Degrees Demoted to Visas Amid Graduate Glut

Prof Shitij Kapur, vice-chancellor of King’s College London, states that a UK university degree no longer serves as a passport to social mobility. Nearly half of young people now enter higher education, yet good jobs depend on university prestige and course choice. This marks the end of universities’ core promise.

Blair’s 1999 pledge targeted 50% university attendance to drive mobility. Sunak labeled it a 30-year mistake; Starmer echoed in 2025 that it fits no modern need. Cross-party consensus admits expansion overshot economic reality.

Graduate employment edges non-graduates, but real earnings for young graduates stagnate over the past decade. Department for Education data confirms the premium erodes as supply balloons. Sociologist Martin Trow foresaw this: elite scarcity yields to mass necessity, slashing regard and returns.

Tuition fees hit £9,000 in 2012 amid slowest growth timing. English students receive two-thirds prior funding levels. Vice-chancellors face a “triangle of sadness”: indebted graduates, squeezed staff, governments inflating away fees.

International students prop up the system with premium fees. They fund research and subsidize domestic teaching at places like King’s. Recent visa curbs and levies threaten this crutch.

Productivity Paradox

Universities claim world-leading status through this model. Yet UK output stalls while graduates compete globally and with AI. Kapur warns productivity revival hinges on tech mastery, not barista speed—universities hold the key they cannot turn.

Governments since 1997 expanded access without wage growth or job creation to match. Degrees shifted from privilege to baseline requirement. Half enter; few ascend.

This exposes education policy as repeated failure across parties. Blair built the factory; Tories and Labour watch it churn debt over ladders. Social mobility, once verifiable via graduate premiums, now demands exceptional entry tickets.

Vice-chancellors pivot to realism too late. Admissions hit 42% of 18-year-olds; output floods a stagnant economy. Ordinary families borrow for visas to nowhere.

Britain’s decline sharpens here. Universities mass-produce credentials that certify entry, not escape. Cross-party expansion locked in inequality, handing talent abroad while domestic prospects fossilize.