How to Position Your Academic Programs Amid Mixed Economic Signals
Mixed economic signals can be challenging to navigate. Despite headlines trumpeting layoffs and, most recently, bank failures, most indicators still point to a hot labor market.
Jobless claims have stayed below 200,000 for seven straight weeks (as of March 9). For every unemployed person in January, there were 1.9 job openings, signaling a labor shortage in the U.S. for the first time in decades.
Eduventures has predicted no recession in 2023. With that in mind—alongside falling enrollment rates—we do not expect to see a significant uptick in student demand, particularly among adults. This means that many schools will have to work hard to meet enrollment goals. Given the economic noise out there right now, which jobs are projected to grow and how can you best position your academic programs?
Focus on Career Outcomes
One of the surest ways to better appeal to prospects is by providing pathways to high-impact occupations – jobs with fast growth, significant scale, and good pay. Why? Because both traditional and adult prospects are highly driven by career-oriented motivations.
In 2022, traditional-aged prospects reported that the top three expectations for college were career-aligned: “Get a good job after graduation” (57%), “Get a solid foundation for an entire career” (50%), and “Gain practical career skills” (43%). These responses were mostly consistent through the pandemic period.
Adult prospects, long driven by career-oriented expectations, only moved further in that direction over the pandemic period. In fact, the number of adults citing “enrollment motivations NOT related to career aspirations” saw the most dramatic shift. In 2019, pre-pandemic, about 15% of adult prospects selected this response. This percentage shrunk to 11% in 2020, and then to 10% in 2022, representing a 30% drop.
The Forecast for High-Impact Occupations
When looking to the future, Eduventures focuses on three key data points to bring high-impact occupations into focus: growth, scale, and wages. To identify high-impact occupations, Eduventures used the following filters among those where the typical entry-level education is a bachelor’s degree or above:
- Growth: Occupations projected to grow faster than average between 2022-2032 (above 9%)
- Wages: Occupations with hourly earnings above the median for workers with at least a bachelor’s degree ($33.35 hourly)
- Scale: Occupations projected to see the highest number of job gains (sorted from highest to lowest)
Figure 1 shows the top 10 occupations in each credential bucket.
| Occupation | 2022-2032 New Jobs | 2022-2032 Job Growth | Median Hourly Earnings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bachelor’s Occupations | |||
| Software Developers | 374,924 | 25% | $58.05 |
| General and Operations Managers | 351,953 | 11% | $47.10 |
| Registered Nurses | 305,979 | 10% | $37.31 |
| Medical and Health Services Managers | 132,260 | 28% | $48.72 |
| Financial Managers | 120,526 | 16% | $63.32 |
| Management Analysts | 113,479 | 14% | $44.71 |
| Project Management Specialists | 81,540 | 10% | $45.43 |
| Computer and Information Systems Managers | 60,846 | 12% | $76.45 |
| Logisticians | 54,634 | 24% | $37.03 |
| Software Quality Assurance Analysts and Testers | 52,168 | 25% | $47.22 |
| Master’s Occupations | |||
| Nurse Practitioners | 108,509 | 42% | $58.02 |
| Speech-Language Pathologists | 41,843 | 27% | $38.01 |
| Physician Assistants | 38,555 | 27% | $58.43 |
| Occupational Therapists | 22,713 | 17% | $41.14 |
| Education Administrators, Postsecondary | 20,664 | 10% | $46.59 |
| Statisticians | 10,737 | 30% | $45.95 |
| Computer and Information Research Scientists | 7,620 | 21% | $63.22 |
| Nurse Anesthetists | 6,216 | 13% | $94.04 |
| Epidemiologists | 2,631 | 26% | $37.90 |
| Economists | 2,320 | 13% | $50.79 |
| Doctoral Occupations | |||
| Lawyers | 80,593 | 11% | $61.54 |
| Physical Therapists | 45,899 | 19% | $45.97 |
| Medical Scientists, Except Epidemiologists | 21,200 | 17% | $45.82 |
| Dentists, General | 12,517 | 11% | $77.10 |
| Veterinarians | 11,844 | 14% | $48.26 |
| Clinical and Counseling Psychologists | 8,149 | 13% | $39.67 |
| Chiropractors | 6,014 | 16% | $36.06 |
| School Psychologists | 5,690 | 10% | $37.88 |
| Optometrists | 4,232 | 10% | $59.76 |
| Psychiatrists | 3,971 | 14% | $100.00 |
Figure 1. 2022-2032 High-Impact Occupations
Five broad occupational clusters claim multiple high-impact occupations: Health Practitioner Occupations; Management Occupations; Life, Physical, and Social Science Occupations; Computer and Mathematical Occupations; and Business and Financial Operations Occupations.
The list is dominated by health practitioner jobs, with this cluster claiming 12 of the 30 high-impact occupations in Figure 2. This isn’t too surprising given both advanced degree significance in the field (11 of the 12 jobs are master’s degree occupations and above) and U.S. demographic trends. Over the next decade, while the total U.S. population is projected to grow by 4%, the 65-and-over population is projected to grow by 25% placing greater demand on our healthcare system and fueling concerns over the developing nursing shortage. In fact, three of the four bachelor’s and above nursing occupations make it through our high-impact filtering.
Apart from health, STEM-aligned occupations are also prevalent. Nine of the 30 high-impact occupations fall in the Life, Physical, and Social Science and Computer and Mathematical Occupations with jobs like epidemiologists and counseling psychologists representing the former and software developers and statisticians representing the latter. Broadening STEM to include health, known as STEM-H, reveals that 21 of the 30 high-impact occupations in Figure 2 are aligned to these fields.
The Bottom Line
With prospects clearly thinking about career pathways, schools must consistently evaluate the labor market to ensure they are positioned to meet these expectations. A red-hot labor market will discourage many from returning to school, forcing schools to make an even stronger case for why they should be considered. Clearly aligning academic pathways to the next decade’s high-impact occupations is one strategy.
The jobs featured here represent just a sliver of all high-impact occupations. Want to see more? Contact your Client Research Analyst.
Never Miss Your Wake-Up Call
Clint Raine
Eduventures Senior Analyst at Encoura
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