Tyler Cowen: disagreement

Transcript context

…I think IQ is overrated and conscientiousness is underrated for the most part because people can learn new things, but as you know, learning can be uncomfortable. First of all, it requires realizing you don’t really know a thing, paying attention to where, “Oh, I sort of know this,” but looking at the finer points. Yes, I think conscientiousness probably matters more on the whole. If you think about the value of a typical four-year college degree, say, from a large state university in the United States, how much of that value, to you, is learning and how much is signaling or something else? Bryan Caplan thinks it’s about 80 percent signaling. I disagree with him, but that’s a number, right? Well, how much do you think is signaling and how much do you think is learning? Are you saying the alternative is learning at college? Or are you saying something different?…

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