The drop from 2018 to 2022 is as big as the one from 2022 to 2026, so it's not obvious whether AI had a role at all, although it's highly plausible.
I suspect the bigger culprit is the optimized monetization of human attention, because pre-algorithmic social media doesn't seem to be as destructive. The fact that science wasn't as affected as math and reading (both of which rely more on attention/practice than rote memorization) somewhat supports this.
Between 2018 and 2022, we saw the widespread adoption of social media and the rapid digitalization of education. Focusing on these key shifts, it seems clear to me that any kind of electronic learning has had a negative impact on education :p
"Modern" education isn't modern at all. It's a leftover from industrialization, aiming at producing easily controllable worker drones.
"Elites" fearing the "plebs" to question them on things they have no good answers for is what constrains active development of actual modern scientific concepts of pedagogy taking hold. You only get to research what is being paid for.
Look at the, pretty obvious, natural human child-mode of learning: playing games.
Just not escapist nonsense games. Games that model relevant aspects of reality in an engaging way. Where you can fail without real-life consequences and learn from it while enjoying yourself.
Playing games as a biological creature optimized to live on plains is great, your body has a lot of the lessons already encoded in DNA.
When it comes catching up to the last 10,000 years of human development everything tends to get a bit trickier. Play is a good way at learning, but as you get to higher concepts you have to learn but are hard to game it gets a lot trickier.
Trying to easily wrap this up as the elites vs you is highly reductive. Before that age you' have spent most of your time and effort making food and clothes, not active research into the world.
They're not wrong though, like, it is a creation of the industrial era, and honestly, the "elites vs all of us" isn't exactly crazy. Mcgraw Hill is literally owned by Apollo Global Management, don't just take my word for it, look up the relationship the management there had with Epstein.
It doesn't have to be a conspiracy even, it could just be that terrible incentives across the board result in terrible outcomes lol
You're right, but with the rhetoric I see espoused about "don't go to college" by most really rich people (who all went to the best schools themselves) the more I think "don't fall for it kids!"
And there may be some social-engineering intent there, or at least something approximating it? Like, I don't think the elites are all smoking cigars after their Bohemian grove owl orgy (or whatever Alex Jones coded nonsense) and saying "muah hahahaha, we can really make these kids dumber!" But I definitely think that "it sure would be nice if the workers didn't want raises" certainly comes up. No child left behind has certainly had an effect too... Then there's the shootings, the bullying (which appears much much better than when I was a kid at least), and the jingoism/patriotic nonsense.
My wife and I have actually been considering taking the kids out of "traditional school" and doing something more bespoke. Here in Alaska that's a lot more practical than in say, Washington? We have great home school programs here, and with our family members we have the education and qualifications to teach most of the core subjects (lots of retired teachers in our extended family). But, even with my kids in a fantastic school, it is a weird and almost carceral experience for the kids. They're constantly waiting around for stuff, constantly being tested with tests that don't seem to make a huge difference in what's taught, and they aren't really reading literature or doing much in math beyond simple rote work except for one of my sons who is 2 years ahead in math but is still bored.
I'm not saying it was all roses when I was in school 20-30 years ago, but, it feels qualitatively different? Also... even in the nice school they're in, the environment is just... I don't know, oppressive, crowded, and restrained. I'm sorry, it's messed up to make kids ask to go to the bathroom or get a drink of water. I'm sorry, it's weird how authoritarian most of the classes are - I understand why, shrinking budgets mean bigger classes, but at least personally, I feel that there's a lot of merit to the idea that this thing that used to be about learning has become daycare so the parents can stay grinding away while their kids are safely sequestered. We will see if we can do it, but we're thinking pretty hard about just travelling in the winter while they do home school online or take college classes.
What's better: to have my kids sit in a box for 7 hours a day (but really only work for like 2-3 hours) and respond to bells on command or to do online school for 3 hours a day, have mom, dad, and grandma lecture on our specialties and guide them through projects that really push them all from another country in the winter where they can learn a second language, see a different world, etc? I understand that this is a privileged position for us - like, I work from my laptop and my wife has a commutable job, but each day I pick up the kids from their school it feels a little more like picking up a parolee.
College just doesn't work. They don't know what jobs will be available and they are way too far behind the professional sector to teach about them anyway, with rare exceptions that aren't economically favored for, institutionally.
The system forces schools to increase enrollment by assigning a tuition price based on attaching a loan to it. It's basically for profit. Then, the loans can't be forgiven in bankruptcy when the outcome of the education platform fails to produce an income that supports repayment.
To get an education that doesn't completely screw you over, you need to be a minority with a scholarship or actually have rich parents and attend for fun. But in either case, your only benefit financially is the hope of connecting with other students whose parents are richer than yours.
