Originally posted by: destroytheweak


Thanks for providing the source to your statistic that you pulled out of your ass in order to make your argument.

I was wrong in saying that government used to not be involved in the college education system. I was in a rush and was typing on my phone. State's have been involved in funding their universities for a while now. I meant the "federal governments" involvement in the college education system.

for you to facepalm truly shows your lack of knowledge in the subject so you mine as well lock yourself out of this thread since your mental capacity can't handle a rational discussion. If it could you would respond with more then a picture, since I was honestly interested in where that 80% cut came from. for you to not even respond not only proves how ignorant you are, but how you try to spit shit out and back it up with numbers that you could easily make up. If you're facepalming over the fact that government involvement does not raise prices MOST of the time you should probably exit not only this thread, but also any economic discussions in this forum.

then again, the federal government's largest involvement in higher education, after ww2 with the g.i. bill in the 1940's-50's, which more than doubled enrollment well beyond the capacity of existing institutions, was a phenomenal success and helped birth what is still regarded as one of america's most prosperous periods.

historian ed humes has said of it,

"The scientists and engineers and teachers and thinkers who brought in the information age, who took us to the moon, who waged the cold war, you name it - all those men and women were educated through the GI Bill." click here for link

no one said it would cost nothing, just that the return on the investment would make it well worthwhile. as a student of economics you should be familiar with the idea that failing to make capital investment when needed is an inexcusable failure. as china, india, brazil and other ascendant countries begin to outlap us in per capita productivity, skill levels, literacy, etc., although not even coming close to the countries like germany that already have, the question really comes down to whether the hegemony based on a strategy of short term, military brute force that we now enjoy is more cost efficient and sustainable than one based on the long term development of things like skill level and, well, actual merit. the answer may be revealed in your lifetime, and to quote dr. zaius,

"You may not like what you find."

The big question as far as education costs and government involvement... as with infrastructure is are we going to invest for long-term gains on things we know for a fact bring those gains, or are we going to quibble over the short term debt involved or are we going to act like responsible adults with some forethought and long-term goals for this nation and our children and their children and their children.

This was one of my big problems with Bush and with the idea that he would be "America's CEO".. I mean, nevermind the way actual CEOs have behaved over the last 40 years. Bush said at his re-election that he had gained a good amount of political capital and now he was going to SPEND it... not invest it... the Harvard MBA "CEO of America" was going to SPEND his capital. That, sadly was actually a good description of his administration... and his business career. Short term gains that benefit him and his friends and investors, but in the end tank the business itself, which in his business career was always bailed out by people who were either friends with Daddy or wanted to be associated with Daddy's name.. which W.orthless conveniently shared. That is how our nation was run at the highest level for nearly a decade... now we need actual investment to solve our actual problems and keep this a first world nation.. a fucking SOLVENT first world nation... and letting our infrastructure or education levels plummet because of fear of debt is not the way to do it... thats the way to bail out an only slightly wet ship by dumping bucket after bucket of water INTO it.

it's already too late for this generation. this recession could have been a crisis turned into an opportunity if college had been completely subsidized. More people would have stayed in or gone back to school which would have taken the unemployment number down a few points, and when we emerged on the other side of it in a few years and companies started hiring again, we'd have had people who were better trained for the jobs. instead, we've had a national time-out twiddling our thumbs, and when this recession is over, those jobs will be filled either by less qualified workers here, or by more qualified workers in other countries or from other countries.
america has its head up its ass on this one.

Originally posted by: Jason Voorheees

it's already too late for this generation. this recession could have been a crisis turned into an opportunity if college had been completely subsidized. more people would have stayed in or gone back to school which would have taken the unemployment number down a few points, and when we emerged on the other side of it in a few years and companies started hiring again, we'd have had people who were better trained for the jobs. instead, we've had a national time-out twiddling our thumbs, and when it's over those jobs will be filled either by less qualified workers here, or more qualified workers in or from other countries.
america has its head up its ass on this one.

Part of the problem with higher education right now is the disconnect between what students want (job training) and what college is still 'for' (rightly or wrongly, it is emphatically not job training). I would hazard a guess that nothing could have been done over a few years to avert this fuck up.

Truth

to some extent that is true, but you may be overestimating the literacy and basic skills of the general populace outside urban areas in this country [or just outside the ring of enfranchisement within them, in ghettos]. the point is that in 99% of cases, going to college -for anything- will still make you more useful to a prospective employer than dropping out of high school, doing meth and making babies.

but you're right, there should be more door-to-desk type programs that give you all the foundational coursework you need to be literate and educated AND the final finishing skills that will make you qualified for employment the day you graduate. but even if we just made free the programs we know there is a growing deficit in and that have a huge and obvious social benefit, say training nurses and math and science teachers, we'd have a huge leg up in the game.

Vocational/technical paths are definitely key elements to renewed prosperity. I wonder, and here I have very little to go on, whether our economy can function at high levels as a knowledge and service economy without a manufacturing base as well?

historically, and you would probably know better than me, that type of economy has been possible only for much more lightweight nations and municipalities like antwerp and genoa, the financiers of empire, but the u.s. is probably too big and heavy to be carried solely by that kind of economy. even the dutch made their own butter, and still had time to address social services, and that was centuries ago.

i guess by door-to-desk i didn't mean solely desk jobs, so add door-to-line, counter, workbench, etc. to the list.

i just wouldn't write off the value of a freshman year of core curriculum for even people that wind up going into trades and manufacturing either. even an assembly line worker or an auto mechanic benefits from having reviewed basic math skills in college, and even a worker in a meat processing plant benefits from understanding basic college-level biology, especially with regard to contamination and contagion. and we all benefit from them having this knowledge: i want the people making my food to not just be told by their foreman or training manual not to wipe their ass with their bare hands, i want THEM to know why this is a bad idea.

even if you gave them classes on the subject or trained them why that is a bad idea it does not mean they would care

Originally posted by: sidney

even if you gave them classes on the subject or trained them why that is a bad idea it does not mean they would care

.


actually, i bet survey research would show that they would be more likely to care when compared to people without such knowledge - maybe not 100% of the time, maybe like 85% of the time, but even that would make it worthwhile. not really looking for miracles, just improvement.

Originally posted by: Jason Voorheees
historically, and you would probably know better than me, that type of economy has been possible only for much more lightweight nations and municipalities like antwerp and genoa, the financiers of empire, but the u.s. is probably too big and heavy to be carried solely by that kind of economy. even the dutch made their own butter, and still had time to address social services, and that was centuries ago.

That's what worries me - we will always need the base, but we don't value the work or the workers, and the American standard narrative of reaching the middle class eschews labor as a hell to escape rather than a stable job to aspire for. We've even begun outsourcing skilled knowledge-economy jobs (for example, when I get final proofs back for a journal article now they come from India as often as NYC, Boston, or Oxford!)

Destroying jobs from both sides of the economy feels a lot like slow suicide.

Originally posted by: Jason Voorheees

Originally posted by: sidney

even if you gave them classes on the subject or trained them why that is a bad idea it does not mean they would care

actually, i bet survey research would show that they would be more likely to care when compared to people without such knowledge - maybe not 100% of the time, maybe like 85% of the time, but even that would make it worthwhile. not really looking for miracles, just improvement.

well I wouldn't disagree with that

The idea that students don't need any "extraneous" classes outside of their major or that don't teach them actual job skills relies on the idea that all students not only know what they want to do already, but that they will want to stick with it through college, and will even want to stick with it after college as well. There are a lot of jobs out there that require more than one fixed set of skills, many that require often bizarre sets of unrelated skills. There is value in general education.