The Impact of "Unprofessional Degrees" on the Economy

The "Big Beautiful Bill Act" passed under the Trump Administration has updated the list of Professional Degrees. How does that impact the citizens of the United States?

On November 24th, news broke that Trump’s Department of Education had removed many degrees from the list of Professional Degrees. Most notably, a nursing degree was removed from the list, meaning that it is no longer considered “professional”. Many people across the country are outraged over this update. Large debates have sparked across platforms and news stations, debating whether the outcome is favorable or not. Yet, what does an update to this list mean? What does this mean from an economical standpoint? 

A “Professional Degree” is a degree that is for a specific, licensed career and does not focus on research activities, which academic degrees emphasize. These degrees often let individuals be allowed into regulated career fields and have a higher skill level in their specific area. This list of degrees include Pharmacy, Dentistry, Veterinary Medicine, Chiropractic, Law, Medicine, Optometry, Osteopathic Medicine, Podiatry, Theology, and Clinical Psychology. However, I want to focus on the “money” side of things. Having or studying a “Professional Degree” allows individuals to qualify for much higher loans to pursue education than other degrees. According to the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, most graduate students have a loan limit of $20,500 a year, meaning they could take $100,000 in total in loans. Yet, if you are pursuing a “professional degree”, a student could have a loan limit of $50,000 a year, which allows for $200,000 in total of loans.

This difference could mean a lot to students. Pursuing a graduate is not cheap, especially in the United States. For example, according to the U.S. News & World Report, it will typically cost a student between $250,000 to $400,000 dollars to attend a medical school. Not every student is able to afford this cost outright. So many depend on loans, whether it be from the U.S. Government or a bank. If students are not allowed to take out such high loans from the government, they may be limited elsewhere when taking out loans as well, since banks may not loan as high as the government. Also, banks typically have higher interest rates for loans for students than the government since private loans could potentially have a variable rate and banks are a business at the end of the day. Turning to a bank to cover the gaps between tuition and government loans could cost even more for students than they were spending before. This is unfortunately the reality for many students as the Big Beautiful Bill Act takes place. 

College programs may feel an effect too. One effect that may occur is a shift in student enrollment. Losing the classification as “professional” causes lower loan caps for students. This could cause students to not pursue education in a specific program because they are limited financially, which could potentially lead to a drop in enrollment in certain programs. Additionally, there could be an overall drop in graduate programs since students may not be able to financially afford the education. This can pressure colleges to lower tuition costs if they have significant drops in enrollment numbers to make it more affordable for students to attend. Colleges and universities may be forced to rework their tuition, making some degrees more expensive to balance what they may lose to “non-professional degrees”. Emotionally, positivity around the degrees that are no longer considered “professional” could drop. The removed classification can cause certain fields and degrees to be less valued. This can impact the morale of students who study these degrees and faculty that teach them.

The economy could also face a significant impact from the reclassification of professional degrees. In the future, there may be less workers in fields such as nursing and social health because many people may not pursue the profession with increased education costs, costing much loss for GDP. With this as well, there could be long-term workforce gaps in certain professions. Wages and salaries can be impacted since there will be fewer workers who pursue degrees that offer a higher pay scale, slowing salary growth across professions. This can also mean that employers would also have to offer to pay more to the few workers with the qualified degrees, increasing costs for employers and companies. Debt will increase for more students which could cause a negative long-term effect on consumer spending, since individuals will have less to spend in the future. Overall, the economy could face many negative impacts since more individuals will face a strain financially, impacting education choices and workforce population. 

At the end of the day, a change in professional degrees can have many negative impacts, no matter what the benefit may be. Multiple students who pursue these degrees may face heavy financial burden now that high government loans are not as available to them. These students may turn to banks to cover the necessary gaps, potentially increasing the debt they may acquire. Certain college programs could lose enrollment which may cause schools to change tuition prices across the whole school to cover losses that may occur with reclassified degrees. Additionally, the U.S. economy could see multiple long-term effects in the future. Low numbers of people in certain professions due to education costs will cause a shortage of professions in specific areas, which could raise costs for businesses and companies to gain more skilled people to fill needed jobs. Increased debts from more loans will cause consumers later to spend less than they may do now, overall decreasing GDP. 

Although these effects may not be experienced next month, or even in the next year, we will eventually see the negative effects of removing professional degrees in workplaces and the economy. 

Citations: 

“Is Your Graduate Degree ‘Professional’? The Answer Will Determine How Much You Can Borrow.” NAICU, 25 Nov. 2025, www.naicu.edu/news-events/headline-news/2025/11/is-your-graduate-degree-professional-the-answer-will-determine-how-much-you-can-borrow/#:~:text=Among%20several%20changes%20to%20federal,up%20to%20the%20new%20maximum.%E2%80%9D. Accessed 01 Jan. 2026. 

Durrani, Anayat. “How to Attend Medical School for Free | Paying for Medical School | U.S. News.” U.S. News & World Report - Education, U.S. News & World Report L.P., 18 Nov. 2025, www.usnews.com/education/best-graduate-schools/top-medical-schools/paying-for-medical-school/articles/how-to-attend-medical-school-for-free. Accessed 01 Jan. 2026. 

***I do not own the rights to this photo! All credit to Yuhan Du via Unsplash!