Failure to Launch

-- In academic achievement rates: 34 percent of women have a bachelor's degree by age 34 compared to 27 percent of men. At Iowa State University in 2004, 75 percent of women but only 67 percent of men who started six years earlier graduated. The other two public universities have similar gaps. Women in general also have higher grade point averages and are more likely to go to graduate school. -- From the unemployment rolls: Nationally, about 35 percent of men age 25 to 54 without a high school diploma are not working. The unemployment rate for men 16 and older is the highest since 1948. -- From the earnings angle: The median income for men in 2009 was 13 percent below what it was in 1973, according to Postsecondary Education Opportunity, Mortenson's newsletter. The only constant is that women make less than men at the same educational levels. In Iowa, an employed man without a high school degree earns on average $26,000, a woman $18,000.