Some schools think that 0 of 100 is the same as 50 out of 100

So this isn't explicitly personal finance-related but education is related to future earnings so I'm writing about it even though it might be a bit of a stretch.

Basically, some schools have decided that since a 100 is an A and an 80 is a B, that an F should be a 50 -- even if the grade a student actually earned was a 0. That's so crazy that it just might be ... completely insane! The rationale, according to one principal, is "motivation and to give kids the opportunity to pass a grade."

Well that's great. But if you're going to call a 0 of out of 100 50%, you might as well dispense with the whole grading ritual and pass everyone.

Now for the economics tie-in. Policies like this that hand out high school diplomas in exchange for writing your name devalue the education -- and make it so that employers now will only hire based on a college degree. So students who 50 years ago could have gotten a job with a high school diploma now have to spend 4 years and $80 thousand to get the same job.

When we talk about making education affordable again, we should also talk about making a high school diploma meaningful again. Calling 0's 50's doesn't help.