Evaluating the Payoff of a College Degree

By Beckie Supiano. Is college worth it?
News articles raising that question, and reports meant to answer it, are piling up at a steady clip.
And the answer has real consequences for anyone advising a student about whether and where to go to college, and for policy makers wondering if the country has too many degree holders, or too few. A paper released on Monday by the Urban Institute seeks to add context to the debate over whether college pays off. The paper, “Higher Education Earnings Premium: Value, Variation, and Trends,” was written by Sandy Baum, a senior fellow at the research organization. Read more...