At least 7 out of 10 people who are part of the workforce in Colombia did not go beyond high school or did not even graduate from school, according to the latest technical bulletin from Dane on labor force and education, corresponding to the year 2025.
37.1 percent of the Colombian labor force only reached secondary education, that is, they barely have a high school diploma. This is by far the most common educational ceiling among those who work or actively seek work in the country. No other level comes close.
In second place is 17.9 percent of the labor force who did not surpass primary basic education. Followed by 13 percent who managed to complete a technical or technological degree, and 12.1 percent who graduated from university.
Further behind is 10.4 percent who have no approved educational level. Closing the list are those who reached postgraduate level, with just 5 percent, and those who only reached lower secondary education, without completing high school, with 4.6 percent.
And this distribution is not a minor detail. It largely reflects the educational ceiling with which millions of Colombians enter the labor market: most stop at high school, without reaching technical, technological, or university levels.
In fact, if you add those who have no degree, those who only reached primary, those who stopped halfway through secondary, and those who did not go beyond high school, the result is clear: 70 percent of the Colombian labor force never reached higher education. That is, seven out of ten people who work or seek employment in the country do not have a technical, technological, university, or postgraduate degree.
It is also striking that those who stopped halfway through secondary are the least represented group among the entire labor force, even below those who did not achieve any educational level. This suggests that a good part of Colombians who do not finish complete secondary education choose to remain in the system until they obtain the high school diploma, or they drop out before reaching that intermediate point.
In total, those who have no degree, those who only reached primary, and those who stopped halfway through secondary make up 32.9 percent of the country’s labor force. That is, almost a third of those who work or seek employment in Colombia did not surpass basic education.
Unemployment: high school graduates, the hardest hit
The Dane bulletin also details how the employed and unemployed population is distributed according to the educational ceiling reached, and there are figures that deserve attention.
Of the total number of people employed in the country during 2025, 36.5 percent only reached high school. Followed by 18.2 percent of the employed who barely completed primary school.
But it is among the unemployed population where this data becomes more worrying: 43.5 percent of those who did not have a job but were actively looking only had a high school diploma.
Thus, being a high school graduate and nothing more is, at the same time, the educational profile that concentrates the most employment and the one that generates the most unemployment in absolute terms within the Colombian labor force.
Something similar, although on a smaller scale, happens with those who have a technical or technological degree: they represent 12.7 percent of the employed, but 15.5 percent of the unemployed. That is, this group is also overrepresented among those seeking work without finding it.
The same happens with those who only reached primary, who go from representing 18.2 percent of the employed to 14.5 percent of the unemployed, and with those who stopped halfway through secondary, who rise from 4.6 percent among the employed to 5.1 percent among the unemployed.
In contrast, those who have no degree see their participation reduced among the unemployed: they go from representing 10.8 percent of the employed to just 5.4 percent of the unemployed. A similar behavior is observed among those who reached postgraduate level, who fall from 5.2 percent among the employed to 2.5 percent among the unemployed.
Those with a university degree, for their part, remain relatively stable: they represent 11.9 percent of the employed and 13.5 percent of the unemployed.
Women, the most affected by unemployment at all levels
The Dane bulletin also broke down the unemployment rate according to the educational ceiling reached and gender, and the results confirm a trend that repeats year after year in Colombia: at almost all levels, women have a higher unemployment rate than men.
The widest gap is recorded, again, among those who only reached high school: the female unemployment rate reached 13.5 percent, compared to 8.1 percent among men. This represents a difference of 5.4 percentage points.
Something similar happens among those with a technical or technological degree, where the female unemployment rate was 13 percent, compared to 7.9 percent among men.
Among those who stopped halfway through secondary, the female rate was 12.9 percent, against 7.8 percent for men. And among those with a university degree, the difference is also notable: 11.2 percent for women versus 8.6 percent for men.
The gap remains, although with lower figures, among those who only reached primary, where women registered an unemployment rate of 9.9 percent, compared to 5.9 percent for men. And among those with no degree, the female rate was 6.3 percent, against 4 percent for men.
Postgraduate is the only exception to this trend. There, the male unemployment rate, 4.6 percent, slightly exceeded that of women, which was 4.4 percent. It is the only level where the difference is reversed, although it is the narrowest gap in the entire report: just two-tenths of a percentage point.
In total, the female unemployment rate exceeded the male rate by at least 2.3 percentage points in six of the seven educational levels analyzed by Dane.
Formality and self-employment, according to the degree attained
The bulletin also revealed how the occupational position of Colombian workers changes as their educational ceiling rises.
Among those with no degree, self-employment is by far the predominant mode: 66.9 percent of this group identified as self-employed, compared to just 30.3 percent who reported being salaried. The remaining 2.7 percent worked without pay.
This proportion reverses as the level attained rises. Among those who only reached primary, 57.7 percent of the employed are self-employed and 39.7 percent salaried. Among those who stopped halfway through secondary, the difference narrows even more: 50.3 percent self-employed versus 46 percent salaried.
The turning point occurs among those who reached high school, where for the first time the majority of the employed are salaried: 58.7 percent, compared to 39.4 percent self-employed.
This trend deepens among those who reached higher levels of education. Among those with a technical or technological degree, 68.1 percent reported being salaried, compared to 30.9 percent self-employed.
The same proportion, 68.1 percent salaried, is repeated among those with a university degree and/or postgraduate. In this group, 31.5 percent work independently and just 0.4 percent work without pay, the lowest percentage in the entire report in that category.
In total, for the entire employed population of the country, 54.4 percent are salaried, 43.8 percent self-employed, and 1.8 percent work without pay.
Thus, the Dane bulletin presents a clear picture: the higher the degree a person attains, the greater their probability of accessing formal and salaried employment, and the lower the likelihood of depending on self-employment. But that same educational advancement does not manage to close, in most levels, the gender gap that persists in Colombian unemployment.
EDUCATION EDITORIAL
