This paper reviews recent evidence on the labor market returns to credit accumulation, certificates, and associate degrees from community colleges. Evidence is collated from estimates of earnings gaps across college students using large-scale, statewide administrative datasets from eight states. Six of these states were partners of the Center for…

Of the copious research on the labor market returns to college, very little has adequately modeled the pathways of non-completers or compared their outcomes with those of award holders. In this paper, we present a novel method for linking non-completers with completers according to their program of study. This method allows us to calculate the…

Nationally, about two thirds of community college students are referred to developmental education. Thus far, research on the effectiveness of developmental education has focused on students' academic outcomes; in this paper, we examine the economic consequences of developmental education for students. Using longitudinal student-unit record data…