According to a report released by the U.S. Census Bureau, 37 percent of working women and 35 percent of working men had attained a bachelor’s degree or more as of 2010. However, when looking at all adults 25 and older, the report showed that 29.6 percent of women and 30.3 percent of men had at least a bachelor’s degree.
The report uses tabulations from the Educational Attainment in the United States: 2010 to “not only examine gender differences in attainment but also provide the most detailed information on years of school completed ever presented by the Census Bureau.” Here are some more facts from the report:
- In 2010, 36 percent of the nation’s population 25 and older left school before obtaining a degree, including 15 percent of the population that didn’t earn a regular high school diploma, 17 percent that attended some college but left before receiving a degree, and 4 percent that left before obtaining an advanced degree.
- In 2010, 64 percent of the nation’s population 25 and older finished their schooling, including 29 percent with a high school diploma, 9 percent with an associate’s degree, and 15 percent with a bachelor’s degree, and 11 percent with an advanced degree.
- In 2010, 87 percent of adults 25 and older had at least a high school diploma or equivalent, up from 84 percent in 2000.
- Of the 200 million people 25 and older in 2010, 26 million had not completed high school, while 174 million had attained at least a high school education.
- In 2010, 30 percent of adults 25 and older, or 60 million people, had at least a bachelor’s degree, compared with 26 percent in 2000.
- More than half (52 percent) of Asians 25 and older had a bachelor’s degree or more, higher than the level for non-Hispanic whites (33 percent), blacks (20 percent) and Hispanics (14 percent).
- Women 25 and older were more likely than men 25 and older to have completed at least high school, at 87.6 percent versus 86.6 percent.
- Among the population 25 to 29, 36 percent of women had a bachelor’s degree or more, compared with 28 percent of men.
- Thirty percent of foreign-born residents of the U.S. had less than a high school diploma, compared with 10 percent of native-born residents. Nineteen percent of naturalized citizens had less than a high school diploma. At the same time, 29 percent of the foreign-born population had a bachelor’s or higher degree, compared with 30 percent of the native-born population. (The percentage of native-born residents with at least a bachelor’s degree was not statistically different from the percent of foreign-born residents with less than a high school diploma.) Thirty-five percent of naturalized citizens had a bachelor’s or higher degree.