I’ve been on this kick for a long time: education, unlike what Robert Reich and some other people preach, isn’t the solution for people who are trying to figure out how to contend with the economic future–it’s about corporate power and the battering of peoples’ standard of living, something getting another degree won’t solve.

Our friends at the Economic Policy Institute point to a sliver of this issue with a glimpse at the prospects facing young college graduates:

The labor market for young college graduates, those ages 25 to 35, is slowly improving, but remains much weaker than before the last recession in 2001. It has been 20 years since young college graduates have experienced employment rates as low as those experienced in the last five years.

These well-schooled individuals—possessing at least a bachelor’s degree, and in some cases, an advanced degree—would be expected to fare better than those without college degrees because demand for their skills should insulate them from labor market fluctuations. However, employment trends still indicate that young college graduates have not returned to the wage levels or employment rates at the start of the recession.

The real hourly wages of young college graduates have picked up slightly over the last year after declines for three years in a row. Hourly wages in 2005 were $23.10, up from $23.03 in 2004, but still below the level of $23.77 in 2001

See the rest of this here.