The merits of on-the-job training vs. a formal education

There’s a long-running debate over what matters more—formal learning or learning on the job. On math tests, American teens perform worse than Danes, Latvians, and Koreans. But how much does that matter?

So argues Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel-winning economist at Columbia. He says societies need to emphasize lifelong learning, not just school.

“I am worried, personally, that we’re going to have to rely on the skills of our people in the future.” ——Eric Hanushek, Hoover Institution, co-author of the Science article

An article in the Jan. 22 issue of the journal Science finds that formal education does lift growth—as long as students really learn something. The mistake is to focus on years of schooling.

More schooling Here’s where you see the payoff from school: Singapore makes the point: It has very high test scores and very high economic growth per capita In contrast, the U.S. has pretty good growth even though its results on international...