2027 Communication Degree Underemployment Report: Which Graduates Are Most Likely to Work Below Their Education Level
Co-Founder and Chief Data Scientist
Communication graduates often face a hard first-career choice: take a readily available low-credential job or keep competing for degree-level roles in public relations, media, marketing, corporate communication, or research. Federal Reserve Bank of New York data updated in 2024 shows that roughly 40% of recent college graduates are underemployed, and communications is among the majors where the risk is higher.
This guide is for students, recent graduates, parents, and career changers who want to understand the mismatch, compare career paths, and build a practical plan to avoid long-term overqualification.
Key Things to Know About Underemployment in Communication Industry
- Communication majors face a meaningful underemployment risk because many entry-level openings value writing, customer interaction, and social media familiarity but do not necessarily require a bachelor's degree.
- The safest degree-level paths usually combine communication training with measurable skills such as analytics, campaign reporting, content strategy, PR writing, CRM tools, video production, UX writing, or market research.
- BLS May 2024 wage data shows a large earnings difference between degree-aligned roles such as public relations specialist at $69,780 median pay and common fallback roles such as customer service representative at $39,680.
- How likely is it for Communication graduates to become underemployed?
- Is the college curricula for Communication keeping up with employer expectations?
How likely is it for Communication graduates to become underemployed?
Communication graduates are not automatically underemployed, but they are more exposed than students in tightly credentialed fields such as nursing, accounting, engineering, or education. Underemployment means working in a job that typically does not require the worker's level of education.
For communication majors, this often appears as retail sales, reception, general administrative support, food service management, customer service, or basic social media posting without campaign ownership.
The most useful way to interpret the risk is to separate general communication roles from degree-level communication roles. A degree-level role usually expects the graduate to create strategy, manage stakeholder messaging, interpret audience data, write for a defined business purpose, or support measurable campaigns.
A low-credential role may use communication skills every day but does not require a bachelor's-level body of knowledge.
The table below shows how common early-career outcomes differ by role type. It is designed to help readers distinguish a useful launch job from a trap that may not build toward degree-level work:
| Early-career role type | Typical credential match | Why graduates take it | Underemployment risk |
| Public relations assistant or specialist | Degree-aligned | Uses writing, media outreach, campaign tracking, and client or stakeholder communication | Lower if the role includes press materials, reporting, and campaign ownership |
| Marketing communications coordinator | Degree-aligned | Connects messaging, content calendars, email campaigns, events, and analytics | Lower when performance metrics and platform skills are part of the job |
| Social media assistant | Mixed | Often available to new graduates and can build a portfolio quickly | Moderate to high if the role is limited to posting and community replies |
| Customer service representative | Usually below degree level | Uses interpersonal communication and is easier to access without experience | High unless there is a clear path into customer success, training, communications, or operations |
| Administrative assistant | Usually below degree level | May be a bridge into an organization with internal mobility | High if the work is mainly scheduling, routing, and clerical support |
BLS May 2024 data puts the median annual wage for public relations specialists at $69,780. That matters because public relations is one of the clearest bachelor's-aligned pathways for communication graduates, while many fallback jobs pay substantially less and may not produce a portfolio that employers recognize as professional communication experience.
Is the college curricula for Communication keeping up with employer expectations?
Many communication programs teach valuable foundations: persuasion, media theory, public speaking, writing, ethics, interpersonal communication, and research methods. The mismatch appears when employers expect graduates to show proof that they can use those foundations in modern business tools and measurable workplace contexts. A strong transcript helps, but it rarely replaces a portfolio, internship record, analytics sample, or campaign case study.
Curriculum alignment varies widely by school. A student in a program with required internships, portfolio courses, analytics projects, and industry software exposure will usually be better positioned than a student whose coursework remains mostly theory-based.
Students interested in visual storytelling can also compare communication coursework with an online photography degree or digital media coursework to see whether the program builds production, editing, and portfolio evidence that employers can evaluate.