Exceptions for subjects with artificial barriers of entry (medicine, law, etc., and each of those has its own set of problems, mainly the price of education).
(Speaking about the United States, but probably a lot of this applies to many places.)
I disagree with the sentiment that the rich are dissuading college enrollment. I'm not rich. I don't hire college grads. They are broke, entitled, and lack work ethic. After 5 in a row, I started giving opportunities to smart kids, from good families, who exhibit an appreciation for hard work and good moral character. Those people learn in a month what takes a college grad 6. They appreciate opportunity, instead of expecting it.
As I should have always known, a good person is far, far more valuable than a piece of paper certifying victimhood.
I really have found college valuable, but I also self-funded and have no debt. This is pretty much the arrangement I'm trying to set up for my kids too - when I had a blue-ish collar job (bush pilot is a blue collar job no?) I didn't think school had a lot of value, but then again, looking in hindsight, I'd unironically say that the most "valuable" (scare quotes intentional here) course I took was art history. Not because I learned anything that was economically useful, but it gave me a new way to view the world and literally changed some of the decisions I made with my life?
I agree with the idea of giving opportunities to smart kids from good families who work hard and are ethical. But I also think it's pretty damn hard to get good at certain things outside of a classroom? I don't know, I have mixed emotions.
Still, despite my misgivings with traditional education, I think there remains some good that comes from going to a place where your only job is to learn.
I'm teaching my kids how to build a business, and how to learn chemistry and deep science through self learning programs, like Aleks, and the like. Same curriculum as I got in college.
But none of the loans and none of the "go work for IBM" mentality that taught me how to be a loser for way too long.
A few years head start on actual business building is way more valuable than a 250 kid lecture hall with a teacher who never built anything in their life.
The future belongs to entrepreneurs, and that's even more true now with LLM built businesses.
Get them a face to face sales job for a bit. It does a lot for one's character to learn how to break the ice and be personable. And it teaches work ethic.
Zhang, L., Liu, X., & Hu, Y. (2024). Degrees of return: Estimating internal rates of return for college majors using quantile regression. American Educational Research Journal. Prepublished March 12, 2024.
"We estimate the internal rates of return (IRRs) for individuals with college degrees in 10 broad majors compared to high school graduates. Our analysis shows significant differences in the age-earnings trajectories and IRRs across college majors. Specifically, Computer Science and Engineering majors have the highest IRRs, exceeding 13%, whereas Humanities & Arts and Education majors have the lowest IRRs, around 5% for male and 8–9% for female college graduates. Furthermore, the quantile regression analyses show that IRR is generally higher at the high end of the earnings distribution. Finally, we observed a slight decrease in IRR during the study period, which is consistent with the flattening and even decline in college wage premiums following the 2008 Great Recession."
The fact that attending colleges requires certain abilities and privileges that also correlate with financial success doesn't say anything about the influence that college has on earnings.
For all we know, the fact that college direction is ingrained in a public education system that is required by law, hides the fact that college has a negative impact on one's financial product when taken over a lifetime.
The same people that think college might pan out, also think loans for businesses, or other such behaviors that exhibit initiative, might pan out. We'd expect those same traits in leaders and entrepreneurs, and we'd expect them to be paid more.
Plainly, the claim is misguided and its dissemination, I suspect, is most likely driven by profits.
The above study did indeed control for that differences in socioeconomic background and all the rest.
The data is very extensive on this point. You are handwaving away a bunch of science on this, and throwing shade on researchers without anything more than a "yeah, they would say that." That's very weak sauce.
If you want to make a case, at least cite some evidence
Not sure what your sources are. The roi for disadvantaged students is lower than it is for richer students, but still positive across the vast majority of outcomes.
I don't need to cite evidence to point out a logical impossibility.
To make a good experiment you'd need to control for the presence of college in society. The fact that it exists and takes credit for the work of people who would already be doing what it purports to cause makes it impossible to conceive of such a study.
It's just like a church claiming responsibility for human morality, where everyone starts with a church forced on them. Likewise the church will show studies on criminal behavior and drug addicts, and of course, we will find success in their work. God really does save then, right?
I'm not religious, I'm a scientist.
Sure enough lots of people are moral even without the church, and lots of people are incredibly successful, even without college.
And those examples lend themselves to reasoning deductively about the facts, a much higher logical bar when weighing what is or isn't worth believing in.
That's true as far as the latest arguments on the philosophy of science. So I'm perfectly comfortable waving away illogical arguments, and giving less weight to inductive ones, even if they include lots of marketing and other sound research.
It's more worth believing in because it's more logically sound. So no, the sauce is not weak when compared to your faith based argument.
