Altucher: It Can Pay to Not Send Your Kids to College

James Altucher of Formula Capital is against going to college — or at least against paying the money to send his offspring there.

"I have two kids — what am I going to do when they're 18 years old?" Altucher asks on Tech Ticker. "Just hand them $200,000 for them to go off and have fun for four years?"

"If took that $200,000 and put it in something that yields just 5% a year, believe me, I will more than outperform the supposed spread of — you know, that will generate about $2.8 million over the course of 50 year career as opposed to the $800,000 more that a college-educated kid supposedly makes."

Altucher suggests giving young adults a fraction of money that would have gone to their college tuition — $10,000 or $20,000 — and let them start a business.

“Ninety-five percent of them will fail, he predicts. “But they'll certainly get an education — a more valuable education than spending four years blowing off classes and going to parties drinking beer or whatever."

"Teach your kid how to be motivated — how to sell a product, how to build a network of connections,” Altucher advises.

“That's going to be much more valuable than you wasting $200,000, flushing it down the toilet."

For the current academic year, the average cost of tuition and fees for private four-year colleges nationwide was $26,273, up 4.4 percent from the year before, according to the College Board, the educational organization that tracks college costs.