The Next Bubble to Burst: Higher Education?
by PubliusFrom Glenn Reynolds’ latest column in today’s Washington Examiner:
Right now, people are still borrowing heavily to pay the steadily increasing tuitions levied by higher education. But that borrowing is based on the expectation that students will earn enough to pay off their loans with a portion of the extra income their educations generate. Once people doubt that, the bubble will burst.
So my advice to students faced with choosing colleges (and graduate schools, and law schools) this coming year is simple: Don’t go to colleges or schools that will require you to borrow a lot of money to attend. There’s a good chance you’ll find yourself deep in debt to no purpose. And maybe you should rethink college entirely.
Many people with college educations are already jumping the tracks to become skilled manual laborers: plumbers, electricians, and the like. And the Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that seven of the ten fastest-growing jobs in the next decade will be based on on-the-job training rather than higher education. (And they’ll be hands-on jobs hard to outsource to foreigners). If this is right, a bursting of the bubble is growing likelier.
What about higher education folks? What should they (er, we?) do? Well, once again, what can’t go on forever, won’t.
For the past several decades, colleges and universities have built endowments, played moneyball-style faculty hiring games, and constructed grand new buildings, while jacking up tuitions to pay for things (and, in the case of state schools, to make up for gradually diminishing public support).
That has been made possible by an ocean of money borrowed by students — often with the encouragement and assistance of the universities. Business plans that are based on this continuing are likely to fare poorly.
Just as I advised students not to go into debt, my advice to universities is similar: Don’t go on spending binges now that you expect to pay for with tuition revenues later. Those may not be there as expected.
Read the whole thing here.
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243 Comments
There are a lot of people who should not be going to college. Many of them are studying education.
Keep a foot in both worlds. Get some formal education if you can afford it but learn to produce a good or service. Only the talented and motivated can survive in the coming storms.
Obama's message in 2012 will cover this problem with a message that parents of young voters and young voters will love.; Go to college, get an education and then work for the government to receive a lower interest rate or a big chunk of the loan forgiven. The government took over the student loan industry in the health care plan.
Now that Obama has toaken over the Student loan industry will it be any surprise when the govt. starts to selectively forgive loans for students in particular fields?
Union influence in our governement and the existence of public employee unions is destroying our economy and the representative process of our governemnt.
When schools and professional disciplines are dictated by executive fiat (eg: providing loans to students of a particular school or field of study) will skew the outcome of who gets to advance in our society.
the polititization of our educational system as an evil harbinger of things to come.
UNIONS FOR ALL – FREEDOM FOR NONE
No, it won't "go on forever". I'll give you an example of why it won't, especially when you combine higher education with the California fiasco. One daughter works in the CSU system. They have faced furloughs, people leaving and not being rehired, etc. Now she and a co-worker do the job of about 5 people. Does the supervisor of the office pick up the slack? NO! The higher placed bureaucrats do as little as possible and retain their positions, moving up the chain. The students of course, forget that their tuition is subsidized by the taxpayers. Now multiply that all over our nation and see the mess of higher education.
What Mr. Reynolds alluded to in the beginning of his article, that college grads are becoming skilled laborers, has been going on for several decades, at least where I dropped out of college. I'm a self-employed contractor and I can't tell you how many other contractors I know who also ditched their college education to go into the labor force. Some were drop outs like me, but quite a few attained their degrees. I'm not sure if it was the time period…late 70's and the disaster of the Carter administration or if it was the angst of having to "do the nine to five" that moved so many grads towards the skilled labor trades. It also could have been the area. Once people have lived here for a short length of time, they fall in love with the laid back life style and slow pace. I'm talking about the mountains of Western North Carolina west of Ashville.
Mike
I am one of those teachers…and I will be in debt to Sallie Mae until the day I die…I did not understand money…I do now and I teach my students NO LOANS….go into the TRADES….college should be for those who really want it, not for those who think it is what they should do next.
While I am all for making a profit, someone really needs to ask why, for the last 2 decades, the cost of college tuition has consistently increased at 3 to 4 times the rate of inflation. Somehow I don't think I will be seeing the Congress grill university presidents in much the same way that they interrogated oil and finance company executives for their profits.
I'm no economist, but I wonder if the same principle that is driving health care costs up might also be driving the cost of higher education up.
