The Percentage of University Graduate Workers in Indonesia is Increasing

The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) reports that the proportion of Indonesian university graduates in the workforce has shown an upward trend over the past four years. In August 2017, 9.35% of Indonesian workers were university graduates.

This proportion increased to 9.4% in August 2018 and 9.7% in August 2019. However, this percentage decreased to 9.63% in August 2020, the year the Covid-19 pandemic first hit Indonesia.

The proportion of university graduates increased again to 10.18% in August 2021, equivalent to 13.34 million workers in Indonesia.

Despite this increase, this number is still significantly lower than the number of workers who graduated from elementary school, junior high school, senior high school, and vocational high school. A total of 49.39 million workers, or 37.69%, have completed elementary school or less.

23.28 million workers, or 17.76%, are junior high school graduates. Furthermore, 24.72 million workers, or 18.87%, are senior high school graduates.

There are 16.86 million workers, or 12.86%, who are vocational high school graduates. Meanwhile, only 3.46 million workers, or 2.64%, are Diploma I/II/III graduates.