong belief that the country offers access to opportunity. In 2017, 82 percent of Americans said they had achieved the American Dream or were on their way to achieving it. But do all Americans--regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, or socioeconomic status--have equal access to the American Dream? This report examines…

The economic and social landscape that young people encounter today is substantially more complex and challenging than the one faced by earlier generations. Technological change and globalization have transformed the labor market, increasing the value of postsecondary education and hollowing out industries that once employed many workers who had…

Democratic societies are rooted in the widely shared belief that all lives have value. As a result, the idea of educational adequacy in a democracy is rooted in the conviction that education's primary mission is to provide knowledge and skills sufficient to allow people to live fully, according to the standards of their time. In a democracy with a…

In the post-World War II period, workers with a high school diploma or less were able to attain jobs with middle-class wages in American industry. Good jobs were available in manufacturing and other blue-collar industries that employed large numbers of high school-educated workers. But as automation, globalization, and related phenomena have led…

The propensity to believe that good things are likely to happen fuels the enduring belief in the American Dream, including the expectation that each generation will enjoy a better quality of life than the previous one. This report is part of a series on young people's pathways to good jobs. In it, the researchers examine how the route from youth…

Over the past half century, postsecondary education has taken on an increasingly important role in career preparation in the United States, with profound effects on the life experiences of young adults. Having a college credential has become both more valuable in the labor market and more expensive, with much of the burden falling directly on…

The manufacturing workforce has been shaped by decades of industry transformation. Modern manufacturing requires workers with a diverse set of skills to perform functions such as research and development (R&D), product and production design, marketing and sales, and customer support. While workers with a high school diploma or less dominated…

"College Is Just the Beginning: The Employer Role in $1.1 Trillion Postsecondary Education and Training System" focuses on employer investment in formal training for workers in the context of the broader postsecondary education and training system and the primary institutions involved in skill development in the United States. Along with…

Between 1991 and 2016, employment among White, Black, and Latino workers grew by 20 percent, while employment in good jobs soared by 35 percent. Yet the opportunities and benefits of the modern economy have not accrued evenly across the three groups. Discrimination and a history of racial injustice in this country have led to Whites gaining a…

This is the executive summary for the report, "The Unequal Race for Good Jobs: How Whites Made Outsized Gains in Education and Good Jobs Compared to Blacks and Latinos." Between 1991 and 2016, White workers built on their past educational and economic privileges to attain bachelor's and graduate degrees in historically high numbers and…

Judging from how much high school students and their parents worry about standardized test scores, one might presume that an SAT or ACT score is the primary factor in college admissions. But a look at the numbers reveals a different reality. A review of SAT and ACT standardized test scores among students in a recent class at the nation's 200 most…

Since 1980, the Black college-going rate has nearly doubled, while the Latino college-going rate has more than doubled. As a result, the Black and Latino share of public college enrollment has grown from 15 percent in 1980 to 35 percent in 2015. However, those impressive college-going gains are not being matched by gains in college completion.…

This is the executive summary for the report, "Our Separate & Unequal Public Colleges: How Public Colleges Reinforce White Racial Privilege and Marginalize Black and Latino Students." America's selective public colleges should be among the great equalizers in our society. Funded primarily by taxpayers and carrying a relatively low…

In this report, we present the results of a thought experiment in which we estimated the potential costs and benefits to society of achieving equality in educational attainment and related workforce outcomes by race/ethnicity, class, and gender. We conducted this thought experiment to clarify the role that education can play in reducing…