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Comment by lev99 | Hacker News Reader

> They won't be replaced by a disruptor, they will just no longer be able to crank out mediocre educational product to people who now realize that a Bachelor of Something Or Other from Podunk U isn't actually a ticket to the middle class.

A lot of people say this, but a College Education has an excellent ROI when you look at median earnings of college graduates vs median earnings of high school graduates.

Some majors such as accounting and engineering offer even better ROIs. Some entire industries, such as Education, are almost entirely blocked to someone without a college degree. Lifelong earning numbers are correlation and not causation. We've all meet great engineers that did not complete college. Still, as long as college graduates are out earning high school graduates by significant amounts colleges will not have to worry about attracting new students.

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You mention correlation and causation here already, but perhaps you should take it further? A typical college graduate has considerably more factors in their favor to the typical high-school-only graduate even before accounting for the effect of an education.

The big question is, given a particular student, will they do better with a college education? I think the answer is probably 'yes' if they are able enough to go to a decent (not necessarily stellar) school. However, there is a vast educational hinterland offering terrible courses to weak students. These are propped up by subsidies and the idea that "any college education is better than none".

> The big question is, given a particular student, will they do better with a college education?

Maybe, it's really hard to measure. I suspect a good not great college is a very good way to improve a particular person's life, but not the absolute optimal use of four years and about $30,000.

While this question is really important for individuals to ask, I don't think this question is going to destroy institutions of higher learning. I think a lot of people will still take the relatively safe path of completing a four year degree.

I absolutely agree with you about "good not great" colleges probably working out pretty well for people. I would imagine that these will survive. It's the bottom half/third/quarter (not sure how far it will hit) that will have problems, in my opinion.

Most bottom performing companies will have problems, especially on industry downsides.

One crucial thing I think colleges often offer that helps, on top of the education of course, is the college connections with the business community... which for the student may gain you access to things like employment internships and post-graduation job opportunities. As people in college are often just starting out in their career path, I feel that these college features often give a person quite the leg up in forming your career experience / business network / etc.

Of course, some colleges don't really have a good placement rate or other connections with the business community. I wouldn't be surprised if you are right, and colleges of this sort, that provide poor quality, eventually do go bankrupt.

One interesting question is how many of those higher earners might have been happy to earn less if they didn't have that debt. Earnings might not be the only important variable, like how GDP is not necessarily a measure of happiness.

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