The table below identifies the curriculum gaps that most often affect communication graduates competing for degree-level jobs. It does not mean theory is unimportant; it shows where theory needs to be converted into evidence of job readiness:
| Curriculum area | Common gap | Employer expectation | Best evidence for students |
| Writing and messaging | Essays do not always resemble workplace deliverables | Press releases, executive briefs, email campaigns, web copy, and crisis statements | Polished writing portfolio with before-and-after edits |
| Digital communication | Social media may be discussed but not measured | Campaign planning, scheduling tools, engagement metrics, and reporting | Content calendar plus performance summary |
| Research and analytics | Students may learn methods without using business dashboards | Audience segmentation, survey interpretation, SEO basics, and campaign KPIs | Research memo or dashboard screenshot using anonymized data |
| Media production | Production may be elective rather than required | Basic video, audio, photo, and editing competence for content roles | Short-form content samples with stated objective and audience |
| Professional experience | Internship may be optional | Evidence of workplace communication under deadlines | Internship, campus client project, or nonprofit campaign |
A practical test is to review five current job descriptions for the role you want and highlight repeated requirements. If your classes do not produce samples that match those requirements, use electives, student media, internships, freelancing, or certifications to close the gap before graduation.
Communication underemployment is best understood in comparison with majors that have clearer occupational licensing or technical hiring pipelines. A nursing graduate who passes licensure, for example, enters a labor market where the degree is directly tied to a credentialed role.
A communication graduate competes in broader markets where employers may hire English, business, journalism, marketing, psychology, or liberal arts graduates for similar openings.
Federal Reserve Bank of New York major-level data updated in 2024 consistently shows that underemployment is not evenly distributed across bachelor's degrees.
Communication-related majors tend to sit closer to humanities and general social science fields than to engineering, health, or computer-related majors in terms of education-to-job match. The table below summarizes the comparison in decision terms rather than treating one major as universally better than another:
| Major category | Typical underemployment pattern | Why the pattern differs | Decision takeaway |
| Communication | Moderate to high risk for recent graduates | Broad degree, many non-licensed roles, high competition for entry-level media and marketing jobs | Specialization and experience are important before graduation |
| Business and marketing | Moderate risk | More direct employer familiarity but crowded entry-level applicant pools | Analytics and sales operations skills can improve match quality |
| Journalism and media | High risk in traditional news pathways | Declining or changing newsroom employment and heavy portfolio competition | Multimedia, audience development, and niche expertise matter |
| Computer science and engineering | Lower risk, though not risk-free | More technical screening and clearer role alignment | Project evidence still matters, especially during hiring slowdowns |
| Health and education | Often lower when licensure is completed | Credential rules define eligibility for many roles | Licensure requirements reduce ambiguity but limit flexibility |
The comparison does not mean communication is a poor choice. It means the degree is more market-dependent. Students who leave college with a specific target role, proof of results, and employer-recognized tools are in a much stronger position than students who present the major as a general ability to communicate well.
Taking a low-credential job can affect career growth if it delays portfolio development, weakens professional identity, or causes the graduate to stop applying for degree-aligned roles. It does not have to be permanent, but it requires an exit strategy. Employers usually respond better to a candidate who can explain how a bridge job produced relevant achievements than to a candidate who simply lists responsibilities.
The economic risk is not only the starting wage. A graduate who spends several years outside degree-level communication work may miss early promotions into specialist, coordinator, strategist, or manager tracks. That can affect retirement contributions, loan repayment flexibility, and bargaining power. If federal student loans are involved, a lower income may reduce monthly payments under income-driven options, but it can also extend the time needed to make meaningful financial progress.
Graduate school can help in some cases, but it is not an automatic cure for underemployment. A targeted graduate pathway, such as a masters in human resources online, may make sense for communication graduates who want employee communication, talent development, internal communications, or organizational change roles. By contrast, enrolling in any graduate program without a role target can add cost without fixing the original experience gap.
