More College Grads Equals Faster Economic Growth

Feb. 13 (Bloomberg) -- As the U.S. population ages, andwith the effects of the financial crisis promising to linger forsome time, economic growth will be lower than we would like.This is why the federal government needs to do more to helpAmericans earn college degrees.

For much of the 20th century, the U.S. benefited fromrapidly rising educational levels, as the economists ClaudiaGoldin and Lawrence F. Katz of Harvard University showed intheir 2008 book, “The Race Between Education and Technology.”Over the past 30 years, however, educational attainment hasrisen much more slowly. From 1960 to 1985, the share of adultAmericans with at least a college degree more than doubled, to19 percent from less than 8 percent. From 1985 to 2010, though,the share rose by only about half, to 30 percent. This slowdownhas exacerbated inequality and crimped growth.