President Obama wants to be sure that the United States keeps making the investments that help the economy grow. Congressional Republicans want the government to stop wasting so much money.
Education — particularly higher education — offers a great opportunity for a compromise that would let both sides claim victory and, even more important, help the economy.
Why? Education is the single best investment a society can make. High school became universal in the United States in the early 20th century, when other countries viewed universal schooling as wasteful, which goes a long way toward explaining our economy’s 20th-century success. Likewise, the slowing increase in the number of new college graduates in the 1980s and ’90s helped contribute to the slow economic growth of the last decade. So protecting higher education from across-the-board budget cuts, as Mr. Obama is urging, makes sense.