A longtime Bureau of Labor Statistics study shows what life has been like for Americans born 27 years ago.
The nationally representative survey found they averaged 6.2 jobs so far, most of them before age 22. Well-educated women have held more jobs than those with less education, while there was no difference when compared to how many jobs men held.
These and other slice-of-life facts about young adults have come from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997, which queried 9,000 people born between 1980 and 1984. They were 12 to 17 when interviewed in 1997, a process that has continued since. By now, they are between 26 and 32 and have been interviewed 15 times, most recently in 2011-12.
Over the years, the bureau has issued reports focusing in different aspects of their lives; the one released this week looks at education, employment and household composition from ages 18 to 27.
"The presence of children in the home is what changes it all for women," said an article in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "If a young woman has a child living with her — whether she is married, unmarried with a partner or single — she is more likely not to be employed. For men, the opposite was true — children drove them to work."
"Compared to all adults surveyed by the Census Bureau, this group is more educated," notes NPR. "A lot more of them have some college experience, more have earned at least a bachelor's degree, and fewer have dropped out of high school."
NPR continues: "By a substantial margin, women are more likely than men to be married at age 27 and generally, people with more education are more likely to be married than those with less."
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