September 15, 2015
It’s common knowledge that workers without a college degree are seeing fewer and fewer good job opportunities. Even if they do get a job, it may barely pay the bills.
Nevertheless, a new study from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia shows that there are still places where less-educated workers can not only get a job but one that pays well.
Called “opportunity occupations,” these jobs don’t require a bachelor’s degree, but still pay more than the national median wage.
"Place really matters in terms of providing access to a worker without a college degree the opportunity of earning a decent wage," said the report’s author, Keith Wardrip.
The study looked at 11 metropolitan areas in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware and calculated the percentage of jobs that are opportunity occupations.
At the very top of the list: Reading, Pennsylvania, which benefits from a strong manufacturing sector.
At the bottom of the list: either Philadelphia or Atlantic City. In an interesting twist of the data, the results changed depending on whether the researchers were looking at online job ads or surveys of actual workers and industry experts.
If you looked only at what employers were asking for in online job ads, it seemed like many more jobs required a bachelor’s degree. The surveys of actual workers, in contrast, suggest that fewer jobs required a degree.
For example, in Philadelphia, just 19 percent of jobs are opportunity occupations if you look at online ads. If you look at the survey data, however, 27 percent of jobs fit the bill, which is just a bit below average for the region.
"In Philadelphia, employers tend to want a college-educated candidate," said Wardrip.
According to another Fed study that looked at the issue nationally, Philadelphia ranked 78th out of the top 100 U.S. metro areas for percent of jobs that are opportunity occupations, according to online ad data.
"It could be that the other datasets are underestimating what's necessary for the job … it could be that in some places the work is more complex and more sophisticated," said Wardrip.
It is also possible that city employers are “up-credentialing,” or asking for more education that the job actually requires, because the high number of college-educated people in Philadelphia creates more competition.
"We find that in very populous metro areas with very highly educated workforces...the level of education requested in online job ads is often higher than in other metros," said Wardrip.
So while you probably don’t need to have a four-year college degree to be a secretary in Scranton, you might need a degree for that exact same job in Philly.
Down in Atlantic City, 22 percent of jobs are opportunity occupations according to the survey data, or 23 percent according to the job ad data. The city does have jobs for workers without a degree, explains Wardrip, but they don’t pay above the median wage.
“Nearly 20 percent of the employment in Atlantic City is focused on food preparation and serving-related jobs. Those kinds of jobs are often available to someone without a college degree...but the wage isn't sufficient to qualify as an opportunity occupation," he said.
Whichever way you read the data, Reading still landed at the top. Around a third of its jobs are opportunity occupations.
You can download the full report here.
