The Return to Human Capital

Today's Washington Post reports:

How much is a bachelor's degree worth? About $23,000 a year, the government said in a report released Thursday.

That is the average gap in earnings between adults with bachelor's degrees and those with high school diplomas, according to data from the Census Bureau. College graduates made an average of $51,554 in 2004, the most recent figures available, compared with $28,645 for adults with a high school diploma....

The income gap narrowed slightly from five years earlier, when college graduates made nearly twice as much as high school graduates.

The last sentence caught my eye. It appears that the return to human capital, which increased so much over the past three decades, is now leveling off.