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The Case against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money
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About The Case Against Education: Why The Education
Product Description Why we need to stop wasting public funds on educationDespite being immensely popular--and immensely lucrative―education is grossly overrated. In this explosive book, Bryan Caplan argues that the primary function of education is not to enhance students' skill but to certify their intelligence, work ethic, and conformity―in other words, to signal the qualities of a good employee. Learn why students hunt for easy As and casually forget most of what they learn after the final exam, why decades of growing access to education have not resulted in better jobs for the average worker but instead in runaway credential inflation, how employers reward workers for costly schooling they rarely if ever use, and why cutting education spending is the best remedy.Caplan draws on the latest social science to show how the labor market values grades over knowledge, and why the more education your rivals have, the more you need to impress employers. He explains why graduation is our society's top conformity signal, and why even the most useless degrees can certify employability. He advocates two major policy responses. The first is educational austerity. Government needs to sharply cut education funding to curb this wasteful rat race. The second is more vocational education, because practical skills are more socially valuable than teaching students how to outshine their peers.Romantic notions about education being "good for the soul" must yield to careful research and common sense―The Case against Education points the way. Review "One of Tyler Cowen's Best Non-Fiction Books of 2018" "One of Bloomberg Opinion's Favorite Nonfiction Books of 2018 (Stephen L. Carter)" "Bryan Caplan raises an important question in [his] controversial new book, The Case Against Education. How much of the benefits of a degree comes from the skills you acquire in studying for it? And how much from the piece of paper at the end – what your degree certificate signals to employers about the skills and attributes you might have had long before you filled in a unviersity application form?" ---Sonia Sodha, The Guardian "Would-be students and their parents are rethinking the assumption that a good life is impossible without an expensive degree--not to mention the chase for college admission that begins at kindergarten if not before. [This new book] may help to let out a little more air." ---Naomi Schaefer Riley, Wall Street Journal "You probably won’t agree with everything he says . . . but his broadside is worth considering carefully given that the U.S. spends $1 trillion or so a year on education at all levels, more than the budget for defense." ---Peter Coy, Bloomberg Businessweek "It is an excellent book, on an important topic. Beyond such cheap talk, I offer the costly signal of having based an entire chapter of our new book on his book. That’s how good and important I think it is. . . . Caplan offers plausible evidence that school functions to let students show employers that they are smart, conscientious, and conformist. And surely this is in fact a big part of what is going on." ---Robin Hanson, Overcoming Bias "A book that America has needed for a long time. If we ever reach a turning point where most of us reject the idea that government should mandate and subsidize certain kinds of education, Bryan Caplan will have a lot to do with it." ---George Leef, Forbes "Economist Bryan Caplan of George Mason University has crunched the data for years from every angle and argues devastatingly . . . that college is, for many of those who go there, a boondoggle." ---Kyle Smith, National Review Online "Excellent argument by Bryan Caplan, but missed something central: convexity of trial-and-error & heuristic learning." ---Nassim Nicholas Taleb, "It's like the case against parenting's role in shaping children: I don't want to believe it, but the data force you take it seriously. Good book." ---Charles Murray, "Like most fascinating authors, Caplan