The agenda of indoctrination, a top priority of progressivism, of our youth will be continued and the use of tax payer dollars to fund that agenda will not go away. They will all be unionized government employees and the rest of us will be paying off the loans.
if the college bubble bursts, how long before it is blamed on bush? besides, there will only be one type of employment gubmint work, union gubmint work. do they have degrees in union gubmint work? i need to git me one of those gubmint degrees.
It would be instructive to review the tuition history of Hillsdale College. They except no federal aid, and consequently are not subject to abominations like Title IX. Since they don't do business with the education equivalent of Fannie Mae, they'd be a good control group to check against.
When the bubbles burst, at least a person could actually live in a foreclosed home. But there's no living with the over-priced elitists who got so little for their money, and want so desperately to share their intellectual penury with the rest of us. By force.
We really need to get ourselves away from the mentality that only people who go to college can have successful careers. If everyone has a college degree, then what is the degree really worth?
There is more than enough good money to be made by a skilled tradesman. Finding a decent lawyer is easy these days. Finding a decent carpenter, electrician, or mason–now that's challenging!
College has become a joke unless you are in the hard sciences. Over the decades college degrees have been dumbed-down money makers for college administrators who clearly understood that most of their garbage degrees have little merit in the workplace. Our present economic "recession" whose real stats are more like a worsening depression is proving that. A real job in Women or Black Studies anyone? I think not.
It astounds me in my field, psychiatry, how many young college graduates with social work degrees, out to save the world of course, have no critical thinking skills, how narrow their knowledge base is and how poorly they put narratives to paper. My advice to many young people is find a good trade and build a small business off of it. Reading good literature and perfecting your fine art skills informally is a collateral thing that should be a life long habit.
One great way to minimize the cost of education is to work part time(if you can find a job) and go to school part time. Trust me that it is difficult; but the personal satisfaction and potential reward far outweighs the blood, sweat, and tears you put into the effort. Also look for jobs where the employer will help with college expense. There used to be quite a few. Now, not so sure.
I'm kind of hoping it does burst. Kids don't seem to to want to accept the infection of socialism at "higher education".
Weeding out the ideological slums and focusing on education-focused institutions needs to begin and it won't without a "kickstart".
The colleges know they can increase rates by about the amount the government increases assistance.
It's a ponzi scheme.
The health care issue is more complex, but in the end the fault of government regulations also.
Everything the government touches turns to crap, Socialist Insecurity, Medi-raid, Medi-Scare and Amtrak are great examples of what happens when government gets hold of your money. The eventual collapse of collegiate finance and the student loan system will of course create even more radical leftists hell bent for destruction at dear leader's command. Get the government out of the business of running business and get them out of the business of "managing" i.e. destroying lives.
Can we get an AMEN! here?
Don't worry about funding for college. Just join a Head Start program like we have in Illinois… (Cancel that, the program is broke due to government mis-management!)
Students are less inclined to be radical if they have to work to feed, cloth, and house themselves. It's the student who is entirely supported by govt, parents, etc who has the time to waste in mindless pursuit of antisocial ideology.
Colleges are just like any subsidized entity, ag, oil, Amtrak, it doesn't matter what they charge as long as people can afford to finance it. The quickest way to reduce tuition is for everyone to say FO! and not go. Universities and private schools will not let their facilities sit empty. As long as the students (parents) are willing to afford the financing it will only get worse. Just a little more won't break us, unless taxes go up, or someone loses their job, or junior can't find a job in his "field". Life isn't fair, get used to it, or just be better than the next guy and not so dam picky about how you make your money.
Agreed! Typically the first two years of any 4 yr degree is only a re-hashing of what these students should have learned in high school. Liberal arts is a four year degree that qualifies and trains you for nothing in particular. I would be hugely in favor of granting four year degrees by providing a competancy test to avoid the first two years of -re-educating stundents and getting them right into their field of education quicker and less expensively.
The downside is the intended violent rioting by the ignorantly outraged spoiled brat "students" that would most assuredly ensue in the wake of a higher ed finance failure.
I seem to recall a little revolt that started on October 25, 1917 in the same way…
Higher Education, eh?
The bar gets lowered every year, and standards slip; yet the cost of tuition continues to escalate. It is a contradiction. Personally, I have watched this first hand, personally. Someone close to me is attending one of what is purported to be one of the best law schools in the country; ranked within the top ten. Cost of a degree? It'll top 250k.
What are they teaching?
Hate corporate America and capitalism is wrong.
Makes me some mad, I'm not fit to be around when the topic comes up.
Agreed. My point is that there are many people who enter college, seeking a degree in education, who just don't have the aptitude for college, period, much less being responsible for molding young minds filled with mush.
