You could argue that but it is wrong (well, at least the education-specific bit). Mandatory education in America traces back to the culture (in general) and the enacted legislation (in particular) of the Puritan settlers of New England. The Puritans believed in universal literacy so that everyone could read scripture. They passed laws mandating child literacy and required towns to hire teachers to teach the children. This was all mandated and required by the government and in some sense that can be construed taking choice AWAY from individuals rather than giving choice to them. At the time this system and these requirements were unique in the world.
Letter of Thomas Jefferson to Joseph Cabell, September 9, 1817, reprinted in Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Memorial Edition 1904) volume 17, page 423.
Compulsory school attendance seems like a different question, and more like an implementation detail to me. At least today school attendance is not compulsory if the parents arrange for the child to be educated up to the currently mandated educational standards. (i.e. Homeschooling is legal.)
(It might be possible to do a comparative study of countries/cultures which have codified educational requirements vs. ones that don't-- comparing basic literacy rates to get some insight into this in the general case. It could be very tricky to factor out economics though. I know what I suspect the results would indicate. But I've not the time to do the study.)
Singapore is a good example in this regard. Its compulsory school attendance law is still less than two decades old.
Wide spread college attendance is really only in the 2nd half of the 20th century.
I also believe America's success came from its freedom (and perhaps more so just the idea of freedom), and the culture and attitude (optimism, can do anything attitude) that resulted from that, that made it such a successful country.
Not to mention they stole tons of technology from Europe, and didn't get ravaged in WW2.
In my opinion, what has led to the "downfall" of America, is about 10-15 years of, in my opinion, decidedly unstrategic thinking on the part of manufacturers, specifically hi tech. In many cases, the technology that took generations to develop has essentially been given to the cheap labor manufacturers (China)....this was one of America's most strategic advantages, and they no longer have it.
I do know of people that had to leave college in order to financially provide for family members, for instance an unexpected pregnancy, but that is different than the cost of college itself being a problem.
Krugman's point may not be convincing, but neither is yours that unfettered liberty is the reason that America has prospered. Krugman's inaccuracy, in my opinion, is not that America's education was a driving force in economic growth, particularly in post-war America, but rather that the federal government was a driving force in the growth of education.
The sad thing is that the arguments we have today are not all that dissimilar from the ones that were had on the local levels during the common school movement in the 19th century. Some felt that certain segments of the population were not worth being educated, which is essentially what a lot of people today are supporting with a radically inequitable system, especially for those from poorer (both monetarily and 'culturally').
OCW is a laudable example of open education, but that does little to address one of the key points that Krugman is making. Namely, that on indicators of educational success far lower than college education, we are failing so many of our students. The fact that I can read graduate level micro notes from MIT doesn't help someone who can't properly add because they were provided with poor primary education in the Bronx.
I'm a firm believer in the idea that we rise and fall by our citizens, and it is sad that so many of our citizens are provided with substandard education. To that end, whether you think that federal government does or does not have a role in the educational system, I think we can all agree that something needs to be done, or we will continue to fall behind the rest of the industrial world.
>Education made America great;
I'd argue that individual freedom led to American prosperity, and individuals' choice to partake in education was merely a consequence of a free society.
How can someone look at OpenCourseware, free textbooks, and the self-organizing study groups surrounding the former two and not conclude that education is more available than ever before? Up until WW2, going to college was an unlikely occurrence for the child of parents who had not themselves gone. Was the "American Century" really the result of upper middle class education alone? It was not until the GI bill that college became an odd expectation.
The underlying logical fallacy in Krugman's piece is that attending college is the only form of "higher" education available or even desirable. Shouldn't we instead be asking why lower socio-economic status Americans seem to have adopted an anti-learning cultural bias? Why, as Dean Kamen asks, do we not celebrate society's engineering achievements? It's thinkers? Government subsidy of education is one convenient target of many for those who think more government is the answer to all of society's ills. Never before in America has so much knowledge been available for free from the comfort of one's home (star), and yet he argues that we have some sort of education crisis.
(star) Even at minimum wage, an internet connection only costs at most a few hours labor per month. And, the computer sufficient to partake in this knowledge can probably be found at some upper-middle class curb on garbage day.