"You must spread some reputation around before giving it to Tokeprep again"
Student Loan Debt is Skyrocketing
- Thread starter Padawanbater2
- Start date
Meh, my degree opened up doors for me, but I only paid a grand total of $630 for it out my own pocket. Scholarships, GI Bill and Work-Study programs. Not everyone can do that, for those; pick rich parents or get ready to spend a lot of dough.
Unless you are a 3.0 or better student, I would say that university is not for you.
You bring up another key problem. People get caught up on going to the best school they get into, even when it makes no economic sense. If you get into NYU and you desperately want to go there, even though you also got into a perfectly good state school, you're probably wasting your money. Or people don't bother with state schools at all, in their quest to be elite.
Paying $40,000 a year for undergraduate education at NYU instead of $7,500 a year at a well-regarded state school is equivalent to paying $2,000 for a designer coat instead of $100 for a coat with the same or slightly inferior materials. It might look nicer and it might make you feel elite, but it probably keeps you just as warm. That $1,900 is really a wash.
And yet we have people competing to go into debt to attend these schools!
SirGreenThumb
Well-Known Member
I agree that not everyone can do it, and not a lot of people even want to do it. I go to a state school and have a 3.76 gpa and plan on keeping it that way. I also do co-op and work other related jobs to help with my "real life work experience". I get paid very well for just doing co-op and charging what I want on the side.
Yea, it's all about bragging rights I guess,and that little sticker or license plate you get to show your school pride. I try to take advantage of every opportunity to get job related experience and be the best in my field with my Associates degree and certifications. I should graduate by next spring.
Except it's not free market capitalism, it's government interventionism. The federal government is the largest underwriter of college education in the country.
BadDog40
Well-Known Member
Reagan was adamantly opposed to the idea of a 'free' education.
For those of you too young to know, back in the Sixties, California offered free tuition at all of its excellent public colleges, universities and community colleges. Many of us believed that it was simply a matter of time before we would see free college tuition nationwide.
What happened, of course, was the GOP Reagan Revolution.
At its simplest, the Reagan plan was to lower taxes on corporations and the affluent elite that run them. The mantra is that this produces smaller government starving the beast that provides free public services that the common folk need and enjoy but resent paying for.
One of the first things Reagan did after becoming governor of California in 1970 was get rid of Clark Kerr, who was then the president of the University of California system. That made it easier for Reagan to ram through his plan to abandon free tuition. Not only did that fulfill the GOP goal of shifting the burden for government services back on the consumers, but it also erodes any hope our educational system will become a meritocracy that allows the best and the brightest a chance at the brass ring of a college degree no matter how much money their family makes.
As the Back Bench notes, Reagan quickly instituted a $600 a year tuition by 1971-1972. At those rates, even the poorest kid could work his way through school or borrow enough to earn that all-important sheepskin, but it was merely the start of the tuition hikes and fees to come.
Using the wonderful online tool called Toms Inflation Calculator, we discover that tuition should only be $3,559.30 today, using the same rate. I wish.
As Barbara Ehrenreich wrote in Fear of Falling: The Inner Life of the Middle Class in 1989, education is increasingly the key to financial success. The common wisdom is that bachelors degree will add roughly $1 million to your income over a lifetime compared to a high-school diploma.
http://lansingonlinenews.com/news/snyder-echoes-the-real-reagan-legacy-cheap-talk-about-higher-ed/
abandonconflict
Well-Known Member
Handing out education funding has nothing to do with protecting property rights.
abandonconflict
Well-Known Member
Handing out usury has everything to do with capitalism.
No, it doesn't. The redistribution of property by non-market forces is not the protection of property rights in free market capitalism. Period.
desert dude
Well-Known Member
Some very silly points being made here as if they are wisdom.
College in California used to be "free"! Nothing is free. Never was and never will be. Look at California now.
College should be "free". Free things have no value, that's why they are free. If a college education has value then it should cost something. A degree in victim studies will get you bragging rights at an OWS stink fest and not much more.
The root cause of skyrocketing student loan debt is that the government inflated the bubble with tax payer's money. "Kids" are taught to believe that college is just another experience that they are entitled to. With unlimited funding provided by government guaranteed student loans, "colleges" arose like cockroaches from the woodwork to suck up all that "free" money. Kids major in all kinds of fields that have no value to the economy, hence they can't find a job. It is a hard lesson to learn.
Poor kids, by and large, cannot afford college. I couldn't. I joined the army and took my chances during the Vietnam conflict. I lived through it and went to college on the GI bill. I majored in Chemistry, Math, and Computer Science. I got a job after college because companies need those kinds of skills.
Stamp your feet and demand "free" stuff all you want. Most of us will look at you just as we do the two year old throwing a tantrum in the grocery store when mom says, "no, you can't have the candy bar". The worst scenario for society is that pandering politicians will yield to your demands for their own craven reasons. When they make it "free", whatever "it" is, you can be sure that it is worth every penny you paid for it.
College in California used to be "free"! Nothing is free. Never was and never will be. Look at California now.
College should be "free". Free things have no value, that's why they are free. If a college education has value then it should cost something. A degree in victim studies will get you bragging rights at an OWS stink fest and not much more.
The root cause of skyrocketing student loan debt is that the government inflated the bubble with tax payer's money. "Kids" are taught to believe that college is just another experience that they are entitled to. With unlimited funding provided by government guaranteed student loans, "colleges" arose like cockroaches from the woodwork to suck up all that "free" money. Kids major in all kinds of fields that have no value to the economy, hence they can't find a job. It is a hard lesson to learn.