I can't tell you the number of times I've been part of, or overheard, conversations with people who are clearly disorganized in their thought processes, if not simply of low intelligence, who are seeking education degrees. I also have heard of many examples of students abandoning their original major, because it's too taxing, in favor of education.
I wish I could find the quote. A university of note was celebrating the career of its retiring dean. The dean, in a supremely candid moment, was heard by many to say he was proud of every college at the university, save one. He said the college of education was an embarrassment, which should be drowned like a bag of cats.
Lest I get on the bad side of any good teachers here, let me be clear. I have the highest respect for the profession. At one time, I thought I'd go the way of the teacher featured in the movie Stand and Deliver (which, incidentally, galvanized my place as a fan of Edward James Olmos for all time). The movie doesn't tell the rest of the story, though; of how his peers (yeah, right) and teachers union fought his every effort to raise standards in the school, and how he finally left in frustration.
Never mind the fact, that without an "education degree," I'm not qualified to teach at the primary level. Never mind that my education and experience prepare me to teach calculus, physics, computer science, and electronics shop.
The "perpetual" students aka "perpetual" children, unfortunately that has become about 50% percent of them.
To save money, go to a Community College first and take all of your gen ed classes to get them out of the way. Then transfer to the college you wish to get your degree with.
I should have done this to save money. I dropped out my Junior year (I'm still kicking myself over this) because I was already $13,000 in debt which took me 10 years to pay off. You can not bankrupt a student loan. Only the government is allowed to bankrupt programs like SS but not you!!
Since I home school, I am able to have my 8th grader take 2 high school credits this coming year. She has the option of graduating early if she works at it and going to the Community College right up the street.
My son is currently enjoying being a big rig driver. Although driving nationally, he is spending most of his time in Texas which he says is booming compared to the other places he goes.
The funny thing is that it came out last week that Texas is the least (college) educated state. I expect the most educated state is in the north east where banking , wall street and others had to be bailed out.
So it looks like higher education doesn't = high achievement or education doesn't =smart
One thing I always wondered about higher education, if they were so smart and education was so necessary. Then why can't they figure out how to be self supporting?
If you go to college and don't study science, math, engineering or something technical forget about it. Your liberal arts degree will only get you a job at McDonalds. A lot of Americans are lazy! Always going for the easy degrees with inflated costs. If you get an engineering degree the chances of you paying off a 100K loan is better than getting a sociology degree.
Higher Education makes me think of a bunch of scams that Colleges & politicians have used to rip-off America for years. They are un-just and need to be CHANGED:
1- Student Visa programs which expire and no one monitors them
2- Student quotas giving unfair priority
3- Liberal Professors going un-monitored with their Progressive Idealogy inside classrooms with no cc TV to watch them while we pay the Tuition for them to turn our children into socialists.
etc. So much injustice they have gotten away with for years. We're aware now. Hope to see positive changes.
The cost of a college education was a perennial minor problem – until the enlightened scions of government decided it was all so UNFAIR!!! to minorities and the disadvantaged, so they came up with Basic Educational Opportunity Grants… and that wasn't quite enough to meet the demand. Next came the Supplemental Education Opportunity Grants and, lo and behold! They weren't sufficient to do the job, either. Then they added Federal Work-Study, federal Direct Student Loans and federally guaranteed and subsidized private loans… and higher education got that… much… more… expensive. OK, they said, so let's try tuition tax deductions, HOPE Tax Credits and student-loan tax deductibility! That oughta lick the problem, once and for all! Except for one inconvenient truth: The tax incentives have done nothing of the sort. A college education is no more affordable now than it was 40-plus years ago, when all of this started.
By now, discerning readers will have detected a pattern: When government throws ever more money at a "problem," the beneficiaries will do everything they can to capture every last marginal dollar that's floating around – and the original issue will never be solved. The same thing occurred with welfare. As James Dale Davidson put it so well two decades ago, "When you subsidize poverty and failure, you get more of both."
Isn't the definition of insanity doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different outcome?
Well said and I agree wholey. We already have a preferential, racially and economically, devided means to distribute continuing education money, if you throw in who is willing to be a government lacky independent people will become the uneducated and the unwashed. Slaves to a preferential caste society. Scary stuff man.
Good liberals need to be taught to think that way. It's unnatural and only survives on a grand scale through the liberal institutions training the next round of minions.
Priceline. Hotels, Rental Cars, Airline Tickets…
and now College Education!
