Statistics

National High School Dropout Statistics

Nationwide, nearly one in three U.S. high school students fails to graduate with a diploma. In total, approximately 1.2 million students drop out each year – averaging 7,000 every school day or one every 26 seconds.¹

Approximately one-third (37 percent) of high school dropouts nationwide are steadily employed and are more than twice as likely to live in poverty.²

Over their working lives, the average high school dropout will have a net fiscal contribution to society of approximately negative $5,200 while the average high school graduate generates a positive lifetime net fiscal contribution of $287,000. The average high school dropout will cost taxpayers over $292,000 in lower tax revenues, higher cash and in-kind transfer costs, and imposed incarceration costs relative to an average high school graduate.³

Nearly 60 percent of America’s federal prison inmates and 75 percent of state prison inmates did not complete high school.⁴

The number of people in poverty in 2010 (46.2 million) is the largest number in the 52 years for which poverty estimates have been published.⁵

In 2008, 34.7 percent of 25-34 year olds without a high school diploma were poor, defined as earning an annual pre-tax cash income of less than $10,991.⁶

On average, one additional year of schooling will reduce the murder and assault rate by close to 30 percent, motor vehicle theft by 20 percent, arson by 13 percent, and burglary and larceny by about six percent.⁷

The U.S. death rate for those with fewer than 12 years of education is 2.5 times higher than the rate of those with 13 or more years of education.⁸

America’s high school graduation rate ranks 19^th in the world (forty years ago, we were number one).⁹

In the late 1960’s, the high school graduation rate peaked at around 80 percent.¹⁰

Works Cited

1. Cities in Crisis 2009. America’s Promise Alliance.
   http://www.americaspromise.org/our-work/Dropout-Prevention/Cities-in-Crisis.aspx
   
2. Cities in Crisis 2009. America’s Promise Alliance.
   http://www.americaspromise.org/our-work/Dropout-Prevention/Cities-in-Crisis.aspx
   
3. The Consequences of Dropping Out of High School. Oct. 2009. http://www.americaspromise.org/~/media/Files/Resources/ Consequences_of_Dropping_Out_of_High_School.ashx
4. “Education and Correctional Populations.” Bureau of Justice Statistic Special Report (2003).
   http://www.eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED477377.pdf
   
5. U.S. Census Bureau (Calendar year 2010)
   http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/about/overview/index.html
6. Gabe, T. Poverty in the United States. Congressional Research Service. (2010).
   http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL33069_20100421.pdf
7. Tyler, J. H. & Lofstrom, M. (2009) Finishing High School: Alternative Pathways and Dropout Recovery. America’s High Schools. The Future of Children: A Collaboration of The Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University and The Brookings Institution. Vol.19(1).
   http://www.princeton.edu/futureofchildren/publications/journals/article/index.xml?journalid=30&articleid=49&sectionid=175
   
8. Economic Impacts of Dropouts. National Dropout Prevention Center/Network. Clemson University (2003).
   http://www.dropoutprevention.org/statistics/quick-facts/economic-impacts-dropouts
9. http://www.dosomething.org/tipsandtools/11-facts-about-dropping-out
10. Institute for the Study of Labor Heckman, J.J., LaFontaine, P.A. Dec. 2007 The American High School Graduation Rate: Trends and Levels
    http://ftp.iza.org/dp3216.pdf