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Problems in education #3: Education benefits the privileged

  • January 23, 2022 5:54 PM PST

    In a game with so many losers there must be some winners. As Douglas Webber and others like to point out, those who graduate from university will, on average, earn substantially more money than those who don’t. Speaking of students in the United States, Webber writes:

     

    "The typical college graduate will earn roughly $900,000 more than the typical high school graduate over their working life."

    Is college worth it?

     

    But there are lies, then there are damned lies…and then there are statistics, which are so often adduced to prove lies. One of the biggest and most basic ways in which statistics can subvert truth is by mistaking correlation for cause or cause for effect. Do high earners, in general, achieve their level of income because they went to university … or do they go to university because they come from high income families?

     

     

    Education fails when most of the advantages of education go to those who are already in the most privileged positions, and where you’re going in life is determined, to a large extent, by where you come from.


    This post was edited by JohnYamamoto-Wilson at January 28, 2022 10:02 PM PST