I'd pay good money to see William Shatner taze a certain dean at my Alma Mater…provided I get to name my own price, of course
One of the purposes of going to college is to get through it and create a marketable difference between you and those who do not attend. As one who hires people, it is a separator. It is less on what type of degree and more on that the candidate had the fortitude to get through it. The hope is that one who has the drive to finish, can bring that into the work place.
obama has stated his desire to get everyone through college (by having tax payers pay for it), which will, if successful, will make everyone the same, thus less marketable. A college education will no longer be used as a separator. Is that what we want?
One of my favorite topics. Real spending on public primary and secondary education increased 247% between 1961 and 2005. Today, the average tuition for public school is more than double that of private schools and more than triple that of parochial schools.
Yet how many people do you know who would send their kids to a private school if money were not the issue? The answer is nearly all of them because they want their kids to get a real education and not a joke.
The idea behind public education was laudable, but the execution has failed due to the impacts of Rational Choice Theory. There is no accountability because there is no competition and when competition is eliminated from any human endeavor involving money, fraud becomes the outcome you see demonstrated on a routine basis.
We must realize that education is going to have to be privatized under a scheme that provides equal access to everyone in our society so that money and brains become equal opportunities for all our children. We will never get that from public education, but the Education Plus program plan I have proposed under Lovellian economics provides for all of the outcomes we seek in education without a dime of taxpayer money and without government-run education ever being our shared national nightmare again.
Dave Ramsey, read and suggest his books related to higher education to prospective college students.
The gist he preaches is pay as you go with the student fully invested, and steer away from dream car-
eers, rather practical is as practical does. Ramsey exudes common sense.
.
Not American history! And the education slip begins in grade school, by the time they get to college they are all trophy kids that think all they have to do is show up–once in awhile, they have been taught that effort is rewarded instead of the quality of the effort–effort gets a trophy.
Interesting. Back in the seventies when studying engineering, one of our jokes was when all else fails, teach. That remark was reserved for the alleged "college of education" at my university. And after reviewing some of their course requirements, I still agree today.
I see the same thing happening in education as in health care – if you don't dirtectly pay for it (insurance, loans, governement grants, scholarships, daddy's checkbook) you do not notice how much that something costs.
This is what happened in the medical field where the insurance company pays for the <<Insert Procedure Here>> so I'm not going to question that it costs $9,000.00 for the x-ray of my swollen ankle.
Same thing with higher education – if someone else is paying who cares if it cost $12,000.00 for a class in Underwater Basket Weaving 101. Start putting these things upfront and eliminate the purse strings and colleges and universities will have to compete for students. End result is a better product at a better price.
What about Berkley,,,just a few months ago. The socialists there could not stand the idea that their school was facing a financial crisis,,,,go figure! Socialists need for other's to pay for their obsessions because they cannot or will not pay for it themselves.
Yep.
Give all the little 'tards a "showing up occassionally trophy."
A text-book example of this problem of "Liberal Education" is in the story of the "Three Hikers" in Iraq who got arrested in IRAN.
Needless to say that Iran is evil and that these students are not spies, but what got it into these kids heads that going hiking in that part of the world was a good idea in the first place. How did they get the money to take an expensive trip like that? Why would they choose to go there? What were their parents thinking when they endorsed, gave approval or helped to pay for it?
THE ANSWER: they are Berkley grads and children of progressive parents. Stupidity and progressivism go hand in hand. Their naiveity is obvious to anyone with ANY common sense whatsoever.
Also, my kids are going to a Conservative Christian College like Liberty U. I want them to get a REAL education and not just a diploma of indoctrination in liberalism.
A comparison of what my college education cost, and how much my two nieces paid for theirs, provides anecdotal evidence of the extent to which federal "help" has NOT made college more affordable. All three of us attended selective, four-year schools in the Northeast (theirs somewhat more so than mine; the two of them attended the same college). It's an open secret that these universities are part of a consortium of schools that survey each other annually before they set the costs of tuition, room, board and fees; each of these costs has always been roughly comparable among the institutions. (Off topic: Can you imagine the leaders of private businesses engaging in such collusion WITHOUT going to prison?)
The estimated cost of my senior year, 1980-81, which included the above expenses plus a laughably small allowance for books, but no "pocket money," exceeded $10,000 for the first time for my school.
My nieces, who graduated in 2006 and 2008, incurred comparable senior-year expenses that were on both sides of $40,000.
