It’s Good to Be a College Student (or Grad, or Professor)

September 17, 2010

By CATHERINE RAMPELL

Being in, or at, a college doesn’t seem to be a terribly bad life.

That’s one of the many implications from a new report by Bureau of Labor Statistics, titled “Back to College.” Here, for example, is the lifestyle of the typical full-time college student:

Bureau of Labor Statistics, American Time Use Survey

As you can see, work and educational activities combined add up to just 6.5 hours on the typical weekday. And other research has indicated that college students spend less time studying today than they did several decades ago. (If you’re curious how the general population spends its time, see this neat graphic.)
The report is full of all sorts of other delightful chart porn. Here is a graph showing the percentage of an industrialized country’s population that has a college degree:

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Among these countries, college degree attainment is by far highest in Canada, followed by New Zealand and Japan. The United States comes in fourth. While there are legitimate debates about what portion of a populace “should” go to college, there is little doubt that those Americans who currently have college degrees are by and large better off than those without, at least in the labor market.
In any case, universities are a growing economic force to be reckoned with in the United States. Over the last 50 years employment in higher education has grown dramatically, both in raw numbers and as a share of total nonfarm payrolls:

Bureau of Labor Statistics

The percentage of all workers who are employed by colleges and universities has doubled, from 1.5 percent in 1960 to 3 percent in 2009. Given the many budget troubles faced by universities, particularly public universities, this trend may not hold up in the near future.
For professors who have managed to retain their positions, however, life is also not too shabby. The chart below shows the mean annual earnings (in green) of college and university professors in selected fields:

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Among the categories shown, law professors rake in the most on average, earning $109,150 annually, followed by professors in the health specialties, who earn an average of $103,340. This is of course significantly higher than what the typical American worker makes.

economix.blogs.nytimes.com