Drawing on over a decade of longitudinal linked administrative and earnings records, this report examines earnings returns for CUNY community college associate degree program entrants using selection-on-observables (OLS) and individual fixed effects (FE) methods, distinguishing between terminal associate degree completion and pathways involving bachelor’s attainment, whether earned alone or in combination with an associate degree. Because degree completion is not random, estimated returns depend on the econometric assumptions underlying each approach. The authors pay particular attention to how returns vary across entry cohorts, major fields (as declared at entry), student demographic characteristics, and eligibility for ASAP (a program that provides intensive advising, financial support, and structured coursetaking to help community college students enroll full-time and graduate on time) as well as how these returns evolve over time after graduation (within a 10-year post-entry follow-up period).
The authors find substantial and robust earnings returns to associate degree completion for CUNY community college students across multiple estimation approaches and student subgroups. For example, after accounting for a wide range of factors—including early academic performance and pre-college earnings—the authors estimate substantial earnings gains associated with completing a terminal associate degree by Year 10. Specifically, terminal associate degree completers earned about $2,426 more per quarter (roughly $9,700 annually), representing an increase of about 30% compared to noncompleters. Nearly as many community college entrants completed a bachelor’s degree as completed only an associate degree, and bachelor’s degree completers saw much larger annual returns—about $16,000 annually relative to noncompleters. Although earnings trajectories vary with timing, demographics, and local labor market conditions, degree completion is consistently associated with improved long-run labor market outcomes.