As measured by the Consumer Price Index, prices of all goods and services during the intervening years rose by a factor of 2.1. College expenses quadrupled. Even with student aid, how has this helped gifted but economically disadvantaged students of all backgrounds?
In Ohio Gov. Strickland allows high school students to take college courses at colleges–the college courses are free to the high school students, parents love that aspect. They can get their entire freshman year in for free–well at tax payer expense anyway. He implemented the program on his own, wasn't that nice of him
I forgot to add that the credits are duel credits and go to both Senior high school and freshman college all at the same time, eliminating a year of school altogether. The course can be taken online too.
I would like to add that you should also complete your Associate's Degree before moving on to a 4,6, or 8 year program. The reason for this is simple. If you graduate from a two year program…every single credit you earned is transferable. The 4 year college MUST accept all credits earned on a completed degree!
If, however, you transfer to a 4 year program without first completing your Associate's degree…a 4 year college can, and most likely will, reject up to 50% of your earned credits…or even more!
This is true for the State of Virginia as it applies to all accredited institutions. I have no reason to doubt that it applies in all other States as well. I hope that all of you seeking higher education found this bit of information useful.
As a whole society only a certain percentage of the population need higher education. As our society has become richer and shipping and communications have become cheaper we have outsourced a large percentage of our menial labor. We have further outsource much of our service and construction sectors with immigrant labor. As long as we can continue to find new ways of creating wealth this is generally good for us, however there is one problem, intelligence. Intelligence comes in many forms. Most of us have a mix of these forms, those who have a severe disparity are called savants, but most of us are better in some areas than others. Some are good at math and bad at language skills for instance. One of the most useful and common types of intelligence is mechanical intelligence. This is the kind of intelligence that allows us to build buildings and fix our cars, etc. I believe we've reached a point where those kinds of skills have been under-appreciated and forced those who's best skills are in those areas into other areas, requiring higher education, that they have less then optimal aptitude for. This hinders wealth creation and those jobs become less rewarding (monetarily). Meanwhile the cost of those degrees required to get those jobs continues to skyrocket. It may pop or it might deflate slowly, but I can certainly see the bubble.
Additionally…all first time students seeking higher education qualify for a Federal PELL Grant. This is a fund that will GIVE you money to pay for the first two years of your college education, It does NOT have to be repaid! Also, you can qualify for additional aid in the form of other grants and scholarships once you establish a high enough GPA.
My 17 year old son is going into electronics, a trade skill. When I finally convinced him that jobs in that field are plentiful (someone will always need a computer fixed, a circuit fixed, their home wired, etc.) Thanks to a program through his school, he will walk the aisle to get his high school diploma with 42 hours of college credit under his belt as well, leaving him just 2 semesters from an Associates of Applied Science in electronics. Our voters approved a state lottery that pays for it, plus scholarships for grades from the university, I probably might have to foot the bill for books. (Can you believe the prices for textbooks?)
Bless his heart, he spent his summer taking scholarship paid for English 1 and 2 so that he didn't have to take his senior English this year. The university gave him the opportunity to take the English 1, if he made an A in the class, they gave him the scholarship for 2. His college credit for those runs concurrent with his high school credit. If not for the rest of the math he has to take, he might have been able to graduate high school early.
He is disheartened a little, because he is also aware of his tax burden when he does get a job. He wonders if it is all worth it in the end, to wind up working to pay off this enormous spending.
It used to be you saw bumper stickers reading, "My child is an honor student at [insert government indoctrination center's name here]."
Now, they read, "My child is an honored student at…"
Everybody gets one!
I don't think that's changed, Rick.
I say let this bubble burst. I currently work for my alma mater– an ivy league institution that has been living on public largess for as long as recorded history. Private universities don't pay real estate tax on their property, don't pay any taxes at all, as far as I know. Their tuition has more than doubled in the fifteen years since I graduated. When I found out from a current undergrad that he is now paying more than $1400 per credit hour, I almost fainted.
In addition to the tax-exempt status of these institutions, many like my own are quick to use eminent domain to snatch up still more property to expand their campuses, increase their enrollment and, thus, rake in more tuition payments. The endowments of the largest private universities run into the billions, yet they still hike tuition annually even when the economy stagnates and falters. Cripes, Harvard has a whole office and team of investment managers dedicated to investing their endowment. When the derivatives markets took a nose dive a couple years back, major universities were among the biggest losers and, in my opinion, deservedly so.
