May 04, 2001 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Contract company employees more educated than traditional workers

In 1999, the proportion of contract company workers aged 25-64 with a college degree—38.9 percent—was well above the proportion for traditional workers (31.1 percent).

[Chart data—TXT]

Another 31.9 percent of contract company employees had at least some college but less than a bachelor's degree, as did 28.3 percent of workers in traditional arrangements. In total, about seven-tenths of contract company employees had some college or a college degree compared with approximately six-tenths of traditional workers.

"Contract company workers" are employed by a company that provides their services to others under contract; they are usually assigned to only one customer and work at the customer's worksite.

These data are a product of a February supplement to the monthly Current Population Survey. Find out more in "Characteristics of and preference for alternative work arrangements, 1999," by Marisa DiNatale, Monthly Labor Review, March 2001. 

 

Related TED article:

• Less than 10 percent of workers in nontraditional arrangements