The line chart illustrates the disparities in income levels, categorized by educational attainment, among male employees in the United States from 1964 to 2012.
In general, individuals possessing a bachelor’s degree or higher consistently earn higher wages than workers with a college degree or lower. Over the years, a consistent pattern has been observed regarding the income levels of male workers with an education level below a bachelor’s degree: those with some college, a high school diploma, and less than a high school education.
In 1964 every worker had the same wage regardless of their educational level, however throughout 9 years consistent growth can be found. People with bachelor’s degrees or higher were making much more money than others, around 1.4 percent. After 1973 a small downfall can be observed which lasted until 1975 but right after that year a continued growth occurred until 2012. On the one hand, by that year, employees holding degrees higher than a bachelor’s earned nearly twice as much as they did at the outset. On the other hand, individuals with bachelor’s degrees experienced a 1.4% increase, which remains significantly more favorable than the outcomes for other groups.
From 1964 to 1973 there was continuous growth for all the groups, but people with a lower educational level were making less money than workers with university diplomas. During these 9 years an almost identical pattern in wage level can be seen for these 3 groups of male employees with their maximum of 1.2% in 1973. However, following 1973, certain distinctions emerged. Although the general trends remained similar until 2012, the income levels varied. By the end of 2012, individuals with some college education earned wages at a 1.2% level, those with a high school diploma earned approximately 1.1%, and workers with less than a high school education earned less than 1.0%. This figure is lower than the 1964 statistic.