As many of the respondents have commented before me, there are scarce few degrees in the undergrad curriculum that translate into jobs that pay enough to justify the staggering loans the average middle-class family needs to take out to afford it. For parents with more than one child planning to enroll in college, this can be downright crippling. While most universities offer grants to make up the difference between the tuition cost and what a student can afford to pay, they usually do so after squeezing every last available penny from the parents and, of course, making the student take out the maximum allowable amount in loans. In my case my tuition for four years totaled more than $100K, of which loans covered about 40%, my parents covered another 20%, with the difference taken up by grants and work study employment.
A few respondents above have noted meeting undergrads without even basic critical thinking skills and I can attest to this fact. That's what happens when a school is so focused on matriculation rates and getting its graduates into good graduate schools than in training its students to think. The mean GPA at these schools is often higher than a 3.0. At my esteemed alma mater it was 3.3 or a B-plus. The effect of all this grade inflation is a devaluation of the undergraduate diploma to about the cost of the paper on which it's printed.
I never thought I'd hear you admit that learning to be a liberal was a waste of time, money and effort! There may be hope for you yet! Now, if you could only apply that lesson to your own life, you'd be set!
I had to take my daughter in for a checkup that my insurance doesn't cover. My doctor worked with me, and let me pay the bill on self pay.
By doing so, my bill was actually reduced $83. Heck, at that price (except that she and I are on regular prescriptions) I could almost drop my sick visit insurance and hold it for only catastrophic care.
We had a slightly different addage that falls into the same category: "Those who can, do; those who can't…..teach".
Seems like this pyramid scheme is overdue to implode.
Some noteworthy commentary from the enemy….
Electoral college abolition being pushed by the GPUSA: http://www.greenparty.org/program/grassdemoc.html
CPUSA "Obama isn't going far enough… http://www.cpusa.org/obama-state-of-the-union-he-...
Huffing-paint post "Castrate the Electoral College" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-russnow/med...
It then may come as a further surprise that I do not agree with l_"J."
A major problem with education, is that is it dominated by leftists. If only leftists earn liberal arts degrees, that will never change. Those conservatives, who have a calling to be educators, are heroes for earning such degrees, and remaining in these vipers' nests, to clean them out.
Pyramid schemes always do, in the end.
It's just that when the pyramid scheme is propped up by government (IOW your money), it takes longer to collapse…with much greater collateral damage, when the fall inevitably comes.
Take social security, for example…
And, if you become a staffer , your tuition will be paid off for you. We just shelled out 12 million for that one!
Please!
Nope. Doesn't surprise me a bit. I've read enough of your stuff to know that you're no liberal. And, I agree with your premise that we need more conservative instructors in the education system.
I was not aware that becoming a teacher required a Liberal Arts degree. I suppose I should not be surprised. I wonder who made THAT rule? I'm betting it wasn't a Conservative.
It will definitely require BOTH talent and motivation.
Will the radical leftists actually stand behind their notion of "survival of the fittest" when the brown stuff hits the air handler?
They've been bellyaching at fevered pitch to prop up all of the weakest links so far……
There's a ton of bubbles out there but the mother of all bubbles is either the US bond market or the dark OTC derivatives market bubble. I think they're tied together, the derivative bubble has leveraged up bond market. .
The dark derivative market bubble is over $600 Trillion dollars now (not a typo). If something gives, like a key commodity market or the state bond market and I think the SHTF. Get a little peep behind the curtain….
Watch: "The Warning" available viewing anytime on the internet, PBS, key words Brooksley Borne LTCM (Long term capital management), CFTC. Starts slow, but keep watching, note exact same people are still around trying to keep it together with duct tape. "Small" event happened in 1998 — they barely saved it then. (sorry not a direct link)
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/warning/v....
.
Let's not forget the unsung heroes in the education system…those conservative students who wade through the liberal swamp challenging the liberal ideas of their instructors while maintaining their conservative standards. Many of them do so to the detriment of their own GPA's.
More and more employers are finally waking up to the fact that the traditional sheepskin degree is useless. I could go on for hours on my experiences with the brain-dead idiots that I worked with that flouted their degrees but couldn't handle anything unless there was a text book case they could refer to.
One employer I worked for a few years ago summed it up best. "I'd rather hire someone that doesn't know anything and train them properly than hire someone with their college degree who think they know everything and refuse to learn how it works in the real world".
That guy was a perfect example that college can't teach you How to think…..just What to think.
You were fortunate that you were spared the constant barrage of Liberal/Progressive vomit.
