Comment on Piketty’s Book: What if the Growth in Education is an Illusion?

I’m reading,

CAPITAL IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

Piketty, Thomas (2014-03-10). Capital in the Twenty-First Century (Kindle Locations 2-3). Harvard University Press. Kindle Edition.

It has received phenomenol reviews.  I will comment on it later.  It is important for this blog because he writes that,

“…Knowledge and skill diffusion is the key to overall productivity growth as well as the reduction of inequality both within and between countries…”    

[Italics added by me] (Kindle Location 466)

Even though I will comment later, I won’t to post this now.

In discussing past growth, Piketty writes,

“…In 1980 there was no Internet or cell phone network, most people did not travel by air, most of the advanced medical technologies in common use today did not yet exist, and only a minority attended college. In the areas of communication, transportation, health, and education , the changes have been profound…” (Kindle Location 1709).

I’m not an economist, but here is my question:  If a large amount of the growth in education is an illusion, then isn’t the money spent on it just a transfer of payments and not part of GDP, and, thus, not part of the growth in GDP?