Use this decision rule: a bridge job is acceptable when it creates relevant evidence within a defined timeline. It becomes risky when it merely pays bills while your resume drifts farther from the roles your degree prepared you to pursue.
The salary gap between underemployed communication graduates and degree-level communication workers can be substantial. BLS May 2024 data reports median pay of $69,780 for public relations specialists, while customer service representatives had median pay of $39,680.
That difference of $30,100 per year shows why the first few years after graduation matter: even if a low-credential job is stable, it may slow debt repayment and delay wealth-building compared with a degree-aligned track.
The table below compares common degree-level communication roles with fallback jobs that often use communication skills but usually do not require a bachelor's degree. These figures are occupation medians, not promises for new graduates, and actual pay varies by region, employer size, industry, and experience:
| Role | Degree alignment | BLS May 2024 median pay | What the comparison means |
| Public relations specialist | Strong | $69,780 | Clear fit for graduates with writing, media, campaign, and stakeholder skills |
| Market research analyst | Strong for analytics-focused graduates | $76,950 | Higher fit when communication is paired with data, survey, and consumer insight skills |
| Technical writer | Strong for specialized writers | $91,670 | Often rewards communication graduates who can explain complex products or systems |
| Customer service representative | Usually below degree level | $39,680 | May build interpersonal skills but can limit degree-level progression if not used strategically |
| Retail salesperson | Usually below degree level | $34,730 | Often accessible but rarely signals professional communication specialization |
The wage gap also changes how students should think about unpaid or low-paid experience during college. A high-quality internship or client project may be worth more than a generic part-time job if it helps the graduate qualify for a degree-level role sooner. However, students should still evaluate affordability, transportation, schedule constraints, and whether the experience produces concrete portfolio samples.
Communication graduates are often pushed into low-credential roles by a combination of structural and tactical barriers. The structural barriers include crowded applicant pools, employer preference for experience, regional differences in media and corporate hiring, and the shrinking of some traditional entry-level writing or newsroom jobs.
The tactical barriers are more controllable: weak resumes, no portfolio, generic coursework, limited internships, and unclear career targets.
AI has also changed the entry-level market. Tools that draft copy, summarize transcripts, generate social captions, and produce basic content can reduce demand for purely task-based junior roles.
That does not eliminate communication careers, but it raises the bar: graduates must show judgment, strategy, audience insight, editing skill, ethics, and the ability to evaluate AI-assisted work rather than simply produce first drafts.
The most common barriers fall into these categories:
- No specialization: Employers may not know whether the graduate is aiming for PR, social media, internal communication, content marketing, research, media production, or corporate training.
- No measurable portfolio: Class papers alone rarely prove that a candidate can produce workplace deliverables under constraints.
- Limited internships: Graduates who wait until senior year may compete against applicants with multiple internships, campus media experience, or client projects.
- Weak technical stack: Many roles expect comfort with analytics dashboards, content management systems, social scheduling tools, email platforms, CRM systems, or basic design and video tools.
- Local market mismatch: Some regions have fewer agency, media, corporate headquarters, nonprofit, or government communication openings.
- Overbroad job search: Applying to every "communications" posting can produce weaker results than targeting one role family with a tailored resume and samples.
The strongest candidates do not merely claim they are good communicators. They show how their communication work changed awareness, engagement, attendance, conversion, employee understanding, media coverage, donor response, or customer behavior.
A communication resume should be built around evidence, not adjectives. Hiring managers expect strong writing and interpersonal ability from this major, so the resume has to prove something more specific: what audiences you reached, what content you created, what tools you used, what deadlines you met, and what outcomes your work supported.
Use the following sequence to reposition a general communication resume for degree-level roles:
- Pick one target role family, such as PR assistant, social media coordinator, internal communications associate, content marketing coordinator, market research assistant, or technical communication specialist.
