College is a Waste of Time and Money “College Is a Waste of Time and Money” written by Caaroline Bird introduces the topic to college and high school graduates; Caroline Bird’s claim is that she urges the reader to reconsider why it’s best not to attend college. Her premise is “college is a waste of time and money.” She explores her premise thru topics such as why students attend college?,cost of college, career preparation, material learned, job market outlook, estimates of students in college and financial return on school. Caroline Bird throughout the article uses interviews, statistics and personal real life stories of families, to demonstrate her claim. She uses a variety of ethos,pathos,logic, logical fallacies and assumptions. Also, …show more content…
She states,”According to the estimates made by the economist Fritz Machlup, if we been educating every young person until age 22 in that year 1970, the bill for higher education would have reached 47.5 billion dollars, 12.5 billion more than the total corporate profits for the year” (429). When Bird mentions, Fritz Machlup, an economist he guesses for the year 1970, if every young person were educated till 22 years of age; the bill would be at 47.5 billion, 12.5 billion dollars higher than the business profits. When the audience looks at the statement, few things stick out for example “economist,” so the reader assumes he or she is highly knowledgeable in their field. Then if every young 22 year old educated, the total bill would 47.5 billion, which catches the readers attention towards the end of the quote its stated “12.5 billion more than the total corporate profits for the year”(429). Not only awareness is raised, but terms such as “total corporate profits,” which refers to what the business brought in after taxes makes the reader thnk in business sense. The ethos statement bird mentions is highly critical, the reason being the cost of education is very high, and the tax payer ultimately deals with the