Contra Caplan on higher education - by Richard Ngo

Though it's still a waste of time and money

Getting an undergraduate degree is very costly. In America, the direct financial cost of attending a private university is typically in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Even when tuition is cheap (or covered by scholarships), forgoing three to four years of salary and career progression is a large opportunity cost. There are a variety of reasons why students are willing to pay these costs, but the key one is that desirable employers highly value college degrees. Why? The standard economic answer is that college classes teach skills which are relevant for doing jobs well: the “human…

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• Henry Zimmerman

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