Human capital could also be applied to topics beyond returns to individuals from education。
人力資本還可以被應用於個人教育回報之外的多種話題。
The idea was a powerful variable in explaining why some countries fared far better than others： to promote income growth over many years， heavy investment in schooling was necessary。
這一思想在解釋爲什麼有些國家比其他國家過得好很多時是一個強有力的變量：爲促進長年的收入增長，學校教育方面的大筆投入是必需的。
It shed light on why firms in poor countries tended to be more paternalistic， providing dormitories and canteens： they reaped immediate productivity gains from rested， well—fed workers。
它論述了爲什麼窮國的公司往往更具有家長式作風，提供了宿舍和食堂：它們從吃好睡好的工人那裏收穫了直接的生產力提高。
It informed big increases in the numbers of women studying law， finance and science since the 1950s： the automation of much household work meant that women could invest more in building their careers。
它通告了學習法律金融和科學的女性數量在上世紀50年代之後的巨大增長：大部分家務活的自動化意味着女性可以在構建職業生涯方面投入更多。
And it helped explain the shrinkage of families in wealthy countries： if increasing value is placed on human capital， parents must invest more in each child， making large families costly。
同時，它還爲解釋家庭在富裕國家中的收縮提供了幫助：如果增加值是被放在人力資本之上，父母就必須要爲每一個孩子投入更多的'錢，這使得大家庭變得成本高昂。
But any theory that attempts to explain so much is bound to encounter pushback。
但是，任何試圖解釋如此多事情的理論註定都會遇到阻力。
Many critics bristled at Becker’s market—driven logic， which seemed to reduce people to cold， calculating machines。
許多批評者對貝克爾的這種似乎是把人貶低到等同於冰冷的、會算計的機器的市場驅動邏輯感到不滿。
Although “human capital” is an unsightly term—in 2004 a panel of German linguists deemed Humankapital the most offensive word of the year—it is the task of social science to identify and refine concepts that would otherwise be fuzzy。
儘管“人力資本”是一個不雅觀的詞語——一些德國語言學者曾在2004年把Humankapital選爲年度最具冒犯性詞語——但是，認可並完善這些不然就會含義模糊的概念是社會科學的任務。
It took Becker’s framework to make the importance of education explicit， and to put people at the heart of economics。
它採用了貝克爾的框架是爲了明確教育的重要性，也是爲了把人置於經濟學的中心。
Within the discipline， some objected that Becker had overstated the importance of learning。
在學科內部，有些人反對說，貝克爾誇大了學習的重要性。
Education matters not because it imparts knowledge， critics said， but because of what it signals about the people who complete university， namely that they are disciplined and more likely to be productive workers。
批評者聲稱，教育之所以重要，不是因爲它傳授知識，而是因爲它發出的關於完成了大學學業之人的信號，即，他們受過訓練，並且更可能成爲高效的工人。
In any case， people of greater abilities are the ones who are most likely to get higher degrees in the first place。
一般說來，具有更大能力的是一開始就最有可能拿到更高學位的人。
Yet increasingly sophisticated empirical analyses has revealed that the acquisition of knowledge is in fact a big part of what it means to be a student。
然而，日益成熟的實證分析表明，知識的獲取實際上是作爲一名學生所意味的大部分。
