Derek Lowe mentions dimethyl mercury as the first substance that's not worth the risk:

https://www.chemistryworld.com/opinion/a-risk-not-worth-taki...

His "Things I Won't Work With" series on Science (https://www.science.org/topic/blog-category/things-i-wont-wo...) is fun to read. The link in the article itself now unfortunately just points to the science.org homepage so you have to do some clicking around to get to this blog series.

From the link:

> One problem with this subject is that it tends to lead to bragging contests about who has run the most hazardous reactions. But think about it: if these reactions have all been run for good reasons with the best protective equipment there is less to brag about. And if they haven’t, then the discussion turns into figuring out who has been the biggest fool

I suspect the answer is "bragging rights" in this case.

This was my first thought.-

(Well, the poor woman, then, this article ...)

Fans of this series - and folks who are generally in this post's comments - are likely to enjoy Larry Niven's short story "A Tall Tail": https://reactormag.com/a-tall-tail/

some will be unfriendly or hostile towards the safety-conservative.

Usually the managers of the people that could be affected.

Perhaps education has an intrinsic value to society that does not need to be measured?

For instance: developing citizens who demonstrate critical thinking, responsibility, organization, independence, collaboration, initiative and self-regulation.

Not all of these are easily measurable, but all contribute to a prosperous and free society.

Yet every non-uni worker seems to develop those skills without going to university.

It would be interesting to measure. Critical thinking in particular doesn't seem to be taught.

I personally believe none of those skills were taught during my own engineering degree. For me it was a lot of simple regurgitation against closed ended test questions. In hindsight mostly a fucking waste of time: a piece of paper to get a job.