“As Charles Murray Has Pointed Out…”
Posted on August 27th, 2012 in Uncategorized | 16 Comments »
NIall Ferguson’s new Newsweek column is up: It’s an argument that American higher education is creating a self-perpetuating “cognitive elite.”
...they marry one another, live in close proximity to one another, and use every means, fair or foul, to ensure that their kids follow in their academic footsteps (even when Junior is innately less smart than Mom and Dad).
Just because this is a pet peeve, I will point out: they live in proximity, not close proximity.
Ferguson’s column touches superficially upon several of the current debates regarding college: its cost, its utility, its relevance, and again, that idea that it’s perpetuation an elite. He says that a college degree is less useful than ever for finding a job, but worries about its elitism. He quotes Peter Thiel, Rick Santorum, Charles Murray and others, and then suggests that American higher ed is more democratic for foreigners than Americans, which I don’t get at all, because most of the foreigners who come to American universities–certainly the elite ones—are those whose parents can afford to pay full-freight.
It’s a less offensive column than his “Hit the Road, Barack” piece, but not really much more coherent. There’s a good column somewhere in here, but I think finding it would require more time than Ferguson has available.
16 Responses
8/27/2012 7:42 pm
Ferguson is addressing a series of most important topics regarding the present and future of higher education. Topics which perhaps more of his colleagues should be discussing and studying. Maybe he is being a provocateur, but be that as it may what he is doing is significant to his industry. If more academics and higher education administrators acknowledged, as he is doing, the challenges that he discusses, the ‘next bubble’, and the likely ensuing crisis, that he describes may be averted.
Is Newsweek paying him 75K for this article, or is he writing it as a public service?
8/27/2012 8:18 pm
Like Richard, I too am puzzled by the sentence:
“and use every means, fair or foul, to ensure that their kids follow in their academic footsteps”
what ‘foul steps’ does NF have in mind?
is he talking about academic parents favoring their children to become academics? or about college educated parents trying to get their kids to get into good colleges?
It is puzzling that a scholarly trained mind would not use evidence to support his arguments and make them more transparent. Perhaps this is hard to do in a short magazine article.
8/28/2012 11:36 am
I took “and use every means, fair or foul, to ensure that their kids follow in their academic footsteps” to mean getting their children into good colleges. The idea of parents taking “foul steps” is indeed troubling. Does Niall Ferguson think of SAT prep courses as “foul”? Or is he suggesting that some degree of cheating takes place, e.g. that some parents, in helping their children to write their college application essays, do more of the actual writing themselves? Whatever Ferguson has in mind, it would be good to have more information about it.
I’m also not sure about Ferguson’s suggestion that a new “cognitive elite” is springing up. Again, I’d like to have more information. How exactly does this new elite differ from previous generations, when college-educated parents were eager to see their children also attend college?
8/28/2012 2:18 pm
I was interrupted by some other work, but I meant to add a sentence or so about what others have mentioned in previous posts on this blog: the fact that Harvard goes to considerable lengths to make it possible for students to study at Harvard regardless of their families’ financial means. Here’s what it says on the Financial Aid page:
“Admission to Harvard is need-blind, by which we mean that financial need is not an impediment to admission. International students have the same access to financial aid as United States citizens.
Financial aid at Harvard is entirely need–based and we are committed to meeting the demonstrated need of all students.”
Further, and most emphatically, “no contribution is expected from parents with incomes under $65,000.”
This aid brings students to campus who, in many instances, may be the first from their family to attend college. Other American universities and colleges also offer generous financial aid, if not perhaps quite on the scale that Harvard has pledged itself to do. So on these grounds as well I don’t quite follow Ferguson’s remarks about elitism.
8/29/2012 2:20 am
Judith,
You said,
“I’m also not sure about Ferguson’s suggestion that a new “cognitive elite” is springing up. Again, I’d like to have more information.”
Charles Murray’s book, Coming Apart has a lot of information.
8/29/2012 7:19 am
Thanks, Sam. I’ll explore it.
8/29/2012 11:32 am
I haven’t read Murray’s book, because I’m just not a fan of his previous work, but I have seen some pretty mixed reviews, including this one:
http://www.salon.com/2012/01/30/charles_murray_does_it_again/singleton/
8/29/2012 2:56 pm
Richard,
I’ve been reading Joan Walsh for a long time. She doesn’t begin to come close to an unbiased commentator.
She has made many, many statements over the years regarding the economic and financial aspects of the U.S. that showed she didn’t know what she was talking about.
Very few liked The Bell Curve. That prejudice seems to have carried over to Coming Apart, particularly from commentators on the left.
It is an excellent book, recommended to me by a brilliant lefty HLS graduate. Whether one agrees with Murray or not in his basic beliefs, this book provides a well argued case (backed up by statistics, particularly his concept of “super Zips”) for America coming apart. IMO, the fact that Walsh doesn’t like the book doesn’t mean bupkis. Read it and you’ll be worried about the America your very young son is going to inherit.
8/29/2012 3:43 pm
Watching the Republican convention worries me more, Sam-if there’s a cognitive elite in the country, you certainly won’t find it in Tampa.
8/29/2012 4:38 pm
It very much worries me too Richard. That’s why I’m not watching the Republican Convention.
On the other hand, during the last fifteen years (if not longer) the so called cognitive elites from academia who are in Washington (many, if not most, of whom have never had to meet a Friday payroll, have never worked on a shop floor and have never served in the military or have done alternative service for their country) have set the policies that govern us (with ample aid from the lobbyists).
