Weblogs
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“Law School Transparency” is misleading its customers about the cost of law school and overcharging for data that are available for free (Michael Simkovic)
Brian Leiter recently noted problems with Elizabeth Olson’s uncritical coverage of “Law School Transparency” (LST) in an article published in Bloomberg. The most important substantive problems with Olson’s recent article about LST not already mentioned by Professor Leiter are that: (1) Olson doesn’t mention that LST’s business model is repackaging and selling to prospective law…
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White House proposes to spend approximately nothing on early childhood education to minimize taxes for top 0.1 percent (Michael Simkovic)
NPR reports that the Trump administration has proposed a meager one-time increase in funding for childcare / early career eduction equal to approximately 0.0045 percent of GDP ($1 billion out of $22 trillion estimated 2020 GDP) or about 0.001 percent of household networth. Total federal spending would increase to $5.4 billion, or 0.0225 percent of…
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How Big Tobacco’s star advocate became an education expert for the New York Times and Forbes (Michael Simkovic)
Richard Vedder, a leading opponent of excise taxes on cigarettes, takes a dim view of most of higher education. Vedder depicts colleges and universities as overpriced, wasteful, and deserving budget cuts. Vedder argues that academic freedom and research impede teaching marketable skills. The reality is that public investments in higher education more than pay for…
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“Risk Sharing” is a Covert Tax on Higher Education (take 2) (Michael Simkovic)
Inside Higher Education reports that along with an executive order that would politicize federal funding for higher education and scientific research, President Trump may soon unveil a "risk sharing" plan to tax higher education institutions that accept federal student loans. As I noted previously, when Senator (and former Democratic Presidential candidate) Hillary Clinton proposed a…
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President Trump uses scuffle at Berkeley as pretext to pressure universities into promoting views he endorses (Michael Simkovic)
A recruiter for a far-right group that maintains a "Professor Watchlist" was recently punched in the face while using slogans about "hate crime hoaxes" to recruit (or perhaps to intentionally provoke an incident) at the University of California Berkeley. The FBI and Department of Education have both found that serious (at times deadly) hate crimes…
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A fascinating history of conservative activism on college campuses (Michael Simkovic)
A fascinating, albeit intemperate and sensationalist, perspective on the history of conservative activism on college campuses is available here. The essay discusses strategies such as top-down national campaigns funded by wealthy donors, programming crafted by national organizations staffed by well compensated and experienced political operatives with ties to the Republican party, and executed on particular…
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Should law schools be penalized for admitting students from wealthy families who are not motivated to work? (Michael Simkovic)
Scott F. Norberg argues for a law school accreditation standard tied to student employment outcomes. The proposal is interesting, and may have some advantages over a standard tied to bar passage rates, for example because it does not give state bars–who can make the bar exam more or less challenging and have incentives to strengthen…
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Raising tenure standards is no free lunch (Michael Simkovic)
Brian Leiter and Paul Caron both recently noted a study by Adam Chilton, Jonathan Masur, and Kyle Rozema which argues that law schools can increase average faculty productivity by making it harder for tenure track faculty to get tenure. While this seems plausible, denying tenure more often is no free lunch. A highly regarded study…
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Samuel Moyn (Yale): Law schools are too focused on public law to serve the public interest (Michael Simkovic)
In a thought provoking essay in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Professor Samuel Moyn argues that law schools' focus on judge made law in general, and the Supreme Court in particular, is counterproductive especially when justified on ostensibly progressive grounds. Offline, Professor Moyn suggested that, to better help students understand how the legal system influences…
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McKinsey responds to New York Times hit piece (Michael Simkovic)
The consulting firm McKinsey is a leading employer of graduates of elite law schools, business schools, medical schools, and other professional programs. The New York Times recently ran a piece attempting to link McKinsey to regimes that abuse human rights. McKinsey's response appears below. Readers of this blog are probably familiar with how uneven in…
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Financial Times: White House Considered Blanket Ban on Student Visas for Chinese Nationals, partly with goal of hurting Universities (Michael Simkovic)
From the Financial Times: "White House hawks earlier this year encouraged President Donald Trump to stop providing student visas to Chinese nationals, but the proposal was shelved over concerns about its economic and diplomatic impact. . . . Stephen Miller, a White House aide who has been pivotal in developing the administration’s hardline immigration policies,…
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Testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on the “State of Intellectual Freedom in America” (Michael Simkovic)
I testified earlier today at the House Judiciary Committee on the "State of Intellectual Freedom in America." A copy of my written testimony can be seen here. My shorter oral remarks are available here. An excerpt appears below: "Disagreement between knowledgeable scientific experts and median political views often do not suggest political bias on the…
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Think tanks, CBO dramatically overestimated the direct budgetary costs of Public Service Loan Forgiveness (Michael Simkovic)
I've previously noted some of the outrageously implausible assumptions used by organizations with links to private student lenders (such as the New American Foundation, AEI, Brookings, Manhattan Institute, and Barclays) in an apparent effort to portray federal student loans as a threat to the public fisc. Such studies have been used to justify increases in federal…
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Pope Center: UNC Chapel Hill remains “a problem” for suggesting that programs to alleviate poverty might help alleviate poverty (Michael Simkovic)
When North Carolina researchers who study poverty criticized conservative law makers in North Carolina, political leaders reminded academics of the dangers of speaking out against their bosses. Republicans responded by shutting down the law school's poverty center, crippling its civil rights center, and voting for draconian cuts to UNC Chapel Hill law school's budget. North…
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Should Online Education Come with an Asterisk on Transcripts? (Michael Simkovic)
The ABA recently voted to permit a dramatic expansion of online legal education. Online education is controversial in higher education. It is even more controversial in legal education, which relies more on classroom interaction and less on lectures than most forms of higher education. Widespread perceptions that online education is lower quality than live instruction…
Porphyry of Tyre on Theology and Theurgy (Harvard University Press & Center for the Study of World Religions, 2026) Permanently…