The research you provided shows that we might expect some people to benefit from college. Sure. But to prescribe it for everyone, is clearly a mistake. It's bad for many famous examples, and it's bad for countless more of us who now lead companies in fields we didn't study.
As a side note, for others out there pedaling this lie, it's offensive and dismissive to act like repaying such a huge debt over 20 years is a win. I sweat and struggled, and ate trash for your lies.
Your lies did that to me. Take responsibility for that, and think carefully, before you go convincing other kids to follow in my footsteps.
dumberquestions · · focus · HN ↗
I suspect the bigger culprit is the optimized monetization of human attention, because pre-algorithmic social media doesn't seem to be as destructive. The fact that science wasn't as affected as math and reading (both of which rely more on attention/practice than rote memorization) somewhat supports this.
asutekku · · focus · HN ↗
AlienRobot · · focus · HN ↗
Loquebantur · · focus · HN ↗
"Elites" fearing the "plebs" to question them on things they have no good answers for is what constrains active development of actual modern scientific concepts of pedagogy taking hold. You only get to research what is being paid for.
Look at the, pretty obvious, natural human child-mode of learning: playing games.
Just not escapist nonsense games. Games that model relevant aspects of reality in an engaging way. Where you can fail without real-life consequences and learn from it while enjoying yourself.
pixl97 · · focus · HN ↗
When it comes catching up to the last 10,000 years of human development everything tends to get a bit trickier. Play is a good way at learning, but as you get to higher concepts you have to learn but are hard to game it gets a lot trickier.
Trying to easily wrap this up as the elites vs you is highly reductive. Before that age you' have spent most of your time and effort making food and clothes, not active research into the world.
piloto_ciego · · focus · HN ↗
It doesn't have to be a conspiracy even, it could just be that terrible incentives across the board result in terrible outcomes lol
JumpCrisscross · · focus · HN ↗
“Versus” implies intent. Apollo owning McGraw Hill doesn’t explain falling scores across the entire OECD.
piloto_ciego · · focus · HN ↗
And there may be some social-engineering intent there, or at least something approximating it? Like, I don't think the elites are all smoking cigars after their Bohemian grove owl orgy (or whatever Alex Jones coded nonsense) and saying "muah hahahaha, we can really make these kids dumber!" But I definitely think that "it sure would be nice if the workers didn't want raises" certainly comes up. No child left behind has certainly had an effect too... Then there's the shootings, the bullying (which appears much much better than when I was a kid at least), and the jingoism/patriotic nonsense.
My wife and I have actually been considering taking the kids out of "traditional school" and doing something more bespoke. Here in Alaska that's a lot more practical than in say, Washington? We have great home school programs here, and with our family members we have the education and qualifications to teach most of the core subjects (lots of retired teachers in our extended family). But, even with my kids in a fantastic school, it is a weird and almost carceral experience for the kids. They're constantly waiting around for stuff, constantly being tested with tests that don't seem to make a huge difference in what's taught, and they aren't really reading literature or doing much in math beyond simple rote work except for one of my sons who is 2 years ahead in math but is still bored.
I'm not saying it was all roses when I was in school 20-30 years ago, but, it feels qualitatively different? Also... even in the nice school they're in, the environment is just... I don't know, oppressive, crowded, and restrained. I'm sorry, it's messed up to make kids ask to go to the bathroom or get a drink of water. I'm sorry, it's weird how authoritarian most of the classes are - I understand why, shrinking budgets mean bigger classes, but at least personally, I feel that there's a lot of merit to the idea that this thing that used to be about learning has become daycare so the parents can stay grinding away while their kids are safely sequestered. We will see if we can do it, but we're thinking pretty hard about just travelling in the winter while they do home school online or take college classes.
What's better: to have my kids sit in a box for 7 hours a day (but really only work for like 2-3 hours) and respond to bells on command or to do online school for 3 hours a day, have mom, dad, and grandma lecture on our specialties and guide them through projects that really push them all from another country in the winter where they can learn a second language, see a different world, etc? I understand that this is a privileged position for us - like, I work from my laptop and my wife has a commutable job, but each day I pick up the kids from their school it feels a little more like picking up a parolee.
trimethylpurine · · focus · HN ↗
The system forces schools to increase enrollment by assigning a tuition price based on attaching a loan to it. It's basically for profit. Then, the loans can't be forgiven in bankruptcy when the outcome of the education platform fails to produce an income that supports repayment.
To get an education that doesn't completely screw you over, you need to be a minority with a scholarship or actually have rich parents and attend for fun. But in either case, your only benefit financially is the hope of connecting with other students whose parents are richer than yours.