Excellent point – I think that's what health insurance was supposed to be about, it's like insurance for the car – if it gets wrecked you're covered for it, but you still pay for the brakes and oil changes. Same thing with health care – pay for the runny nose, cough and sore throat but if you get cancer you're covered
With education it's not there yet but I think it's coming – why do you think the government took over the education loan process? Government service for college grants or loan forgiveness? That means the tax payer is funding higher education and the real costs get lost in the shuffle (just look at our tax laws to see how complicated the government is with our money). And where does that money really go? Let's face it there are a lot of extreamly liberal progressives hanging out in academia.
This is absolutely true. What the hell are you going to be able to do, for example, with a master's degree in feminism or women's studies except teach those two moronic subjects?
I never finished college. Leaving was one of the best decisions I ever made, as it spared me a lot of debt, and at the time colleges didn't even have degrees for what I do (IT support, systems/networks).
Frankly, technical schools are a better path than colleges for most.
Nope. Doesn't surprise me a bit.
Don't get me wrong. I did not mean that you might assume that since I am a Jew, and you-know-who claims to be one, that we would have the same opinion. I meant that l_J's brief moment of lucidity may not be all that lucid.
I was not aware that becoming a teacher required a Liberal Arts degree.
I was specifically referring to students earning liberal arts degrees (though any degree will do for the sake of argument), with a sight to becoming college professors. You definitely will need a degree, usually a Phd, in the field in which you hope to teach.
And I applaud the stalwart conservative who plans to teach in the liberal arts. Every time I paid a visit to that side of the campus, I had an overwhelming urge to bathe in Purell.
When the "higher" education bubble bursts it wouldn't surprise me if the Obama Regime came up with some sort of "individual mandate" to attend college to prop up the system. No worries if you cant' afford it, 5 years service in Obama's civilian defense "corpse" will see your government student loan debt forgiven.
And many of them are studying engineering, nursing, business, computer science….I see them every day in the college classes I teach.
Yep, you've rubbed my fur the wrong way, all right.
The college I attended was one of the best in producing excellent teachers because they made the effort to sort the wheat from the chaff. We were thrown into teaching our first semester. Those who left either couldn't cut it or realized teaching was not the easy job they thought it would be.
That said, I do agree that the college "system" has been overblown. The real problem with the cost of college, though, is the course overload. In most universities, students can't finish a degree in four years, even if they go full-time each semester. This has been going on for a long time. I entered college in 1980 with a full semester of credit (tested out). I went full-time each term, plus summer school–and I STILL couldn't graduate on time. Today I see my students struggling wth the same problem.
Then come and teach my classes and see just how easy it is.
The loan-forgiveness program has been around for many years.
Down with tenured terrorists! Free their minds and their a$$es will follow! (Nice 60's touch don't you think)
Mi hermano!
The purpose of liberal arts is NOT to train you for anything in particular. That's the knowledge for knowledge's sake thingy…
That is EXACTLY what I wanted back in my college days….68-72……yeah, crazy-insane time. Half of it was a redundant waste of time.
The college I attended was one of the best in producing excellent teachers because they made the effort to sort the wheat from the chaff.
I envy your experience. My Alma Mater, while having well-respected engineering, math, and medical colleges, has an education school like a Chinese dog food factory.
"When you subsidize poverty and failure, you get more of both."
Add to that that when you designate a group as losers requiring all manner of eternal subsidies that they internalize their victim status and act accordingly.. I guess another way of saying the same thing. Instead of veiwing the success of others without resentment, then, emulating the skills to be likewise succcessful our victim class wants the wealth accumulated by the hard work of others transfered to them. It's pretty much were we stand in America today thanks to the Democrats.
The students have been molded into the "new Bolsheviks" and it is only a matter of time before Obama "nudges" them to violence. Keep an eye on the "Electoral College Annulment" movement being pushed from the college campuses right now. This is the backdoor to "mob rule" democracy and if you dig deep you will find that all of the radical groups are behind it.
I believe that the key to the violent revolution the radicals are seeking are the radicalized college students and vulnerable high school kids.
They're just waiting for the official "tipping point event" to happen and Obama is getting ready to provide it.
I got that advice from my mama many moons ago. She forced me to take a typing class in high school (this was 1977). Know-it-all-teenager said, "Why? I'm going to college, and I can hire someone to type my papers." Wise mama said, "You'll have a hard time finding a teaching job, so you'd better learn something that can help you put food on the table in the meantime." I found that I really liked typing, and this piqued my interest in business, and computers….she was SOOOOO right!!!
