All demographics see a college education as less important now than they did in 2019.
Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | fstop123/E+/Getty Images
Only about three in 10 Americans view a college education as “very important,” the lowest percentage since Gallup began asking the question in 1978. The number has plummeted since 2013, when 70 percent viewed college as “very important.”
In an August poll, a plurality of respondents, or 39 percent, said a college education was “fairly important,” while 29 percent said it was “not too important.”
“Fairly important” was the most popular answer when the question was first asked in 1978, but the large majority of respondents have said it was “very important” in two polls in the ’80s and one in 2013. That number first began dropping in 2019, when just 51 percent of Americas selected “very important,” an almost 20-percentage-point decrease in just six years.
It dropped again to 35 percent in 2025 and then to 31 percent this year.
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Every single demographic group lost confidence in the importance of higher education, according to Gallup’s data. The biggest declines were among Democrats (22 percentage points) and Black respondents (25 percentage points)—both of which were among the groups in 2019 most likely to say they considered a college degree very important.
As of 2025 and 2026, men and Republicans were least likely to consider a degree important. Hispanic people were the most likely to still highly rate the importance of college, with 47 percent selecting “very important.”
Even though both college-educated and non-college-educated respondents feel a college degree is less important now than they did in 2019, the gap has widened from three percentage points to eight percentage points.
For years, various surveys and reports have shown Americans are losing confidence in higher education and losing certainty in its value. In Gallup’s most recent poll of Americans’ confidence in higher education, fewer respondents reported feeling “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in higher ed, while Democrats’ confidence in higher ed reached a record low .
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