Sunday, May 18, 2014

Can education help you get out of poverty?

For many years, we hear our parents talk about how we should study hard so that we will be able to graduate and get a good paying job.

Most of the people I know are spending a lot of money on education, be it on school fees or tuition fees even though their family household income might be below average. The kids start having private tuition as young as pre school in recent times.

I've seen a few parents who held two jobs just so that they can send their kids to a good school or hire private tuition for their kids. They strongly believe that having a good education will help their kids break free from the poverty or rat race. Part of them also want their kids to beat other kids in school so that they can be proud of them (sometimes u wondered if doing well in school is really for the benefit of the kids or the parents).

Source: 9gag. The rat race 

I believe that education can help one gain deeper insights and make decisions (especially political decisions which impact the whole country. Look at what happened to some of our neighboring countries). It might or might not help you break free from poverty or rat race depending on how you make use of what you have learnt as well as many other factors such as your EQ, your ability to make people like you at the workplace, opportunities that you have, degree of risk aversion, your ability to have vision etc etc

Even though education is not the only factor, it is probably undeniably the key to many things such as:
1. Interview with a good company
2. Knowing kids who come from rich and influential family (this is why some parents sent their kids to branded school)
3. Human capital
4. Not let other people look down upon them
5. Self confidence
6. Productivity
Etc

It is easier for Singaporeans to break free from poverty than people in places such as India where caste system is still pretty prevalent. With strong support and resources from the government on education, it is definitely one of the key means to breaking away from poverty.

What do you think?

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