By 2020, the UK will have one of the most academically qualified populations in the world, with half the working age population forecast to have a degree or higher level education. Many praise this development: a well educated population is a national asset and access to education is a right that should be available to everyone at no cost. But is this really true? In his book ‘The Case against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money’, Professor Bryan Caplan of Princeton University argues that in general the benefit of education is so small that it is outweighed significantly by the cost. Despite some increase in literacy and numerical skills, from a societal standpoint the vast education sector is a giant waste of time and resources. Especially higher education functions more as a signalling exercise than as an exercise in assimilating useful knowledge and improving individual productive capacity. That is of course not to say that higher education has no value. It most certainly does – for the individual. Numerous studies confirm the increased earnings potential by holding a university or college degree. The question is, is this because completing an education has resulted in increased productivity or because a diploma gives access to better paid professions? According to Caplan, the latter is the case.
Industry disagrees. Surveys show that employers are likely to consider young job applicants less than ready for the world of work. But this should not surprise us. Saddling the general taxpayer with the bill and obligation to turn irresponsible youngsters into less irresponsible adults absolves business from having to do it. Of course an employer will rather pluck a mid-20s adult from a university than employing an 18-year-old, no matter if the 3-year university degree has had only marginal impact on skills levels and maturity – if they are not the ones paying for it, some education is better than none, from the point of view of the employer.
But the common argument in favour of free education is of course egalitarian. Those from poor backgrounds should not be left behind, so more money needs to be pumped into education to enhance capacity and secure equal access. Caplan suggests the opposite: education austerity. And surprisingly, this could benefit those at the bottom rung of the social ladder. This may seem counterintuitive and is certainly contrary to everything you usually hear about public education. But the champions of universally free education should spare a thought for those the state education system leaves behind: the more university graduates who flood the job market, the less opportunities for those who do not hold a degree. Dropouts find competing for highly skilled and better paid jobs very difficult, even if their better educated competitors have learned little from their academic endeavours. Holding the diploma is enough to put you at the head of the queue. And the data shows that no matter how accessible higher education becomes, children from middle- and higher class families attend university in far greater numbers than those from poorer backgrounds. Social mobility is a question of more than access: it requires the impetus to take advantage of opportunity. Evidence seems to indicate that social learning discourages the less affluent from seeking education. This clearly suggests that free education actually is regressive, working to exclude children from poorer backgrounds from job opportunities. Getting government out of education would reduce the demand drastically, which would benefit society as a whole through less wasted resources and promote the interest of those at the bottom of society at the same time.
Most who have endured a university degree will share common memories of lectures spent in a combination of boredom and disinterest. Many will admit to choosing a course because it was easy to get a decent grade, not because of a desire to acquire knowledge about the subject matter. Most will probably also admit to having forgotten large parts of what they were taught. With university fees up to £9,000 a year in the UK, some may even doubt if it’s worth it at all. What may convince them that they made the right choice is probably the daunting thought of facing the jobs market without the diploma. For most, the signalling value far outweighs the skills enhancement of education.
A private market for education would serve to reduce the amount of education on offer drastically. Business would offer scholarships only to meet their demands for educated labour. Vocational training would be much more prevalent. Students of art, poetry or music would have to fund their own degree or find willing benefactors.
Still, the current systems have advantages for some. A few years frittered away at uni at taxpayer expense is not a bad way of working your way to the front of the jobs market queue. But the real winners from the relentless pumping of taxpayer money into education is academia itself. The losers are those who do not get an education anyway.