The "Value" of a Degree

In these days of student loans where people are leaving university with 30K of debt¹ this little soundbite from a More or Less podcast² broadcast in December 2010 should still be of interest.

So the moral is that in terms of straight finance an arts degree is really bad investment (the £22K lifetime income boost won't even pay off your student loan) but a maths or computing degree is well worth it boosting your income by £220K over a lifetime (a man with a degree in maths and computer science writes).

For the sake of our nation's communal intellect we can only hope that people don't make the decision on the degree they will take based on financial grounds or the arts are screwed.

(A modified repost from Posterous)

1. Unlike in my day: I was on full grant and earning good money in the holidays' writing software in the first computer boom as microprocessors first appeared.
2. Which I recommend by the way.