Trapped by $50,000 Degree in Low-Paying Job
By Janet Lorin - Dec 7, 2011
Laura Sayer, unsure of what she wanted to do after graduating from college in 2006, figured a master’s degree was “a safe bet.”
With $5,000 in undergraduate loans from her time at the University of Cincinnati, Sayer was set back $50,000 more after completing the Interdisciplinary Master’s Program in Humanities and Social Thought at New York University. The 27-year-old now makes about $45,000 a year as an administrative assistant for a nonprofit group, a job that didn’t require her advanced degree.
More people are losing the same gamble as a 33 percent jump in U.S. graduate school enrollment in the past decade, coupled with an 80 percent surge in tuition and required fees, runs headlong into a weaker job market. Universities are fueling the trend by offering more one- and two-year programs in areas from environmental science to sports management that rarely come with financial aid other than the option for loans.
“Students need to be more skeptical that the income, debt and job-placement statistics that they’re being shown about graduate schools may not reflect individual experiences,” said Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of FinAid.org, a website with educational-lending information. “It’s like the advertisements on TV for weight-loss programs: the results are not typical.”
About one-third of people with master’s degrees make less money on average than a typical bachelor’s degree holder, said Stephen J. Rose, a labor economist with Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce, citing U.S. Census data.
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