Exceptions for subjects with artificial barriers of entry (medicine, law, etc., and each of those has its own set of problems, mainly the price of education).
(Speaking about the United States, but probably a lot of this applies to many places.)
I disagree with the sentiment that the rich are dissuading college enrollment. I'm not rich. I don't hire college grads. They are broke, entitled, and lack work ethic. After 5 in a row, I started giving opportunities to smart kids, from good families, who exhibit an appreciation for hard work and good moral character. Those people learn in a month what takes a college grad 6. They appreciate opportunity, instead of expecting it.
As I should have always known, a good person is far, far more valuable than a piece of paper certifying victimhood.
piloto_ciego · · focus · HN ↗
I agree with the idea of giving opportunities to smart kids from good families who work hard and are ethical. But I also think it's pretty damn hard to get good at certain things outside of a classroom? I don't know, I have mixed emotions.
Still, despite my misgivings with traditional education, I think there remains some good that comes from going to a place where your only job is to learn.
trimethylpurine · · focus · HN ↗
But none of the loans and none of the "go work for IBM" mentality that taught me how to be a loser for way too long.
A few years head start on actual business building is way more valuable than a 250 kid lecture hall with a teacher who never built anything in their life.
The future belongs to entrepreneurs, and that's even more true now with LLM built businesses.
Get them a face to face sales job for a bit. It does a lot for one's character to learn how to break the ice and be personable. And it teaches work ethic.
compiler-guy · · focus · HN ↗
<a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/stoken/default+domain/W9MBX7ZGK8FKK86JZ3Z9/full" rel="nofollow">https://journals.sagepub.com/stoken/default+domain/W9MBX7ZGK...
"We estimate the internal rates of return (IRRs) for individuals with college degrees in 10 broad majors compared to high school graduates. Our analysis shows significant differences in the age-earnings trajectories and IRRs across college majors. Specifically, Computer Science and Engineering majors have the highest IRRs, exceeding 13%, whereas Humanities & Arts and Education majors have the lowest IRRs, around 5% for male and 8–9% for female college graduates. Furthermore, the quantile regression analyses show that IRR is generally higher at the high end of the earnings distribution. Finally, we observed a slight decrease in IRR during the study period, which is consistent with the flattening and even decline in college wage premiums following the 2008 Great Recession."
trimethylpurine · · focus · HN ↗
The fact that attending colleges requires certain abilities and privileges that also correlate with financial success doesn't say anything about the influence that college has on earnings.
For all we know, the fact that college direction is ingrained in a public education system that is required by law, hides the fact that college has a negative impact on one's financial product when taken over a lifetime.
The same people that think college might pan out, also think loans for businesses, or other such behaviors that exhibit initiative, might pan out. We'd expect those same traits in leaders and entrepreneurs, and we'd expect them to be paid more.
Plainly, the claim is misguided and its dissemination, I suspect, is most likely driven by profits.
compiler-guy · · focus · HN ↗
The data is very extensive on this point. You are handwaving away a bunch of science on this, and throwing shade on researchers without anything more than a "yeah, they would say that." That's very weak sauce.
If you want to make a case, at least cite some evidence
Not sure what your sources are. The roi for disadvantaged students is lower than it is for richer students, but still positive across the vast majority of outcomes.
trimethylpurine · · focus · HN ↗
To make a good experiment you'd need to control for the presence of college in society. The fact that it exists and takes credit for the work of people who would already be doing what it purports to cause makes it impossible to conceive of such a study.
It's just like a church claiming responsibility for human morality, where everyone starts with a church forced on them. Likewise the church will show studies on criminal behavior and drug addicts, and of course, we will find success in their work. God really does save then, right?
I'm not religious, I'm a scientist.
Sure enough lots of people are moral even without the church, and lots of people are incredibly successful, even without college.
And those examples lend themselves to reasoning deductively about the facts, a much higher logical bar when weighing what is or isn't worth believing in.
That's true as far as the latest arguments on the philosophy of science. So I'm perfectly comfortable waving away illogical arguments, and giving less weight to inductive ones, even if they include lots of marketing and other sound research.
It's more worth believing in because it's more logically sound. So no, the sauce is not weak when compared to your faith based argument.
The research you provided shows that we might expect some people to benefit from college. Sure. But to prescribe it for everyone, is clearly a mistake. It's bad for many famous examples, and it's bad for countless more of us who now lead companies in fields we didn't study.
As a side note, for others out there pedaling this lie, it's offensive and dismissive to act like repaying such a huge debt over 20 years is a win. I sweat and struggled, and ate trash for your lies.
Your lies did that to me. Take responsibility for that, and think carefully, before you go convincing other kids to follow in my footsteps.