What the movie ‘Parasite’ tells us about HE and inequality

This year’s Academy Award for Best Picture went to Parasite, a South Korean film that touched on themes of inequality and class conflict. One character forges a credential ‘proving’ his enrolment in a university in order to land a job as a tutor. The plot point underscores the idea that in South Korea and the rest of the developed world, a college education is the only way to get ahead, writes Preston Cooper for Forbes.

This view is so prevalent in South Korea that the country has taken its obsession with higher education too far. Seventy per cent of young Koreans have a college credential, the highest share in the developed world. In the United States, 49% have a higher degree – lower than Korea, but still above the rich-world average. With so many students pursuing college, the value of university degrees has, unsurprisingly, plummeted and there is intense competition among students to get into a top-ranked university, where the earnings pay-off is greater. To that end, most Korean families pay out of pocket for expensive tutoring to help their children perform well on the state college entrance exam. Private tutoring can start from the age of two years old, and is commonplace by the age of five.

It’s a race to nowhere. Korea, and to a lesser extent the US, spend hefty portions of national income on education that does not cultivate the skills workers need to move the economy forward. Korean businesses complain that college students don’t graduate with the skills they need to be successful in the workplace.
Full report on the Forbes site