Most employers prefer a degree even when the job does not require one, Lumina-Gallup survey finds

Eight in 10 U.S. hiring decision-makers prefer candidates with a college degree, whether or not the role requires one, according to a Lumina Foundation and Gallup survey of 2,500 employers that Gallup published on October 19.

It is the second annual employer study by Lumina, an independent private foundation in Indianapolis that works to make learning beyond high school available to all, and Gallup. Courtney Brown, Lumina's chief data and research officer, set out the foundation's reading of the results in a post on October 20.

What did employers say?

Most prefer degrees and trust colleges more than the public does.

Confidence varied by size. At organizations with fewer than 10 employees, 44% of employers expressed high confidence in higher education, compared with 59% or more at every larger size, Gallup reported. Smaller employers are also less likely to require a degree.

How does the public compare?

It is less confident. In a separate Gallup measure, 38% of U.S. adults expressed a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in higher education in June 2026. Brown's post says that is down from 57% when Gallup first asked in 2015, and that 46% of Americans expect AI to make degrees less important, while 20% expect it to make them more important.

How reliable are the numbers?

Less than a typical Gallup poll. Gallup fielded the survey online August 5-18, 2026, using an opt-in panel from TestSet, with no quotas and no weighting. "A margin of error was not calculated due to the use of opt-in sample," its methods note says. An opt-in panel is made up of people who signed up to take surveys rather than a random sample, so the results describe these respondents and may not represent all U.S. employers.

What else does Lumina cite?

Brown cites research from Harvard Business School and the Burning Glass Institute finding that dropping degree requirements produced only a modest increase in hiring of workers without bachelor's degrees. "An employer can say a degree is optional but still prefer the candidate who has one," she wrote. She also cites Federal Reserve Bank of New York figures of about 5.6% unemployment and 42% underemployment among recent college graduates in the second quarter of 2026. We have not checked those figures against the originals.

What should nonprofit employers consider?

Many nonprofits have dropped degree requirements to widen their applicant pools. In our view, saying a degree is optional is not the same as hiring without one, and a board can ask for the numbers on who is actually hired. For the budget pressures behind many staffing decisions, see the Urban Institute's findings on government funding disruptions.