While discussing human capital in this chapter, Wheelan writes about skills and how they matter in a developed world; what really caught my attention was when he began to talk about how little of incentive there is to attain skills if one does not live in a "skilled" area.
Wheelan ends his paragraph with the following quote, "If a nation starts out skilled, it gets more skilled. If a nation starts out unskilled, it stays unskilled."
This idea was a foreign one. It seems like common sense that people would want to continuously push themselves to become better people. But in unskilled countries, it seems to be the oppisite. Wheelan provides a great example of how a skilled worker needs other skilled workers to be successful. (The heart surgeon needs nurses etc) He then goes on to explain how there is much less of an incentive to become skilled if those around you are the same way. It shocked me that this was the case, but at the same point it makes sense. It really makes me wonder what kinds of things these unskilled people (who are very trainable) could become. Who knows, it sounds crazy, but Micheal Oher was that way, who's to say there aren't more like him?
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