Dear friends and readers,
This morning, my latest article for the New York Times Magazine was published online. It’s titled Saying No to College, and it will be the cover story in next weekend’s print magazine. I hope you’ll give it a read.
The article started as a quest for an explanation to a puzzle. A few years ago, public opinion about higher education in the United States suddenly began to decline sharply. I wanted to understand why.
I’ve been writing about colleges and college students for almost a decade now. My first article on the subject, Who Gets to Graduate?, appeared in the Times Magazine in 2014, and my book about higher ed, now titled The Inequality Machine, was published in 2019. As I talked to people both inside and outside of higher education, it became clear to me that Americans were growing more disheartened and pessimistic about the value of college.
For this new article, I set out to find what was behind this sudden shift. My reporting led me to some new economic research that turned on its head a lot of what I’d always been told about the financial benefits of college. There’s also a political dimension to this question; more than ever, Americans’ feelings about college are determined by their partisan leanings. (The reverse may also be true.)
Working on this story was an enlightening experience for me as a reporter. I hope you enjoy the result.
Some Newsletter Housekeeping
This newsletter marks a shift in technology for me, as I’ve migrated my mailing list from Mailchimp to Substack. That behind-the-scenes switch shouldn’t have much of an effect on you as readers, though you may notice some cosmetic changes in the way these updates look. (If you encounter any glitches, please let me know!)
As a reader, I’ve become a fan of Substack over the past couple of years, and I find I am consuming more and more of my news and information through its newsletters. I thought I should give the platform a try as a producer of words as well.
After a bit of a pandemic hiatus from magazine writing, I’m planning to do a lot more in the months ahead, and I’m hoping to use this newsletter as a way to keep readers up to date on what I’m learning and what I’m publishing. I hope you’ll stay subscribed, and I hope you’ll let me know what you think. If there’s anyone else you think might appreciate these updates, please feel free to pass on this email. Thank you, as always, for your interest and your support.
Yours truly,
Paul Tough