In this New Yorker article, “What is College Worth?” John Cassidy considers the value of higher ed. Proponents of expanded access to higher education have often championed its role in meeting overall civic goals — more clergy, more doctors, “better citizens,” — rather than its mere benefits to the individual. Today we often hear about bolstering the economy, boosting productivity by educating the workforce, etc. It’s good for the individual, but we really want to improve the U.S. economy as a whole.

Economist Kenneth Arrow proposed the “screening model” of education that posits college as a sorting or filtering system that provides a series of hurdles a student must pass in order to demonstrate a certain minimum level of mental fitness, the ability to accomplish assigned tasks and sociability.

Certainly there are common assumptions that a college degree 1) is necessary and 2) is a somewhat magical guarantor of future happiness and prosperity. People with college degrees do earn more on average than those without, but why, asks the article, are there so many highly educated adults taking jobs that do not require  higher education?

“Increasingly, the competition for jobs is taking place in areas of the labor market where college graduates didn’t previously tend to compete. As Beaudry, Green, and Sand put it, “having a B.A. is less about obtaining access to high paying managerial and technology jobs and more about beating out less educated workers for the Barista or clerical job.”

It seems like a depressing article, but he actually ends on an interesting note:

“Being more realistic about the role that college degrees play would help families and politicians make better choices. It could also help us appreciate the actual merits of a traditional broad-based education, often called a liberal-arts education.”

There’s a lot to this article and it’s certainly worth a read.