The perceived importance of college education among Americans has dropped to a new low, continuing the downward trend in the last 15 years, according to a new Gallup survey that was released Thursday morning.
The poll found that 35 percent of U.S. adults rate college education as “very important.” Around 40 percent said it is “fairly important,” while another quarter, 24 percent, said it’s “not too important.”
In 2019, when asked about the importance of college, over half of Americans, 53 percent, said it was very important. The figure was nearly 20 points lower than in 2013, when 70 percent said the same. In 2010, 75 percent of U.S. adults said that a college education was very important.
Those who said that college education is not too important have more than doubled since 2019, Gallup noted. Only 4 percent said that in 2010.
Among parents with kids under the age of 18, the results were similar. Forty percent said college education was somewhat important, 38 percent said it was very important, and 21 percent said it was not too important, according to the survey.
Support for higher education has dropped among all major subgroups in the last 12 years.
Even among college graduates, Democrats and people of color, who historically have been more likely to be in favor of higher education, less than 50 percent said that education is very important now, the poll found.
Close to half of college graduates, 46 percent, said college is fairly important. Another four-in-10 said it was very important, while 12 percent said it was not too important.
Among non-college graduates, 32 percent said college education was not too important. About 31 percent said it was very important and 37 percent said it was fairly important, according to the survey.
The poll was conducted Aug. 1-20 among 1,094 Americans. The margin of error was 4 percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level.
