In today’s letters section:
Your editorial repeats the oft-heard statistic that people with college degrees earn significantly more money than do people without them. While the figures are true on average, they can be misleading as to the benefit many young people will derive from a college degree today.
If you look at the average earnings of people with college degrees, you include a lot of people who earned their degrees decades ago. That’s important because there has been a slow but noticeable erosion of academic standards over time. The recent National Assessment of Adult Literacy report shows that the literacy of college graduates has declined. In the 1992 survey, 40% of college graduates were “proficient” readers, but the new figures indicate that has fallen to 31%.
Evidence also shows that a rising percentage of students who graduate from college wind up accepting “high school jobs” when they enter the labor force. Colleges and universities accept large numbers of marginal students who can earn enough credits to graduate in the current watered-down academic environment, but who gain little human capital benefit from their four or more costly years in school.
Of course, many students do benefit greatly from a college education, but we should resist jumping to the conclusion that everyone who gets a degree is going to enjoy a boost in his earning potential.
Shannon L. Blosser
John W. Pope Center for Higher Education Policy
Chapel Hill, N.C.
