OK, I love the Planet Money podcast and would recommend it to absolutely everyone. While I haven’t yet listened to the podcast in question, I must say that my lunch began to curdle in my stomach just a little when I read this post: NPR: Turn Students Into Investments.

“What if teachers were paid based on the future income their students make… That way the students would turn into ‘investments’ for the teachers.”

No offense to Ryan C., who made the suggestion, but this is a disastrous idea.

A number of flaws are already expressed in the comments, so I didn’t add to those. The one’s I find most compelling aren’t the practical/logistical problems, but the moral/philosophical ones. What does this approach say about our values as a society? Capitalism, as an ideology, is reductionist and dehumanizing, whereas education has the potential to elevate people to the very pinnacle of their human potential, something the market is woefully unable to reflect.