I see your point, but I think you've made a couple assumptions that aren't necessarily accurate. First, higher education needn't be solely one or the other. Th

I see your point, but I think you've made a couple assumptions that aren't necessarily accurate. First, higher education needn't be solely one or the other. There have also been some important points brought up elsewhere in the comments about the "sticker price" versus what students actually pay. Additionally, this is a complex issue, especially in the US where the perception of the value of a degree can vary wildly depending on the institution in question. One part of the original article that struck me as true is that high school students should be better coached during the process of choosing a college or university and then choosing a major or concentration. The idea behind general human capital, though, is that it actually increases the ability of the student to thrive in a dynamic economy. The returns on an education with a significant "holistic" component are, at least in theory, higher than those on an education that is weighted toward job training. For example, while it is certainly true that borrowing $100,000 to study pottery at a large university is probably not a good idea, there are enough colleges and universities in the US that if a student really wants to study pottery, he can do so for much less (for example, at a community college, where tuition costs are still quite reasonable). But really, pottery (to continue the example, though this is applicable to many fields frequently cited as "useless") is closer to specific human capital. This actually helps explain why the students commonly featured in articles about these issues can't get jobs. They have been given "job training" for jobs that don't pay well or hardly even exist. If their programs of study had been more "holistic" then perhaps they would be in better shape today (of course it should go without saying that there are counter-examples out there, I'm just talking about trends and averages here). So in some sense, it seems that part of the problem is that we already focus too much on "job training", especially for low-return jobs. Of course a degree in finance (business schools do a great deal of job training) is far more lucrative, but the principle is the same.