Education and Economic Growth

What we appear to be seeing is what my colleague Dan Hamilton calls a "hollowing out of the middle." Technology has increased demand for very-high-skilled people, as we see in the Silicon Valley, and it’s increased the demand for low-skilled people, as in the McDonalds example. It’s also reduced demand for many people in between, that is, the middle class.

Focusing excessively on higher education creates problems while doing no good. It is ridiculous to attempt to give 65 percent of young people a college degree. You cannot achieve that goal without reducing the quality of the graduates, which reduces the value of the degree for the better students. This would be repeating what California has done with high school diplomas. Graduation requirements have been reduced to the point that the degree is meaningless for almost all purposes.

by Bill Watkins

Full Story: http://www.newgeography.com/content/005167-education-and-economic-growth