If we want to build competitive economies, we need a human capital revolution. But what does that actually mean? A new book from the OECD explores this question and the human side of economic man and woman. Here, the author offers some personal reflections on the need to understand the bigger picture of how human capital is formed and the role that education can play.
“Our values and beliefs inhibit us from looking upon human beings as capital goods, except in slavery, and this we abhor.” So wrote American economist Theodore Schultz in 1961 in his pioneering analysis of the role of human capital in economic growth. Schultz did not share that inhibition.
In the same article he rejected the idea that there is anything demeaning in the notion of people consciously investing in themselves–through education and training, for instance–to create a “capital” that brings long-term returns. “By investing in themselves, people can enlarge the range of choices available to them,” he declared. “It is one way free men can enhance their welfare.”
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