North Carolina
Source: IPEDS Completions, 3-yr avg AY 2022–25 (NCES; 2024–25 provisional), bachelor’s degrees, CIP 14 + 11; China 33.2%: PRC Ministry of Education, 2022 bachelor’s graduates by discipline (NSF NCSES S&E Indicators Fig. HED-30: 32.8%, 2020); Population: Census NST-EST2025.
North Carolina at China’s rate would graduate 19,250 engineers a year. It graduates 6,284.
North Carolina produces 6,284 engineering and computer science bachelor's degrees a year out of 57,982 total, a mid-pack engineering producer, from 39 institutions. At China's rate it would produce 19,250. Output is growing (+12.6% over three years). Gap Score: 33% of the China benchmark. Its own economy is projected to open 16,400 engineering, computing and technician jobs a year through 2034; in-state degrees, associate and bachelor's together, cover 49% of them.
The gap against China’s benchmark
Three-year trend: eng+CS share of degrees
North Carolina is missing 12,966 engineers a year at China's rate, roughly 7x the annual output of North Carolina State University at Raleigh.
Where North Carolina’s engineers are made.
39 institutions produce engineering or computer science bachelor’s degrees in North Carolina. The top 8 account for 87% of output.
Every producing institution. Circle area = eng+CS bachelor’s degrees per year
Top producers
| # | Institution | Eng+CS / yr | % of its degrees |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | North Carolina State University at Raleigh | 1,924 | 29.1% |
| 2 | University of North Carolina at Charlotte | 1,266 | 21.9% |
| 3 | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | 611 | 11.5% |
| 4 | Duke University | 556 | 25.0% |
| 5 | North Carolina A & T State University | 485 | 22.0% |
| 6 | East Carolina University | 227 | 4.8% |
| 7 | University of North Carolina at Greensboro | 211 | 6.4% |
| 8 | University of North Carolina Wilmington | 173 | 4.6% |
Jobs vs. degrees
North Carolina's own labor-market projection, 2024–2034, for engineers, computer occupations and engineering technicians, against the degrees the state produces at every level.
Openings against output
Where the openings are
| Occupation | Openings / yr |
|---|---|
| Software Developers | 3,720 |
| Computer Systems Analysts | 1,650 |
| Computer User Support Specialists | 1,230 |
| Computer Occupations, All Other | 950 |
| Civil Engineers | 900 |
| Industrial Engineers | 840 |
Coverage: degrees ÷ openings
Openings are the state labor agency’s own 10-year projection: new jobs plus replacing workers who retire or leave the field (BLS method). Not every opening goes to a new graduate, so this is a coverage measure; it does not count vacant positions. Occupations: engineers (SOC 17-2), computer occupations (SOC 15-12) and engineering technicians (SOC 17-3, the associate-degree tier), the jobs CIP 14 + 11 degrees feed; degrees here include associate degrees to match. Source: North Carolina labor-market projections via Projections Central (U.S. Dept. of Labor).
North Carolina's megasites need engineers it does not yet graduate
Since 2021 the state has put JDIG grants, site-prep appropriations and county tax rebates behind a $13.9 billion Toyota battery plant, a $5 billion Wolfspeed wafer fab, a $4 billion VinFast EV factory and a $10 billion Amazon AI campus in Richmond County. Two of the four have stalled or gone bankrupt, and every one assumes technicians and engineers the state does not yet graduate at scale.
The drain.
North Carolina is a net importer of talent, leading the nation with about 84,000 net domestic migrants in 2024-25, and it keeps roughly two-thirds of its own public-university graduates. The flagship is the leak: only about half of UNC-Chapel Hill graduates stay, and the UNC System says the state still needs 5,000 to 10,000 more graduates a year.
Sources: NC Education Futures Initiative (UNC); NC Department of Commerce; UNC Charlotte; NC OSBM; UNC System
Who’s covering it.
Reporters already cover this, but no one has combined it into a single number the way the Index does.
The fix, in North Carolina.
Fund Propel NC with service terms
The 2026 budget put $57.5 million of recurring money into Propel NC, short of the community college system's $93 million request, yet completions still trail openings in nearly every Propel NC sector. Pair the new model with a Digital ROTC track: tuition-free engineering technology and IT credentials at Randolph, Central Carolina and Richmond community colleges in exchange for a two-year commitment to a North Carolina employer, starting with the Toyota, Wolfspeed and Amazon sites they already serve.
Attach retention to the $125M engineering build-out
The state has put a one-time $125 million plus recurring money into engineering expansion at NC State and three other campuses, and NC State's Engineering North Carolina's Future plan adds 4,000 seats. Convert a slice of that expansion into service-for-tuition scholarships that require graduates to work in-state, aimed squarely at the flagship's ~50% retention rate.
Write pipeline clauses into JDIG
VinFast shows North Carolina will claw back incentives when jobs do not appear. The next JDIG for a fab, battery or data-center campus should also require the company to co-fund Digital ROTC cohorts at nearby community colleges and count local graduates hired toward its job milestones, so incentive dollars also pay to build the workforce.
What Digital ROTC would fund
Digital ROTC: federal student loans that cover two years of engineering, computer science, or cybersecurity school at a community college, whether those years end in an associate degree or transfer into a bachelor’s program. The loans are forgiven in full after 24 to 36 months of service in government technology roles. In North Carolina, 21% of engineering-track credentials are associate degrees today. Digital ROTC is built to expand that community-college route.