Between 2003 and 2009, the gap between the educational attainment of the population and the educational demands of available jobs (that is, "structural unemployment") increased in all but four of the nation's hundred largest metropolitan areas (Rothwell and Berube 2011). Given that a larger education gap between the demand and supply of educated workers is associated with a higher unemployment rate in the metropolitan area (2011), these data demonstrate the need to imporve educational attainment in all metropolitan areas.