A new report released Monday by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce (CEW), supported by College Futures Foundation, argues California could generate $4.4 trillion in net monetary gains if 70 percent of adults across all demographic groups attain a postsecondary credential by 2035.
Hispanic and Latino Californians, who currently hold some of the state’s lowest attainment rates, account for $4.2 trillion of the projected impact alone.
“How much opportunity are we leaving on the table?” asked the report’s lead author and Director of Research at the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce Dr. Zach Mabel. “What happens if disparities continue, and what becomes possible if they don’t?”
What the report surfaces is not simply a case for education as an economic strategy; it is a case for closing equity gaps as a public good. That means migrant farmworkers in the Central Valley, working mothers returning to community college after a night shift, older adults who are re-imagining school again after decades in a labor force that told them experience was enough — all of them have an important role to play in raising the state’s economic standing, if California leaders invest in the supports they need to attain the credentials.
That possibility carries weight. With five years of major investment, the report projects California could see $65.5 billion in annual net gains. Over five decades, the returns would eclipse public costs nearly 30 times over.
The report treats credentials as pathways and public investments. It also insists geography matters; the Bay Area is not the San Joaquin Valley, and they should be treated according to their unique contexts. A credential means something different in a region shaped by agriculture than in one shaped by tech.
