Education: The Not So Low, Low Hanging Fruit

A few things to consider:

• Nationally, 89% of non-low-income students graduate from high school on time compared to 74.6% of low-income students.
• The U.S. is the only country where educational attainment levels among those just entering the labor market do not exceed those about to leave it.
• Among 25-34 year-olds, the U.S. ranks 15th among 34 OECD countries in secondary education attainment.
• Internationally, the US is ranked 17th in reading, 20th in science, and 27th in math.
• Since 1972, the cost of a university education has risen at more than 3x the overall rate of inflation.
• College completion for households in the top quarter of the income distribution rose from 40% to 77% between 1970 and 2013, whereas for those in the bottom quarter, it increased only from 6% to 9%.

I state these statistics not to attribute blame, or merely for shock value, but because I feel like they aren’t stated enough.

The 2016 presidential election was deftly void of detailed, intellectual discussion regarding the state of education in our country. Yet, I don’t blame the politicians — they merely speak to the things voters appear to be concerned about most: terrorism, immigration, and “bringing jobs back.”

While there is merit for individuals to be concerned about these things, these concerns are by-products of a greater underlying shortcoming — America’s scarcity of education capitalization.

Education is so important because its effects scale quickly. College educated individuals typically marry each other, earn two incomes, and have children after marriage. Their kids start off with a significant advantage. These kids are read to, exposed to museums, music lessons, and the world outside of the United States, further enriching their perspective.

Why are we not doing more to solve this problem?

Because the arc of education is long. It takes resources. It takes time. It’s easier to bully US companies into not moving jobs overseas — providing a quick and ultimately fleeting bump in employment. It’s hard to come clean and stomach the fact that the labor pool in the US doesn’t have the skills to perform higher value-add jobs.

I don’t claim to have the answers. Yet I am proclaiming that the challenges are worth talking about. They are problems worth solving.

If we really want to address inequality and social mobility in this country, we must start with education.

There are three things that are true of any problem worth solving: it’s hard, it takes time, and it takes awareness.