Attending a Little Bit of College Is Worse Than Not Going at All

The recession took a bite out of earnings for all workers—but people who made an unsuccessful attempt at college were hurt the most. Those who’ve completed some college have seen their paychecks shrink the most compared with all groups of workers since 2007, a new report shows.

The report, released on Thursday by the Economic Policy Institute, analyzed data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and found that real hourly wages for workers who started, but didn’t finish, college declined 5.9 percent from 2007 to 2014. That’s worse than the dip for workers who didn’t graduate high school (5.2 percent decline), those who graduated high school (3.7 percent), and those who graduated college (2 percent). The only group whose wages have bounced back to 2007 levels are workers holding advanced degrees. Even so, their recovery has been modest at best: The EPI says advanced degree holders’ real hourly wages are now sitting merely at 2007 levels.