Poor kids, by and large, cannot afford college. I couldn't. I joined the army and took my chances during the Vietnam conflict. I lived through it and went to college on the GI bill. I majored in Chemistry, Math, and Computer Science. I got a job after college because companies need those kinds of skills.
Stamp your feet and demand "free" stuff all you want. Most of us will look at you just as we do the two year old throwing a tantrum in the grocery store when mom says, "no, you can't have the candy bar". The worst scenario for society is that pandering politicians will yield to your demands for their own craven reasons. When they make it "free", whatever "it" is, you can be sure that it is worth every penny you paid for it.
Padawanbater2
Well-Known Member
I'm interested in hearing what you think might be a valid solution to this problem. But please, try to consider all the variables. What would you suggest to thousands of young adults exiting high school in 2013?
I remember being in high school and my biology teacher telling me college is the only way to make it in life, you have to go to college, you can't afford it isn't an excuse, etc.. Pretty much my entire high school career teachers and administrators were pushing the idea of college, on the one hand it's understandable as most of them grew up in that age with that same kind of mindset, they just didn't realize or take into account that the times are always changing and their experiences could be different from kids growing up a generation or two after them, which has turned out to be the case..
I read a statistic that kind of made sense, something like 2/3 of the people going to college in the US shouldn't be there, (this might have been an opinion on some forum, I can't remember, good point none the less..), if you're not a 3.5GPA student or above it's pretty much pointless. I think the guy was essentially saying college is an institution designed for America's elite, managers, bosses, people of authority, not your average Joe's. Since there's been a couple generations of people growing up sold on the idea that a college education is the only way to a successful life, businesses can require it for a job that normally wouldn't require it as a prerequisite to employment and justify it with the supply of candidates. It's a catch 22 and a vicious cycle.
Should most Americans go to trade schools? Should high schools realistically inform students on an individual basis where they think they should go and why? I'm absolutely sure something like that would be seen as politically incorrect in our society..
Sorry for the rambling post..
desert dude
Well-Known Member
First, you have to want to go to college. It's not a four year party unless you are rich and the outcome doesn't matter. If dad is willing to foot the bill for four years of debauchery, then go ahead and milk him for the foolish cow he is.
Second, you need to look at it as an investment, so it needs to pay off at the end. You need to come out of that four year course with a marketable skill. Don't be foolish enough to borrow $100K for a degree in theater. Nobody needs me to point out the worthless degrees, you all know what they are.
As far as government's involvement, a good first step would be a strict quota based on field of study: If the US needs 200,000 engineers then the government should offer loan gaurantees to 200,000 students who major in engineering, and maybe offer 200 slots for all of the useless stuff. Like most things that are completely screwed up, government's involvement in education is at the root of the student loan crisis.
If you REALLY want to go to college and you are poor, then join the military and pay your dues. The GI bill put you through college.
I think trade schools are a good thing. A lot of college grads would be better as plumbers, electricians, etc.
Wavels
Well-Known Member
Therein lies the crux of this matter.
I have a hunch we would be better of without SLMA---Salliemae.
How could things possibly be worse....the cost of tuition is skyrocketing, largely as a result of this misguided Government meddling.
Unintended consequences can be a real bummer.
ASMALLVOICE
Well-Known Member
In the last 10 years, we have employed a large number of college "interns" to assist us in the summer. I am completely at a loss as to why there are so many, going into debt for an occupation that will only bring instant struggle as soon as they are thrown into the job market. The costs of obtaining thses degrees are so distant from the potential they encompass that the student will more than likely never get the damn thing paid off.
Piss on degrees and get liscensed in a few crafts, hell, I have never been without work. I see thousands, with a degree, starving to death daily and they just keep driving down the same &(%&^% road expecting different results, madness in the least.
I cannot count how many jobs in the field I have chosen that have been posted into my e-mail this week alone. From coast to coast, any state I choose. Yet idiots still sit there and would rather starve to death than break a sweat, I say let em. Work is out there, just have to ditch that "pussy" mentality and go to work.
Peace
Asmallvoice
Piss on degrees and get liscensed in a few crafts, hell, I have never been without work. I see thousands, with a degree, starving to death daily and they just keep driving down the same &(%&^% road expecting different results, madness in the least.
I cannot count how many jobs in the field I have chosen that have been posted into my e-mail this week alone. From coast to coast, any state I choose. Yet idiots still sit there and would rather starve to death than break a sweat, I say let em. Work is out there, just have to ditch that "pussy" mentality and go to work.
Peace
Asmallvoice
ginwilly
Well-Known Member
I'm hoping against hope you understand this
Without the State, all trade would be free trade. Free trade is what capitalism is based on. What you seem to understand as capitalism is actually cronyism.
In an anarchist society free trade would be the only method of commerce unless you count theft. But since you can't own anything in your world, there is no such thing as theft, so free trade it is.
So if you agree with free trade as the best option but think capitalism is the evil that is destroying the world, then feel free to off yourself, it would be easier on the rest of us.
Or we could post quotes of Chomsky, that works too.
SlaveNoMore
Active Member
I think trade schools are highly underrated. In two years of hands on education you can come out making decent money. I was hired before I graduated welding school making 19/hr. Nursing, welding, mechanics,hvac are all areas that are always in demand.
I also agree that there are a lot of people in college that would be better off being plumbers or electricians and I don't mean that in a derogatory way. You can never go wrong with trade school except that it's hard work.
UncleBuck
Well-Known Member
without the state, monopolies crop up, then you're really fucked.
your stupid reagan sound byte world is an illusion.