RALEIGH – You’ve heard it said many times, I’m guessing, that the economic fate of North Carolina is significantly dependent on how many of its students attend college. This myth is remarkably resistant to evidence and logic, yet it continues to guide policy decisions – most recently in the form of a provision to allocate 10 percent of expected net revenues from a government lottery to college scholarships for North Carolina students.
College and university education is already a heavily subsidized good. Undergraduates attending government campuses have most of the cost of their educations, on average, covered by state and federal taxpayers. And students at private colleges also receive significant amounts of grant and loan money from governments.
Surely this is a good idea, it is said, because the 21st century economy is based on brain, not brawn. The more taxpayers subsidize college enrollments, the more workers will acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to staff the growing industries of the future. Yes, students may derive most of the direct benefits from getting a higher education, but the rest of us derive indirect benefits – and unless we ante up for our “fair share,” the good of higher education will be underprovided, and we will lose the economic benefits we would have gained from a more-educated workforce.
Have I explained these arguments fairly? I hope so, despite my frustration with them. Superficial plausibility and baseless assumptions are their genesis, not intellectual rigor and a careful marshaling of the facts.
First of all, it is simply not the case that all or even most of the jobs expected to be generated in coming decades will require a college education to perform. Even for those careers for which college degrees are often sought, it is an unfortunate truth that many of the employers don’t really expect students to be better workers because of what they learned in college. Instead, entrance to and exit from college are viewed as sifters, identifying individuals who have the ability and drive to succeed at their tasks. When entrepreneurs come up with alternative (and far less-expensive) means of certifying that individuals are knowledgeable, skilled, and motivated, college degrees would lose their luster. I expect that to happen anyway – inflation-adjusted wages have grown for those with graduate degrees and held steady for high-school grads since 2004, reports Business Week, while declining for those with undergraduate experience or degrees. This transition would happen faster if higher-education subsidies were lessened.
Second, higher college enrollments do not necessarily mean better-educated people. Graduation rates remain pitiful for public institutions, as in the UNC system where almost half of freshmen don’t graduate in five years. Those who do graduate have not necessarily learned much of vocational value (and much of what they have learned has only propaganda value).
Third, the indirect economic benefits that we receive from students who truly do get a good college education are benefits that we also pay for indirectly – by hiring these graduates or purchasing goods and services from them. That’s why it can make perfect sense for individuals to borrow money to invest in higher education. If they pick the right major and study, they can realize a good rate of return on that investment. If they don’t have to worry as much about getting that return, you end up with the situation we are in now: some kids headed off to college despite a realistic prospect of gaining significant from it, and others devoting their college careers to indulgent pursuits rather than economically productive ones.
Government spending on education can only be justified by non-economic benefits, such as those advanced by Jefferson, Smith, and other classical liberals, and few can reasonably be argued for in this case. Whether for economic gain or, my preference, simply to live the life of the mind, getting a college education can be a wondrous thing. That doesn’t make it an entitlement – something you are justified in compelling others to pay for.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.