The Washington metropolitan area ranks among the top regions in the country for having a work force that’s educated enough to fill the available jobs, a Brookings Institution report released Wednesday has found.
Roughly half the available jobs in the region require a college degree — second in the country only behind California’s Silicon Valley — while the Washington area’s work force is among the most highly educated in the nation, with 47 percent holding a bachelor’s degree or higher, the report said. Combined with one of the nation’s lower unemployment rates, it makes the work force in this region one of the best-matched in the country to fill the supply of jobs.
“The D.C. metro area looks to be very strong going forward because of its high education attainment rate,” said Jonathan Rothwell, the senior research associate who authored the report, “Education, Job Openings, and Unemployment in Metropolitan America.” “Going along with that, it has a number of high-tech and entrepreneurial businesses that are poised to grow in the upcoming years. It really is in very good shape relative to the rest of the country.”
| Supply and demand | ||
| Metro areas with smallest education gap for job openings | ||
| Education gap | Unemployment rate | |
| Madison, Wis. | -1.1% | 5.3% |
| Honolulu | 0.2% | 5.7% |
| Provo-Orem, Utah | 0.5% | 5.9% |
| Raleigh-Cary, N.C. | 1.3% | 8.4% |
| Washington, D.C.-Va.-Md.-W.Va. | 1.4% | 5.7% |
| Metro areas with largest education gap for job openings | ||
| Education gap | Unemployment rate | |
| Fresno, Calif. | 11% | 16.9% |
| Modesto, Calif. | 11.8% | 16.9% |
| El Paso, Texas | 13% | 10% |
| Bakersfield-Delano, Calif. | 13.7% | 15% |
| McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas | 13.9% | 11.7% |
The region ranks fifth in the nation in its “education gap for job openings,” or the ability of the work force’s education level to match the requirements of available jobs. Madison, Wis., tops the list, while largely agricultural regions in California and Texas take up the bottom of the list that comprises the nation’s top 100 metro areas.
Rothwell noted that unlike some of the other top metro areas, the Washington region has a balance of university life and industry.
“It’s hard to imagine places like Durham and Raleigh, N.C., being in the high-tech industry if not for the fact of [the University of] North Carolina and Duke [University] being there,” he said.
Tamara Jayasundera, researcher and senior economist at Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce, said the federal government is a big provider of jobs that attract educated workers from all over the country. But the region’s extensive university system also plays a role.
“You see a lot of people who come here to study and end up finding jobs and settle in the area basically because of the high demand for an educated work force,” she said.
The reverse is true for those who don’t have a bachelor’s degree.
“The less educated are leaving because there are less opportunities in the area,” Jayasundera said.
