An Awkward College Question

It depends on the price of admission and the opportunity cost of my time.

Dating apps have replaced a large social coordinating function of college. During my orientation I actually had an administrator stand on stage and admonish the crowd that we were there to study and not find spouses. I suppose if Colleges were so narrow in focus that joining one served as an effective lifestyle or value signal for future partners it might also be worth it.

We might get an approximation by adding up the number of students who major in fields like “Gender Studies,” Nineteenth Century French Poetry, etc.

A lot. There are things about college that many people enjoy and would be willing to pay for. One of those things is acquiring new knowledge, for its own sake. Yes, it’s possible to acquire new knowledge on one’s own, but college classes “package” the experience in a way that (for most people) is likely to prove more effective than a do-it-yourself approach. There are also the atmospherics: ivy-covered halls, late-night bull sessions, (temporary) freedom from making a living, etc. Admittedly, college enrollments would decline if college was shown (and widely known) not to bestow financial benefits. But it would still be a valuable consumption good for many.

An interesting question if you consider the origins of “higher education” among the monasteries, which were themselves holding pens for excess noble offspring removed them from succession politics. Even as many of these “leisure” aristocrats did advance natural science, when their studies began they were by definition economically useless.

The liberal arts as pointed out by Mises, are hobbies. Beyond the higher education signaling to employers, to study the liberal arts is to affect the signal of aristocratic leisure. Granted vocational skills developed during studies, such as writing or research ability, are developed in the studies of the economically-useless topics.

I feel this observation from 1890 remains true

For example : The question being propounded, What is the value of the combined services to man of Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Disraeli, as compared with those of Sir Henry Bessemer? Ninety-nine out of a hundred men of sound judgment would doubtless say, ” The value of the services of the two statesmen is quite unimportant, while the value of the services of Mr. Bessemer is enormous, incalculable.” But how many of these ninety-nine men of sound judgment could resist the fascination of the applause accorded to the statesmen ? How many of them would have the moral courage to educate their sons for the career of Mr. Bessemer instead of for the career of Mr. Disraeli or of Mr. Gladstone?* Not many in the present state of public sentiment. It will be a great day for man, the day that ushers in the dawn of more sober views of life, the day that inaugurates the era of the mastership of things in the place of the mastership of words.

—Charles H. Ham, Mind and Hand: manual training, the chief factor in education (1900)

You said in your interview with Tucker Carlson that about 5% of people should go to college. I think that’s a good estimate for this hypothetical.

Should we assume that everyone would be aware that higher education had no effect? If so, then I suspect few would actually go. However, so long as higher earnings can at least serve as a pretext for higher education, I think most would continue to attend.

I think college would remain popular for the same reason that Shaw said marriage is popular: it combines a maximum of temptation with a maximum of opportunity. A college concentrates in one place a large number of age-appropriate potential mates for both men and women. Finding a suitable boy (or girl) is still a major reason why people attend college; indeed, it may be THE major reason. And colleges also tend to segregate by social class, with “elite” schools attracting “elite” students and less fancy places attracting less well-off students, etc. While colleges offer more diverse potential mates than local churches or synagogues, they still tend to match like with like, perpetuating pre-existing social stratification rather than upsetting it.

Are we assuming that a degree still has signaling value, just not in the context of employment (e.g. I can show my friends how smart and hard-working I am)?

If so, then I would guess a small, but non-zero fraction of the populace.

If not, then I doubt anyone would go, especially with the rise of the internet and alternative forms of education.

A lot, but many would just be there for the booze and parties and hot dates.

What I wonder is: how many would go to college, *and what kind of colleges,* if (a) it didn’t affect income, (b) the booze and parties and hot dates and sports and other non-academic features were somehow eliminated, and (c) there were no public, taxpayer-financed subsidies?

I suspect that enrollment would fall by 70%, and 80% of the remaining enrollment would be at religious schools.

I graduated from Columbia many years ago, and now I’m ready to retire. I’d love to go back, and take all the courses I never got a chance to take when I was an undergraduate. I wouldn’t want to pay today’s prices, however, and I don’t think I could stomach the deconstruction and political correctness. But I will look into my local university and see what they have to offer people my age.

People will still seek status. Some people will seek knowledge for it’s own sake. Well, maybe a few.

If all other factors remain the same (i.e., quality of faculty, access to information, etc.) that I consider before enrolling in a higher education institution, yes.

Also, in retrospect, attending college was the only means available to remove myself (and several of my peers) from an environment that was chaotic and violent.

So while under this circumstance (college has “zero effect on students’ careers or income“), I would still attend. However, there are many other factors to consider.

College or draft? Draft or college?

Back in the day, I picked college even tho’ I didn’t really want to.

At college, I met a lot more pretty girls who were smart than I would have in my preferred path.

And my parents told me it was college or out the door. College was easier than making rent every month.

Here is an opposite thought that might be of interest. A friend of mine who went to college with me. He was not brilliant and so had to work very hard to get a degree in accounting, but he did it and maintained, I think about a 3.2 average. He hated college the whole time. He took nothing for interest but just what was required his electives were just easy grade classes.

If not for the chance of getting a good paying job he would not have gone.