Today we have the cognitive elite, students of “The Depression”, some of whom are anchored in outmoded thoughts, charged with setting policies that have not worked. If you read Reinhart and Rogoff, these policies not only have never worked but will never work. You have Nobel laureates, and economists on the West Coast, who make mistake after mistake about how financial markets work. These are the cognitive elites. Murray devotes a good part of his book to their follies.
8/29/2012 8:13 pm
@Sam Spektor, three question - first, is it possible for you to regard people with different views of finance and monetary policy as reasonable and well-informed? or is the mere fact that we disagree with Reinhart and Rogoff enough to label us hopelessly ignorant? Reinhart and Rogoff are hardly accepted as gospel within economics, after all.
Second, why is that you regard “economists on the West Coast” who disagree with you as members of the so-called “cognitive elite” but these East Coast economists you like are not?
Third, what on earth does “[working] on a shop floor” have to do with the evidence in favor of Reinhart and Rogoff’s thesis? Did it occur to them while they were on the assembly line?
8/29/2012 8:35 pm
Sam, you a brilliant! indeed many of these ‘cognitive elites’ are totally out of touch with the real world. They have created their own microcosm of ideas and cultural values. Totally disconnected from the rest of the country. This is especially the case in the faculty of arts and sciences at Harvard. Troublesome that some of them then pontificate about which way forward for the country. Fortunately the rest of the world is very aware of the gap and does not give a damn about what these professors think or how they see the world… that’s why they pay them $50 per lecture, as someone posted on this blog a few days ago.
It is people like Fergusson, who actually have useful things to say, that get ostracized at a place like Harvard. Wait and see how he will be punished by his colleagues -as some of them have already done in this blog- for his Newsweek article denouncing de decline of universities in America. But the rest of the world won’t give a fig about what his colleagues think, and will continue to pay NF fat checks for having interesting and useful ideas to share.
8/29/2012 10:30 pm
@Anonymous8:35pm - every time someone makes an argument like yours, I am reminded of this comedy sketch about “Worthington’s Law,” i.e., a person who makes more money than you is better than you: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aF8wLg5Asgo
8/30/2012 3:12 am
@ mad @er
First para. Of course it is. My comments had nothing to do with disagreement about policy. It had to do with the fact that it is clear to me that very bright economists do not fully understand how markets really work. I wasn’t referring to Reinhart and Rogoff in any role as ” practicing economists” (e.g. Nobel laureates or former university presidents), but rather in their role as economic historians, where they are respected as among the most astute. It’s clear to me from their book, and other economic history that I’ve read over a long period of time, that it wasn’t different in 2005-2007 and it appears not to be different today (and in the past two years plus). Because you’ll probably ask me for an example of what I’m referring to, let me give you just one. Perhaps I’m wrong (and please correct me if I am), but I believe that no matter how hard you try, you can’t take on more debt and use more leverage to permanently solve a solvency (or debt) problem. A liquidity problem, yes; a solvency problem, no!! The ECB has tried, and continues to want to do that with Greece. Greece says it needs more time and if it has more time it will grow its way out of its predicament. Can you tell me what Greece has to offer the world in terms of products so that it can grow? It will not grow and hundreds of billions of dollars, including some IMF money partially funded by your tax dollars, will be wasted. The same thing will probably happen with Spain and perhaps even with my beloved Italy. However, the unelected ECB (and a certain entity in our country) have decided to be central planners rather than central bankers.
Second para. I wasn’t picking on West Coast economists in general, nor favoring East Coast economists. I mentioned Reinhart and Rogoff as economic historians, not as “preaching” economists. “Preaching” economists, from either coast, have an absolutely perfect record in looking back. In terms of being right looking forward, based on my experience, again over a long period of time, half are right and half are wrong, and tomorrow, those that were right today, will be wrong and vice versa. How else is one to explain the fact that all economists are looking at the same data and coming to such different conclusions and proposing such different solutions..
Third para. You said : “what on earth does “(working) on a shop floor” have to do with the evidence in favor of Reinhart and Rogoff’s thesis.” Nothing as far as I know, because I didn’t even allude to that. I wasn’t thinking of Reinhart and Rogoff as elite economists (they might be for all I know), but as among the best economic historians. What I was referring to was that elite economists in Washington, New York, Palo Alto and Cambridge have proposed “remedy after remedy” that have served to enrich Wall Street at the expense of Main Street. If they had ever worked on a shop floor, they might really understand what it means to have to pick up a paycheck on Friday to meet the bills next week. They haven’t and they don’t. It’s all theory. ZIRP and multiple QEs and we still have intractable unemployment. Stimulus measures that went into deep pockets which capitalize on wasted tax dollars (painting lines on city streets is not effective stimulus). Three years ago, other suggestions were given to elite economists with regard to solving the unemployment problem (incentives for private industry to hire). Only today are they being used and unfortunately too little too late.
8/30/2012 11:45 am
@Sam Spektor, thanks for your detailed reply. I’m not sure that the difference between regarding R and R economic historians rather than as practicing economists is as great as you imagine, but it’s still helpful in clarifying your views.
However, I still am perplexed by your last paragraph, where it seems to me that your disdain for this purported “cognitive elite” edges towards simple anti-intellectualism. Putting aside disagreements about quantitative easing, how does the knowledge of what it feels like to pick up a Friday paycheck give someone special insight into what it takes to stimulate a massive, complex economy? If anything, I would think that knowing how hard it is to pay the bills would cause economic policy makers to focus much more on alleviating unemployment than on long-term debt and deficit issues.
8/31/2012 4:44 am
Thought that being friends of a number of economists at Harvard would perhaps insulate me from a charge of “edges towards simple anti-intellectualism.” Guess not.
Perhaps I didn’t choose the right friends. Would Harry Lewis and Richard Thomas do?