I took this as a completely serious and reasonable proposal. For context, I have taught (middle school through University), am on the board of an education non-

I took this as a completely serious and reasonable proposal. For context, I have taught (middle school through University), am on the board of an education non-profit, have an advanced degree and plan on accumulating more of them. What is unreasonable about what the author says? You seem put-off by the way they break down college into 3 principal components: signalling, training, and fun... But other than an emotional reaction to that framing, can you say why it's wrong? I can think of one piece left out, but I will explain why it's reasonable to leave it out. As part of marketing 4 year liberal arts degrees, schools play up a fourth component, which was more of a factor in the past: non-economic human-development (i.e. learning certain topics enriches your life and adds meaning). I do think this is a real component, but I think, in an effort to maximize profit, universities have completely thrown this away in practice (while making it a cornerstone of their pitch). And if we separate economically usefully human development from non-economically useful human development, the later is (by definition) a luxury good. This luxury good can be obtained for free on the internet, so paying $100-500k for it is just signalling. Hence it can be ignored. Don't get me wrong, I want to live in a world where everyone's motivation is non-economic human-development... But that is not the late-stage capitalism dystopia we find ourselves in - and I think the author does a good job describing the state of things.