When to Defund

From my The Case Against Education:

When I argue education is largely wasteful signaling, most listeners yield. Popular resistance doesn’t kick in until I add, “Let’s waste less by cutting government spending on education.” You might think conceding the wastefulness of education spending would automatically entail support for austerity, but it doesn’t. The typical reaction is to confidently state, “Education budgets should be redirected, not reduced.”

Such confidence is misplaced. The discovery...