10 Countries With the Highest Percentage of College Graduates in the World

Education is considered the driving force behind any modern country’s advances – a fact that the 10 countries with the highest percentage of college graduates in the world will tell you is true. We can all agree that a school does not really show off your intelligence, rather than your ability to efficiently learn and research. The list we did on the 34 smartest countries in the world will show you that with the mismatch of its results and the ones you’re about to see.

Even with the norm that tertiary education has become, the world is expected to meet a shortage of qualified professionals at some point in the near future. This tendency is mainly attributed to the fact that a lot of graduates struggle to find work in their field and because of the aging workforce that already takes these positions. Having educated specialists is very important for a country because of all the strictly-trained niche positions that today’s industry offers. While we are in imminent danger of robots replacing our labor as a more cost-effective and efficient solution, this time has not come yet and even when it does, we still have a lot of work that requires a human touch. A local qualified workforce also lowers the price of labor in cases where outsourcing is not a viable option.

College education has been around in one form or another for centuries. Ever since the European Renaissance brought the pursuit of knowledge and intellectual expansion to the western world, as opposed to the blunt religious past, education has been one of the most important and sought after activity. While in the past training for a certain position, learning a craft or studying arts and technique were passed on individually, face-to-face from an experienced person to a trainee, with the introduction of higher education, these skills were taught in bigger and bigger groups, making education far more efficient than ever before. Of course, this too has turned into one of the most profitable businesses nowadays. Let’s look at the 10 countries where people make use of that business the most.

10. Ireland

Ireland’s education reforms in recent times come to show that you can sacrifice a little profit in order to make higher education more accessible. People there make use of that on a big enough scaled to put Ireland on our tenth spot.

9. Australia

Australia started out as a place where people went with hopes for a new, more successful beginning in their lives. Probably pursuing the same, Australia’s big number of graduates put it on the ninth spot in our list.

8. Finland

Finland has long been known as one of the most progressive countries as far as education is concerned. Their will to break the traditions and offer free, personalized education for their youth has been paying back excellently.

7. United Kingdom

The home of some of the most prestigious and acclaimed universities/colleges in the world stands proudly at the seventh spot on this list.

6. South Korea

South Korea’s population is surely enjoying all their new (historically speaking) freedom, and attending and finishing higher education seems to be one of their favorite pursuits, aside from coffee and odd musical one hit wonders.

5. New Zealand

The beautiful island nation stands fifth on our list of the 10 countries with the highest percentage of college graduates in the world. New Zealand’s youth is also among the most satisfied with the way of life they are being handed.

4. United States

The United States of America have successfully turned college education into one of the most dreaded and sought after at the same time parts of the nation’s lives. With inhumane pricing and an economy which heavily relies on degrees, the USA takes the fourth place.

3. Japan

Japan is another country that has been known to take a different approach to education, offering its young learners a chance to pick specialized education from the moment they finish kindergarten.

2. Israel

Israel’s instances of higher education are among some of the most respected in the world. Similarly, Israel is home to a huge number of highly specialized professionals.

1. Canada

Canada takes the first spot on the list of the 10 countries with the most college graduates in the world with it’s immense flow of young people willing to make a name for themselves in and out of their colleges.