Education Quote by Rutger Bregman
““As illusions go, this one is pretty stubborn. When you’re obsessed with efficiency and productivity, it’s difficult to see the real value of education and care. Which is why so many politicians and taxpayers alike see only costs. They don’t realize that the richer a country becomes the more it should be spending on teachers and doctors. Instead of regarding these increases as a blessing, they’re viewed as a disease. Yet unless we prefer to run our schools and hospitals as if they were factories, we can be certain that, in the race against the machine, the costs of healthcare and education will only go up. At the same time, products like refrigerators and cars have become too cheap. To look solely at the price of a product is to ignore a large share of the costs. In fact, a British think tank estimated that for every pound earned by advertising executives, they destroy an equivalent of £7 in the form of stress, overconsumption, pollution, and debt; conversely, each pound paid to a trash collector creates an equivalent of £12 in terms of health and sustainability.””
About This Quote
Source Book: Humankind: A Hopeful History, 2019
Society often undervalues education and healthcare, treating necessary spending as a burden rather than an investment, especially as efficiency becomes a cultural obsession.
In simple terms: Education and health are seen as costs, not investments.
Invest more in teachers and doctors as wealth grows.
Themes
Mood
Type
When to use this quote
- government budgeting
- public health planning
- school administration
- urban development
- environmental policy
Key Concepts
Questions to Reflect On
- How can we reframe public spending as an investment?
- What policies can reveal hidden costs of cheap goods?
Focusing solely on short‑term efficiency can ignore long‑term societal benefits and hidden costs.