Quote to Ponder: All Years of Schooling Are Not Equal

"Almost every economic and social policy analyst recommends improved education, especially for low-income groups, as one of the surest ways to achieve shared prosperity. There is a question, however, of whether new jobs require higher skills or whether the availability of better-educated workers enables employers to hire them for jobs requiring less education. Confusion over the relationship between education and economic outcomes results in part from using years of schooling as a measure of educational achievement (i.e., skills and knowledge). Obviously, all years of schooling are not equal. There often are very different outcomes when educational achievement is measured by objective achievement assessments and compared with economic performance or social pathologies. It also clearly makes a difference what kinds of knowledge and skills people have, not how many years they spend in school."

Ray Marshall
Former US Secretary of Labor