There is a spectacularly silly story on the BBC today. 
 
It “reveals” that students who take out student loans will end up paying back more than they borrow. So does anybody taking out any loan at more than 0 per cent interest. What a discovery! Don’t any BBC journalists have mortgages?
 
The story measures repayments in cash and not real terms, which is economically illiterate. It adds up the repayments graduates will make over a 30-year period, during which - with the best will in the world - inflation will have made mincemeat of the value of today’s money.
 
“Taking cash figures and looking 30 years ahead is rather an odd way of doing it” universities minister David Willetts told BBC Breakfast. Odd? I’d have found a stronger word.
 
The figures were produced by “leading accountants”, the BBC said. Apparently more than one firm was consulted. But nobody involved seems to have consulted their common sense.