- Collect five current job descriptions for that role and identify repeated nouns, tools, deliverables, and outcomes.
- Rewrite your summary around the role, not the major, using phrases such as "entry-level public relations candidate with media list, press release, and event campaign experience."
- Move portfolio evidence near the top, including campaign samples, writing clips, research briefs, content calendars, media kits, newsletters, analytics reports, or video projects.
- Convert duties into results, such as "drafted weekly newsletter for 1,200 student subscribers" or "built a social content calendar for a nonprofit fundraising campaign."
- Add a skills section that reflects employer language, including tools, writing formats, research methods, analytics platforms, and content systems you can actually use.
- Tailor each application by matching the top third of the resume to the job's most important requirements.
Common mistakes include listing "excellent communication skills" without evidence, using the same resume for PR and HR roles, hiding internships under unrelated work history, and omitting campaign metrics because the numbers seem small. Even modest metrics are useful when they show that the graduate understands audience, purpose, and results.
Certifications can help communication graduates qualify for degree-level roles when they fill a real skill gap. They are most useful when paired with a portfolio project, because employers want evidence that the candidate can apply the credential in a workplace context. A certificate alone is weaker than a certificate plus a campaign report, analytics dashboard, content calendar, or writing sample.
The table below summarizes certifications and skill credentials that often align with communication career paths. Requirements, costs, and employer recognition vary, so students should verify current details before enrolling:
| Certification or credential area | Best-fit communication roles | Why it may reduce underemployment risk |
| Google Analytics or digital analytics training | Marketing communications, content strategy, audience research | Shows ability to connect messaging with measurable audience behavior |
| HubSpot content, email, or inbound marketing certifications | Content marketing, social media, email marketing, demand generation | Demonstrates familiarity with digital campaign workflows |
| Hootsuite or social media platform certifications | Social media coordinator, community manager, digital communications assistant | Moves the candidate beyond casual platform use into scheduling, reporting, and governance |
| Project management fundamentals | Agency coordinator, events, internal communications, campaign operations | Helps show readiness for deadlines, stakeholders, timelines, and cross-functional work |
| Adobe, video editing, or design tool training | Digital media, content production, brand communications | Supports portfolio-building for roles that blend messaging and production |
| UX writing or content design training | Product communication, web content, user education | Connects communication skills with technology, usability, and customer experience |
Certifications are not the same as licensure-based career changes. For example, a communication graduate interested in counseling, family systems, or therapeutic communication would need to compare licensure-oriented education such as online MFT programs rather than assuming a short certificate can qualify them for clinical practice. The same principle applies across fields: choose the credential that matches the job's actual eligibility requirements.
The best way to reduce underemployment risk is to treat the communication degree as a platform, not a complete job-search strategy. Students should build a clear role target, employer evidence, and a network before graduation.
Waiting until after commencement often means competing with candidates who already have internships, referrals, clips, dashboards, and campaign samples.
Use this practical plan during college or immediately after graduation:
- Choose a primary path by sophomore or junior year, such as public relations, corporate communication, content marketing, social media strategy, market research, technical writing, media production, or internal communication.
- Map your classes against job descriptions and fill missing skills through electives, student media, campus employment, freelance projects, or certifications.
- Complete at least one substantial internship or client-based project before senior year, then turn it into a portfolio case study with objective, audience, deliverables, tools, and results.
- Build a small but focused portfolio rather than a large collection of unrelated assignments; quality and relevance matter more than volume.
- Develop tool fluency in the platforms your target roles mention most often, such as analytics, CMS, email marketing, social scheduling, CRM, design, video, or survey tools.
- Network with alumni in specific role families and ask about hiring criteria, portfolio expectations, and realistic entry points.
- Apply early and consistently, using tailored resumes for each role family instead of one broad communication resume.
