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> That's two things: the people and the degree, not just the degree. Yes, true, it’s a valid point, but there’s really no debate over whether getting the degre
by dahart 5y ago
> That's two things: the people and the degree, not just the degree.
Yes, true, it’s a valid point, but there’s really no debate over whether getting the degree is causal. And side note, the Fed’s data is for all Americans, not just a suggestive sample. The line between holding a degree and not is surprisingly clear. All the debate is over what the cause actually is. Specifically, to what degree the content of the education is responsible for better earnings vs whether simply holding a certificate, but not necessarily learning anything or gaining skills, is the reason for higher income. And I’m no expert here, I’ve only browsed a handful of them, but my understanding is that they more or less all conclude it’s a mixture.
And yes, selectivity of school has less effect than selective schools might have you believe, at the same time that just having a degree from a state university has more effect than some people suggest.
- sokoloff 5y ago> there’s really no debate over whether getting the degree is causal Is there no debate in the sense of "this is completely settled science that getting a degree causes a doubling of income on an aptitude-independent, statistically-sound, population-wide basis"? Or "it's not being debated because that debate is uncomfortable"? Or in some other sense of that phrase?
- dahart 5y agoYour question is getting at the reasons for causality, and not necessarily whether there is a causality. The answer of course is complicated, in that school aptitude depends on family history of education and socio-economic status, and a wide variety of other factors. As far as I can tell, it is clear and widely agreed that just having a degree provides some degree of earnings benefits regardless of aptitude or history or social class (for reasons of selection and social signaling and other things). And there also seems to be widespread agreement that getting the degree yields skills that also translate into some degree of earnings benefits, statistically. Studies are trying to control for aptitude and measure how much education alone contributes -- and it’s not 100%. But nobody is arguing about whether having the degree puts one in the higher earnings camp.
- sokoloff 5y agoMy main point is: Observing a difference in income in the presence of a degree is evidence of correlation, but not of causation.
- dahart 5y agoAnd mine is that the existence of causation has been established. The debate amongst researchers is over the weights of various causes, not whether it’s just a correlation.
- sokoloff 5y agoDo you have any research you can point me to? I'd like to learn more about this proof of causality in doubling (genuinely).
- dahart 5y agoOne is the St Louis Fed study, which I found you and I have discussed briefly in the past. ;) https://www.stlouisfed.org/~/media/files/pdfs/hfs/is-college-worth-it/emmons_kent_ricketts_college_still_worth_it.pdf https://www.stlouisfed.org/~/media/files/pdfs/hfs/is-college... I’m only skimming quickly, this doesn’t fully back me up, but section III talks about some causal analysis, for example: “mediation tests causal relationships between variables. While the SCF is not longitudinal and thus a pure causal effect cannot be tested, we can be confident that reverse causality in the ordering of these variables is not possible.” I have to be fair and note that there are also several comments about what is not causal as well as data that implies more causation than what their analysis reveals. The references in this paper point to a couple of other papers that have “causal” in the title. Unfortunately I don’t have the time right now to read these again, but I recall seeing causal analysis during that previous discussion about the St. Louis Fed study, research that studied education outcomes and controlled for people with similar SES backgrounds, similar family history of education, etc., and found the apparent causal contributions of education. BTW, there is absolutely a fuzzy gray line here. What I’m calling causation (social bias) may be what you’re calling correlation (education alone is not the entire causal reason for higher incomes - to your point that one cause is the people). Lest we get too stuck on terminology, I’m perfectly happy pointing out that the correlation is extremely high, and the statistical difference between with degree and without degree is surprisingly large.