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A Study of Student Loans and
Taking into consideration that these studies were made ten years apart
(1913 and 1924) and the rise in incomes since, the final estimates bear a
close relationship. These two studies bear sufficient evidence that a College
education has a cash value. This value is sufficiently important to be taken
into consideration as one of the many reasons for helping the Student
through College. However, the cash value as set forth by these two studies
lacks certain adj ustments which should be taken into consideration:
1. The cost of a College education includes not only the positive
expenditures, but what the Student would have been able to earn
if he had been engaged in a remunerative activity.
2. There are not a few young men whose aims and ideals are so
raised by a higher education that they themselves are rendered
much less efficient as money rnaking machines. This is to be considered
only from the cash value standpoint of a higher education.
3. Those who complete a College or university education are in most
cases the ones who, without such an education, would have earned
an income above the average. The comparison of a selected group
with the general average is not a reliable way to determine this
cash value. It must be observed, then, that these estimates are
not scientific and are not therefore sufficiently reliable to be used
as a basis for credit extension.
The problem of arriving at the cash value of an education is not so
simple as the above studies would indicate. It should be determined for
the purpose of loans in an entirely different manner. The earnings of
graduates the first, second, third, and up to the tenth year after graduation
should be ascertained. This would be divided further into the
earnings of graduates of the various schools of learning. A comparison
would then be made, not with average incomes, but with the incomes of a
group having the same ability as College people; the difference to be
measured not being the ability, but the difference between the same ability
when untrained and trained by a College education. A man’s College
training cannot be considered as the all important element in his financial
success. In Order to secure more accurate figures, it would be necessary
to measure the amount of influence which a higher education has on the
earning capacity of an individual.
Education An Investment
It is not possible to conclude what the exact cash value of an education
is, but it can be accepted with certainty that education has some cash
value. This value warrants not only the loans now being made to students,
but loans on a much larger scale. If acquiring a higher education is the
securing of a product (training) which the Student will later be able to
“cash in” on, then there is as justifiable reason to secure this training on
credit as there is to buy land, Stocks, bonds, or any other form of invest