- Evaluate fallback jobs by asking whether they offer internal mobility, relevant projects, transferable tools, and a six- to twelve-month exit path.
Further education can be useful, but the timing matters. Master's degrees, certificates, and even accelerated pathways such as one year doctoral programs should be evaluated against a specific career outcome, total cost, employer recognition, and whether the credential solves the actual barrier.
For most entry-level communication graduates, relevant experience and a targeted portfolio usually produce a faster return than pursuing another degree without a defined occupational goal.
The smartest strategy is not to avoid every low-credential job at all costs. It is to avoid becoming stuck in one. If a temporary role helps you gain access, income, and relevant projects while you keep building toward degree-level work, it can be part of a rational plan. If it disconnects you from your target field, it deserves a deadline and an exit strategy.
Some communication graduates use low-credential roles as short bridges, especially when the job is inside a relevant employer such as a university, hospital, nonprofit, agency, media company, or corporate marketing department. The risk rises when the job does not create new evidence for a degree-level resume.
A front-desk role at a PR agency can be useful if it leads to writing assignments or campaign support; the same role becomes limiting if it remains purely administrative.
Research on early-career underemployment in the broader college labor market shows that the first job matters because hiring managers often screen later applicants based on recent experience.
For communication graduates, the longer a resume is dominated by work that does not involve campaigns, media, analytics, content, writing, stakeholder management, or research, the harder it can become to prove degree-level readiness.
A low-credential role is more likely to be temporary when it includes these features:
- Access to internal communication, marketing, HR, training, customer success, or media teams that could become transfer destinations.
- A supervisor willing to assign writing, reporting, presentation, event, or content projects that can be documented in a portfolio.
- A clear timeline, such as applying for internal coordinator roles after six to twelve months rather than waiting indefinitely.
- Skill development that matches target job postings, including analytics, CRM use, copywriting, or project management.
- A work schedule that leaves room for interviews, certifications, freelance projects, or networking.
The red flag is a job that uses communication only as customer politeness, phone handling, or conflict de-escalation but offers no path toward measurable communication work. That experience may be valuable personally, but it is weaker as evidence for degree-level hiring.
Other Things You Should Know About Communication
It can be worth it for students who build a focused skill set and portfolio before graduation. The degree is riskier when treated as a general credential without internships, technical tools, writing samples, or a defined role target.
Specializations tied to measurable business needs are usually stronger, including public relations, digital marketing communication, market research, technical writing, internal communication, and content strategy. Outcomes still depend on location, experience, portfolio quality, and employer demand.
Unpaid internships can help only if they are financially manageable, legally structured, supervised, and likely to produce strong portfolio evidence. Paid internships, campus client projects, student media leadership, and nonprofit freelance work can also build relevant experience.
There is no universal deadline, but graduates should reassess after six months. If the role is not producing relevant projects, internal transfer options, new tools, or portfolio samples, it is time to intensify applications, upskill, and pursue degree-aligned opportunities.
- Communications Degree Job Outlook 2026: Career Tips & Data https://www.mastersincommunications.org/communications-degree-job-outlook/
- The Labor Market for Recent College Graduates https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market
- How Undergraduate Internships Lead to Early Career Inequality and Misconceptions about College Majors http://www.wipsociology.org/2021/04/15/how-undergraduate-internships-lead-to-early-career-inequality-and-misconceptions-about-college-majors/
- Jobs for Communications Graduates: Top 12 Best Across Industries https://www.betterup.com/blog/jobs-for-communications-graduates
- Half of College Graduates Have Jobs That Don’t Use Their Degrees – The Chronicle of Evidence-Based Mentoring https://www.evidencebasedmentoring.org/half-of-college-graduates-have-jobs-that-dont-use-their-degrees/
- Room for Progress in College Graduates’ Transition to the Labor Market - Public Policy Institute of California https://www.ppic.org/blog/room-for-progress-in-college-graduates-transition-to-the-labor-market/
