http://theunbrokenwindow.com/2009/07/29/too-much-of-a-good-thing/ The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design. - F.A. Hayek Thu, 24 May 2012 03:09:54 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.3 http://theunbrokenwindow.com/2009/07/29/too-much-of-a-good-thing/comment-page-1/#comment-19279 There’s No Public Goods Problem in Higher Education | The Unbroken Window Wed, 01 Dec 2010 09:44:00 +0000 http://theunbrokenwindow.com/2009/07/29/too-much-of-a-good-thing/#comment-19279 [...] Now think of higher education the same way. The free-riders here are the rest of society, who rarely compensate students to obtain more higher education, but they certainly do benefit if I do get educated. Textbooks suggest that governments simply subsidize students (or worse, run schools themselves) to overcome the free-rider problem. But think of what colleges have become. Just as port- and slip-owners ended up bundling the valued public good (the light) with the valued private good (the port-slip), which is easy to exclude non-payers from, so too have colleges bundled this public good (education) with an easy to exclude private good (entry into the dating market, party scene, connections, etc.). Thus, it is extremely likely that the public goods problem in higher education has been solved, and perhaps even “oversolved.” [...] [...] Now think of higher education the same way. The free-riders here are the rest of society, who rarely compensate students to obtain more higher education, but they certainly do benefit if I do get educated. Textbooks suggest that governments simply subsidize students (or worse, run schools themselves) to overcome the free-rider problem. But think of what colleges have become. Just as port- and slip-owners ended up bundling the valued public good (the light) with the valued private good (the port-slip), which is easy to exclude non-payers from, so too have colleges bundled this public good (education) with an easy to exclude private good (entry into the dating market, party scene, connections, etc.). Thus, it is extremely likely that the public goods problem in higher education has been solved, and perhaps even “oversolved.” [...]

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