Is a "Name" Education Any Better for Outcomes? Empirically, No.

[sakky]

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The study itself is cited all over, such as in an Atlantic Monthly article from 2004 on the Brookings Institution website (<a href=“http://www.brookings.edu/articles/20...terbrook.aspx)%5B/url%5D”>http://www.brookings.edu/articles/20...terbrook.aspx)</a>. The study itself, however, is a tad harder to get. Since the paper is from the National Bureau of Economic Research, you’ve gotta pay. However, the abstract is below (cited from the NBER website):

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<p>Well, actually, the final version has been published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics (QJE). Not that that’s any easier to get online, however, those who are college students can probably get it through their campus library through JStor or EBSCOHOST. </p>

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Two economists, Alan B. Krueger and Stacy Berg Dale, studied the earnings of college graduates and found that for most, the selectivity of their alma maters had little effect on their incomes once other factors, like SAT scores, were taken into account.

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As another approach to adjust for selection bias, we control for the average SAT score of the schools to which students applied using both the C&B and National Longitudinal Survey of the High School Class of 1972

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Well, hey, there, folks. Using longitudinal data from the class of 1972, they find no significant difference than students accepted or rejected by more selective colleges and students who attend the more selective colleges when SAT scores (I know, they’re controversial, but they served as a fair metric in this case, socioeconomic and ethnic biases notwithstanding) are controlled for.

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<p>And right there is a major limitation of Dale & Krueger. Their main control variable is SAT scores. But honestly, can anybody name a single top school that admits people solely on SAT scores only? I think we can all agree that many of the top schools like Harvard could easily fill their entire class with perfect SAT scorers if they wanted to, yet the fact is, plenty of people with perfect scores don’t get in, and others with lower scores do get in. </p>

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studied the earnings of college graduates and found that for most, the selectivity of their alma maters had little effect on their incomes

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<p>And this, I agree with others here, is probably the biggest limitation of Dale & Krueger: that *incomes * are the outcome variable. As others here have said, money become less important once you have a livable amount. Let’s face it. Once you’ve secured a middle class or upper-middle-class lifestyle, then earning another $10k or $20k or even $100k a year doesn’t really matter. After all, you’re still going to be living basically the same lifestyle. Sure, you might live in a better house and drive a better car, but you’re still basically going to live the same lifestyle. Hence, at that point, it’s more important for you to find a career that you truly enjoy as opposed to one that will earn you every single penny you can get. </p>

<p>In fact, I would argue that there may actually be an inverse relationship between top colleges and income simply because many of the students at top colleges come from very rich families and hence don’t care about money. Hence, for example, they can spend their lives doing (low-paying) nonprofit work. Similarly, many of the graduates from top colleges end up working in academia as professors, who are relatively low-paid, but who not only have the intellectual free to study what they want, but can also get tenure (which means that they can never be fired). Think about that: regular people may have to earn excess money as a buffer to tide them over in case they get laid off. Tenured professors don’t need that because they can never be laid off. </p>

<p>The corollary to that is that if you don’t have money (i.e. if you’re poor), then a few more thousand dollars can really matter a lot. Hence, I’m not surprised to find that Dale & Krueger indicates that the elite colleges are highly useful if you’re poor. </p>

<p>The upshot is that the real value of any given school is in whether it helps you to do what you want to do in life, regardless of whether it makes a lot of money or not.</p>