Is Harvard Worth It? | Mother Jones

Kevin Drum reports:

What's the value of a college education? Quite a bit, if the wage premium for college grads means anything. But maybe it doesn't. After all, smart kids go to college, and smart kids are going to earn more regardless. Maybe college doesn't have any independent effect at all.
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David Leonhardt summarizes:

Once the two economists added these new variables, the earnings difference [of elite universities] disappeared. In fact, it went away merely by including the colleges that students had applied to — and not taking into account whether they were accepted. A student with a 1,400 SAT score who went to Penn State but applied to Penn earned as much, on average, as a student with a 1,400 who went to Penn.

“Even applying to a school, even if you get rejected, says a lot about you,” Mr. Krueger told me. He points out that the average SAT score at the most selective college students apply to turns out to be a better predictor of their earnings than the average SAT score at the college they attended.

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For what it's worth, then, high school seniors probably shouldn't worry quite as much about which university they attend as they do. If you're good enough to get into Harvard, you'll probably do just as well if you end up going to the University of Michigan instead.

This has been my experience as well. It is far more important that you do as well as you can wherever you are, than that you be at the most exclusive possible school. Find the school that fits you - and your budget. Your future employers* are smart enough to look beyond the name on your diploma.


*or law schools, or med schools, or graduate schools, etc.