Latino Education and Economic Progress: Running Faster but Still Behind reveals that lagging college degree attainment has led Latinos to become stuck in the middle-wage tiers of the labor market. The report also finds that obtaining a college degree remains a challenge, with only 21% of Latinos having a bachelor’s degree.

1. Latino Education and
Economic Progress:
Running Faster but Still Behind
By: Anthony P. Carnevale and Megan L. Fasules
October 11, 2017

2. Overview
• Earning a college degree remains a challenge for Latinos: only 21 percent
have bachelor’s degrees, compared to 45 percent of Whites and 32 percent
of Blacks.
• Low college degree attainment has led Latinos to become caught in the
middle-wage tiers of the labor market.
• With access to better college and career counseling, Latinos can run faster
toward a promising economic future.

3. Latinos are falling behind in many crucial
college outcomes
• While Latino enrollment
has increased at two- and
four- year colleges, Latino
postsecondary attainment
has only increased from 35
percent to 45 percent.

4. Latinos have increased their share of good jobs
that require less than a bachelor’s degree
• Latinos are concentrated in occupations that require less
education and where wage growth is slowest
• Latinos hold only 9 percent of jobs which require a bachelor’s
degree and 7 percent of jobs requiring a graduate degree

5. Latinos have increased their share of good jobs
(continued)

6. Latinos earn on average 18 percent less than
Whites at every education level
• Latino men and women are last in the overall earnings race
compared to Whites and Blacks
• However, Latino and Black men earn similar wages if they have a
bachelor’s degree or higher
• When Latinos are employed in high-wage occupations like those
in STEM, race-based earnings gaps between Whites and Latinos
essentially vanish

7. Latinos earn less than Whites at every education level
(continued)

8. Lack of college and career counseling and
socioeconomic barriers contribute to the earnings gap
• Latinos often start at a disadvantage because many of their
parents have not gone to college
• Country of origin and English language ability are important
sources of wage disparity between Whites and Latinos, but do
not entirely explain the wage gaps between foreign-born and
US-born Latinos
• Only 34 percent of foreign-born Latinos have some form of
postsecondary education compared to 61 percent of US-born
Latinos

9. Latina women are the lowest earning group in
America compared to Whites and Blacks
• Latina women have higher
completion rates than Latino men
at every level of postsecondary
education
• Latina women are typically in
low-paying majors, but those in
high-paying majors still have
lower earnings than Latino men

10. Conclusion
• High school graduation rates for Latinos have improved the
most since the 1990s compared to their White and Black peers
• Closing the information gap is imperative in supporting
Latinos through their educational and career pathways
• Latinos’ deliberate mass improvement in high school
graduation to success at certificate levels leaves them poised for
advances in bachelor’s and graduate degree level attainment

11. For more information:
See the full report at: cew.georgetown.edu/LatinosWorkforce
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