自古典政治经济学以来,经济学中的资本主要指以物质形式体现出来的有形的物质资本。到了上个世纪50年代,教育经济学创造性地扩充了物质资本的概念,将人力资本也纳入资本范畴当中。美国经济学家沃尔什在《人力资本论》中首先提出了人力资本的概念,认为人力资本是以劳动者的质量或其技术知识、工作能力表现出来的资本。1960年舒尔茨在美国经济学年会上发表题为《人力资本投 Since classical political economy, the capital in economics mainly refers to the physical material capital embodied in material form. By the 1950s, educational economics creatively expanded the concept of material capital and included human capital in the category of capital. Walsh, the American economist, first proposed the concept of human capital in “human capital theory” and argues that human capital is the capital shown by the quality of workers or their technical knowledge and ability to work. In 1960, Schultz delivered a speech entitled “Human Capital Investment” at the annual meeting of American Economics