Think college isn't worth it? You're not alone, according to a new report from Nielsen. Based on a survey of 2,000 people--900 of whom were college graduates of various ages--the authors found that a majority of college graduates believe college offers a lower return on investment compared to a decade ago. However, what is popular is not always right; as Bloomberg's Natalie Kitroeff asserted: “In reality, not going to college is far more expensive than ending your education at high school. The difference comes to hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
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Ever wonder how much the average philosophy major has to pay toward his/her student loans? Now you can know, using this interactive calculator from Brookings. Utilizing college-major specific earnings data from the US Census Bureau, the Undergraduate Student Loan Calculator shows typical debt burdens (as a percentage of income) for over 75 majors during the decade following graduation.
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College is the key to upward mobility, according to Jim Trankersley from the Washington Post. Of those born in the bottom of the income ladder, 9 of every 10 who graduated from college moved up economically later in life. In contrast, only half of children without a college degree make the same leap.
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President Christopher B. Nelson, of St. John's College, penned an editorial in The Washington Post that sought to defend the value of a Liberal Arts education. Wrote Nelson, "The lens of economics distorts our judgment about the true worth of higher education. The things that matter most in education...do not fit this [economics] paradigm. They are not scarce, and yet they are extremely valuable—indeed they are among the most valuable in human life. They do not become scarce by being shared. Instead, they expand and grow the more they are shared."
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Matt Chingos of the Brookings Institution discussed the report he co-authored with Beth Akers, which found that although average student loan balances have increased over the last 20 years, so have earnings--and significantly so. Chingos also discussed the fact that affluent households hold a disproportionate share of education debt. "An era in which students from low-income families used loans to supplement grants has given way to a system dominated by the wealthiest Americans, many of whom were born to affluent parents." According to Chingos, this phenomenon may be misguiding the debate over the value of college. 
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"College in today's economy is like sunscreen on a scorchingly hot afternoon: You have to see the people who didn’t apply it to fully appreciate how important it is. The same way a blistering sun both makes sunscreen feel ineffective and makes it more crucial than ever, recessions can both make a college degree seem ineffective and make it more important than ever." --Derek Thompson, The Atlantic
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