We Don't Need No Education?

Education, education, education is once more at the heart of political debate. Tony Blair has staked his position on forcing through plans to introduce new fees for higher education. There can be little argument that the current state of universities cannot be allowed to continue. Yet before rushing into new plans, surely we should ask what we expect from higher education, and who stands to benefit?

Debates about higher education are complicated by the very different kinds of higher education available. There are few similarities between a degree in Medieval History and one in Hospitality. For this article, I'll divide degrees into three broad types, although I freely admit that the division is only one of many possibilities, with much overlap between my categories. Firstly, we have vocational degrees - those which have a direct relevance to a single career. This category includes such subjects as Hospitality, Engineering and Accountancy. The second category are the numerical degrees, including most sciences and, obviously, maths. Finally, there are the humanities - history, literature, art. Obviously there are some holes here - where to put the soft sciences, for instance, let alone all the variations on business studies. It doesn't matter. I'm not trying to develop a robust taxonomy, just illustrating that treating academia as a monolithic block is seriously flawed.

The expectations placed on higher education, and who benefits from that education, depend enormously on the degree. Vocational degrees are the easiest. The student expects to obtain training for and a job in a specific industry. The employer expects to receive a graduate who already possesses at least some of the knowledge and skills needed for a given position. Who benefits is slightly less clear. In a sense the student benefits - they acquire a job which they would otherwise be unqualified for. But that is only true because others are also trained by universities for the same jobs. Remove university training for these jobs, and the jobs themselves would remain - someone would need to do them. In many cases, the same people would be employed - the qualities that recommend training them through a university would be equally attractive to an employer. The only difference would be that the employer would need to train new employees, rather than relying on academia to do so. Clearly, the current system primarily benefits the employer, who avoids paying to train staff for a job that they need done.

A similar argument can be formulated for numerical degrees. Very few people with such degrees move into jobs which directly use their knowledge, yet these degrees are highly valued by prospective employers. Why? Simply because these degrees all teach logical analysis, numerical literacy, problem solving, and, above all, the ability to research and learn. The personal development that students go through in all these degrees is of huge benefit to employers, which is why they seek to recruit such students in vast numbers. Companies clearly see a great benefit to having a large pool of graduates to choose their employees from.

Humanities courses differ primarily in the expectations placed on them by employers. The analytical and research skills are expected to be different, and to suit different jobs. In many cases, numerical graduates are preferred, but humanities dominate within, say, journalism or politics. The expectations of the students often differ too. For some reason, humanities is often seen as the easier option. Having studied both physics and medieval history at university, I'm inclined to disagree.

Where both numerical and humanities courses differ from the vocational is in the expectations of the students. While a vocational course is normally undertaken with a view to working in the subject area, that is unlikely to be the case for other degrees. Self improvement, interest, or just a desire to experience the social life associated with university are all likely reasons for undertaking those degrees. Certainly some people do hope that a degree will lead to a well paid job, but most students endure three years of poverty and end up with a considerable debt. It is exceedingly doubtful that the vast majority of graduates end up significantly better off now, let alone after another nine grand (plus interest) is added to their debt. Think about the maths. The average full time wage is currently around the £18,000 mark. Even assuming that school leavers will be underpaid, that's still £40,000 or so that a graduate doesn't earn while at university. Add on the current debts of up to £10,000 or so, plus the government's proposed £10,000 in fees, and the average student will need to earn £60,000 (plus interest) more than his degree-less peers just to break even. While some graduates might make more than this, the majority are simply not that well paid. By the time you take early retirement and unemployment into account, even breaking even on a degree is a risky proposition.

Many graduates already face greater expenses - in terms of both debts and lost income - from their degrees than they can reasonably hope to repay from their career path. The government proposes to make university even less of viable financially by enlarging student debt. Yet this is completely at odds with their other stated aim - to increase student numbers, with a goal that 50% of the population will attend university.

The government's aim to increase attendance at universities is based on the idea that an educated public benefits Britain. Better educated employees allow British firms to compete in world wide high-tech, research, and service based industries. Quite simply, having destroyed our manufacturing base, we can only compete on the world stage on the basis of our intellectual ability. We cannot hope to compete with the developing world by providing cheap labour, so instead we need to produce ideas, management, finance, and entertainment. The legacy of Thatcher (and one endorsed whole-heartedly by Blair) is that our economy increasingly relies on the calibre of our graduates.

In short, everyone benefits from well-educated people. Let's forget issues like quality of life, or engagement with democracy - both of which can be important reasons for adult education. In purely economic terms, the country benefits from having educated people who can participate in health care, education, government and industry. Employers benefit from having a large pool of skilled employees to choose from. Individuals benefit from the opportunity to improve both themselves and their prospects. Yet, it is only the last of these who are to be expected to pay, despite sacrificing a small fortune in earnings potential already.

There is a further argument against introducing these fees. The Liberal Democrat plan (to introduce a 50% tax rate for earnings over £100,000) has been criticised since an increase in income tax will, apparently, make Britain less competitive. Yet, the higher someone's income, the more likely they are to be a graduate. With the planned increase in student numbers, that will be even more true in the future. So those graduates who are paying back their fees are going to be the same people that we are not supposed to tax. Pardon? This is an increase in income tax, but through the back door. It won't apply to people of Blair's generation, true, but it will quickly come to apply to the majority of actual wage earners. Rather than introduce a fair tax that's cheap to collect, the government proposes to go through this regressive, expensive nonsense in the hope that people won't work out that it'll affect either them or their children.

Before we start burdening future generations of students with ever increasing levels of debt, whilst requiring increasing numbers of our youths to obtain a degree, we need to examine who really benefits and who really pays. Regressively taxing half the population instead of simply raising income tax on the over paid makes no sense.

Graham Robinson. 3rd December 2003.

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