Comments on: Investment Bankers Get Outsourced

By: Chris Lindgren

Chris Lindgren — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 03:14:28 +0000

Our advantage(United States of America) lies in freedom which is being attacked from two angles. More government here and less governement elsewhere. If education revolved around children understanding that seperation of economics and state is as important as seperation of Church and state we would maintain our advantage long into the future.

By: Rob

Rob — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 22:37:08 +0000

Laurence,
I think education is a double-edged sword. While it helps to be exposed to new ideas and thought frameworks, it can just as easily cause you to build a little box that you never leave.

I remember my first electrical engineering class when I learned to do binary math. It blew my mind to think that math didn’t have to be base 10. I had never thought that 1000 could be eight instead of one thousand. All the decimal mathematics I had been taught had made me believe it was the only way to do it.

By: laurence haughton

laurence haughton — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 19:33:32 +0000

And yet one of the great innovators Charles Kettering said: “An inventor is simply a person who doesn’t take his education too seriously.”

Maybe that’s the strength of our system, we don’t take our coursework and professors too seriously. Rob could the same thing be said about business innovators and their MBA education?

By: Rob

Rob — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 19:01:34 +0000

David,
Let me rephrase that. It doesn’t lie in education because our school system isn’t the best in the world. However, we have the capability for it. The infrastructure is in place, and our graduate schools lead the world in some categories.

By: David Foster

David Foster — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 18:15:10 +0000

Rob, why does our advantage lie in education? This is a statement that’s made fairly often, but I’ve never seen it really justified. Is there something about the US that gives us a sustainable competitive advantage in education? I would think one could argue exactly the opposite, given the slow-motion catastrophe in K-12 education. But even absent this, why would schools in Poughkeepsie be naturally superior to schools in Mumbai?

I *do* think we have a competitive advantage in a climate which is positive toward business entrepreneurship, but this is something different.