# The Case Against Education

The Case Against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money[1] is a book written by economist Bryan Caplan and published in 2018 by the Princeton University Press. Drawing on the economic concept of job market signaling and research in educational psychology, the book argues that much of higher education is very inefficient and has only a small effect in improving human capital, contrary to the conventional consensus in labor economics.

Caplan argues that the primary function of education is not to enhance students' skill but to certify their intelligence, conscientiousness, and conformity – attributes that are valued by employers. He ultimately estimates that approximately 80% of individuals' return to education is the result of signaling, with the remainder due to human capital accumulation.

## Summary

### Human capital model

The foundation of the drive to increase educational attainment across the board is the human capital model of education, which began with the research of Gary Becker.[2] The model suggests that increasing educational attainment causes increased prosperity by endowing students will increased skills. As a consequence, subsidies to education are seen as a positive investment that increases economic growth and creates spillover effects by improving civic engagement, happiness, health, etc.

#### Present value of learning, adjusted for forgetting

The simple human capital model tends to assume that knowledge is retained indefinitely, while a ubiquitous theme in educational interventions is that fadeout (i.e., forgetting) reliably occurs.[3] To take a simple example, we may compute the present value of a marginal fact ${\displaystyle F}$ that increases a person's productivity by ${\displaystyle V}$ as:

${\displaystyle PV(F)=\int _{0}^{\infty }e^{-rt}Vdt={V \over {r}}}$
where ${\displaystyle r}$ is the discount rate used to compute the present value. If ${\displaystyle V}$is $100 and ${\displaystyle r}$ is 5%, then the present value of learning ${\displaystyle F}$ is$2,000. But this is at odds with the concept of fadeout. To correct for this, assume that the probability density function for retaining ${\displaystyle F}$ follows an exponential distribution – with the corresponding survival function ${\displaystyle S(t)=e^{-\lambda t}}$. Then the present value of learning ${\displaystyle F}$, accounting for fadeout, is given by:
${\displaystyle PV(F)=\int _{0}^{\infty }e^{-rt}S(t)Vdt=\int _{0}^{\infty }e^{-(r+\lambda )t}Vdt={V \over {r+\lambda }}}$
Since the expected value of an exponential distribution is ${\displaystyle \lambda ^{-1}}$, we may tune this parameter based on assumptions about how long ${\displaystyle F}$ is retained. Below is a table showing what the present value is based on the expected retention time of the fact:

Present Value of Learning ${\displaystyle F}$, with Fadeout
3 Months 6 Months 1 Year 2 Years 3 Years 5 Years 10 Years

## Reviews

### Mixed

• Stephen L. Carter in Bloomberg Opinion[20]
• I’m not sure he’s right, especially about education being almost entirely for the purpose of signaling, but goodness does he make a strong case. Agree with him or not, you’ll never look at the schools and colleges in quite the same way.
• Tyler Cowen[21]
• Ilya Somin[22]

## References

1. Caplan, Bryan (2018). The Case Against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0691174655.
2. ^ Becker, Gary S. (1962). "Investment in Human Capital: A Theoretical Analysis" (PDF). Journal of Political Economy. 70 (5): 9–49. doi:10.1086/258724. ISSN 0022-3808. JSTOR 1829103.
3. ^ Cascio, Elizabeth U; Staiger, Douglas O (2012). "Knowledge, Tests, and Fadeout in Educational Interventions". NBER Working Paper No. 18038.
4. ^ Spence, Michael (1973). "Job Market Signaling". The Quarterly Journal of Economics. 87 (3): 355–374. doi:10.2307/1882010. ISSN 0033-5533. JSTOR 1882010.
5. ^ Ree, Malcolm James; Earles, James A. (1992). "Intelligence Is the Best Predictor of Job Performance". Current Directions in Psychological Science. 1 (3): 86–89. doi:10.1111/1467-8721.ep10768746. ISSN 0963-7214. JSTOR 20182140.
6. ^ Gottfredson, Linda S. (1997-01-01). "Why g matters: The complexity of everyday life". Intelligence. Special Issue Intelligence and Social Policy. 24 (1): 79–132. doi:10.1016/S0160-2896(97)90014-3. ISSN 0160-2896.
7. ^ Deary, Ian J.; Strand, Steve; Smith, Pauline; Fernandes, Cres (2007-01-01). "Intelligence and educational achievement". Intelligence. 35 (1): 13–21. doi:10.1016/j.intell.2006.02.001. ISSN 0160-2896.
8. ^ Barrick, Murray R.; Mount, Michael K. (1991). "The Big Five Personality Dimensions and Job Performance: A Meta-Analysis". Personnel Psychology. 44 (1): 1–26. doi:10.1111/j.1744-6570.1991.tb00688.x. ISSN 1744-6570.
9. ^ Specht, Jule; Egloff, Boris; Schmukle, Stefan C. (2011). "Stability and change of personality across the life course: the impact of age and major life events on mean-level and rank-order stability of the Big Five" (PDF). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 101 (4): 862–882. doi:10.1037/a0024950. ISSN 1939-1315. PMID 21859226.
10. ^ Plomin, Robert (2012). "Genetics: How intelligence changes with age". Nature. 482 (7384): 165–166. Bibcode:2012Natur.482..165P. doi:10.1038/482165a. ISSN 1476-4687. PMID 22318596.
11. ^ Fuente, Angel de la; Doménech, Rafael (2006). "Human Capital in Growth Regressions: How Much Difference Does Data Quality Make?". Journal of the European Economic Association. 4 (1): 1–36. doi:10.1162/jeea.2006.4.1.1. ISSN 1542-4774.
12. ^ Caplan, Bryan (2008). The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691138732.
13. ^ Snyder, Thomas D.; de Brey, Cristobal; Dillow, Sally A. (2017). Digest of Education Statistics, 2017 (PDF). National Center for Education Statistics. p. 13.
14. ^ Jacoby, Tamar (2014-10-16). "Why Germany Is So Much Better at Training Its Workers". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2019-08-14.
15. ^ Bachmann, Helena. "Who Needs College? The Swiss Opt for Vocational School". Time. ISSN 0040-781X. Retrieved 2019-08-14.
16. ^ Pethokoukis, James (2018-03-16). "The case against education: A long-read Q&A with Bryan Caplan". AEI. Retrieved 2019-08-15.
17. ^ Hanson, Robin (2018-01-18). "Overcoming Bias : Read The Case Against Education". www.overcomingbias.com. Retrieved 2019-08-14.
18. ^ Riley, Naomi Schaefer (2018-01-15). "Review: Deciding Against the Paper Chase". WSJ. Retrieved 2019-08-14.
19. ^ Stein, Noam (2018-06-03). "Bryan Caplan's 'The Case Against Education' — A Review". Quillette. Retrieved 2019-08-14.
20. ^ Carter, Stephen L. (2018-12-20). "My 15 Favorite Nonfiction Books of 2018". Bloomberg Opinion.
21. ^ Cowen, Tyler (2018-05-09). "My Conversation with Bryan Caplan". Marginal Revolution. Retrieved 2019-08-14.
22. ^ Somin, Ilya (2018-03-24). "Bryan Caplan's Case Against Education". Reason.com. Retrieved 2019-08-15.
23. ^ Carr, Sarah (2018-02-16). "Is education a waste of time and money?". The Washington Post.
24. ^ Illing, Sean (2018-02-16). "Why this economist thinks public education is mostly pointless". Vox. Retrieved 2019-08-14.
25. ^ Kim, Joshua (2018-10-18). "The Case Against 'The Case Against Education' | Inside Higher Ed". Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved 2019-08-14.