If you're going to spend the dough to earn a 4-year degree, my advice is to get one with an "S" behind the "B."
So much one learns earning a liberal arts degree can be obtained with a sensible reading list gone through in relaxing evenings in an arm chair.
One should not spend money simply to show prospective employers that one did a 4-year reading list.
Get a degree that gives you a skill that can only be learned from accomplished people, first-hand in the classroom or laboratory.
Those "S" degrees usually mean one has good quantitative and analytical skills.
Think "Dilbert" who, despite his trudge through management hell, has skills that are easily transferred to better employers or that can be put to good use in an entrepreneurial undertaking creating wealth, something about which so many BA-holders, like many in our current stratum of political masters, know virtually nothing.
"Higher education" has become largely a sham. It's purpose is to ensure that the youngsters of parents willing to pay are guaranteed at least $60,000 a year for breathing and dressing nicely.
Simultaneously, the lack of "degreed" status is the acceptable excuse to exploit non- college grads who may actually be the most experienced, accomplished workers in a given endeavor. These non-grads for the most part are now limited in their pursuits not by their knowledge or work ethic or ability to produce revenue for their employer but by their lack of "papers." "Working your way to the top" is now dead.
If I am looking for a doctor or a scientist, I certainly want to see education in those fields. But for most occupations, 99% of skills are learned on the job. I certainly think a degree is a "plus" but when a 21 year old with nothing but a generic 4- year degree is far preferable to a 31 year old with lengthy work history, skills and experience, something just isn't right.
OK, I'm ready to be attacked by the frat boys and sorority girls now…
Why, Oh Why, is it great to promote Mediocrity?
Oh wait, ….it's that Progressive "level the playing field" thing.
That would be the Death of the Republic. Of course, all those people think we're a Democracy……..they never learned in their crappy schools that history has proven that pure Democracies don't work.
I'm in graduate school now, and just ran out of "tuition waiver" (after four years; so what, I'm a slow learner, OK?) so my cost-per-semester just went from $700 to $2,000. I was paying for medical insurance and "differential tuition", meant to recover the costs for extra laboratories for engineering students). Graduate school here runs about $1400 for three (minimum) hours of instruction. I hope to graduate next spring, but who knows if there will be any jobs, even for a Ph.D. I'm here to learn, not make wild amounts of money, but it sure would be nice to earn more for having studied more. The only good side is that I'm loan-free, at least to this point, so if I can get any kind of decent job I'll be ahead. If not, well, life doesn't come with guarantees, and at least I'll have expanded the science knowledge of the race (a micron's worth or so)!
http://www.comeandtakeit.com/small230.gif
"For the past several decades, colleges and universities have built endowments, played moneyball-style faculty hiring games, and constructed grand new buildings, while jacking up tuitions to pay for things (and, in the case of state schools, to make up for gradually diminishing public support)."
You missed one funding source: industry alliances. Universities are increasingly excepting endowments and funding from private industry. In and of itself, this is not entirely bad… but has a great potential for abuse.
- only programs of value to industry will flourish (sciences, engineering, computer science)
- industry may have greater control over what research is conducted (the potential for abuse is just as great as it is for government funding–only researchers willing to kow-tow to the financial, political, social agendas of their funders will get funding)
Texas is proof that Common Sense is highly under-rated.
One thing that is greatly disturbing is the planned "counter protests" to the Restoring Honor rally on 8/28 currently being organized by just about every radical group on every campus in America.
I fear that the radical left may try to make this their "Reich-Stag fire" and really start to harm people.
I will pray they don't do it, but I know all too well their violent nature.
Isn't Shabazz and his crew supposed to be there on 8/28? I know Glenn predicted last month that there will protesting in September or October. He said they will be similar to the 60s riots. I believe there will an October Surprise. There was whisper that Obama may bypass Congress and grant amnesty. All hell would break loose if this happens.
That's more or less the model Sarah Palin followed. Oh, how those spoiled little-minded Ivy grads despise her for that!
Government student loans are nothing but an extension of progressive/Socialism/Marxism theory. Everything the government touches, at taxpayers expense, turns to crap!
SAY NO TO SOCIALISM: http://i40.tinypic.com/2dcbpeb.jpg
Are they at all interested in educating anyone? They are more interested in teaching What to think, not How to think. And the living proof ?……one will sit on Supreme Court and one sits in the Oval Office.
There are quite a few radical groups planning on belligerent "counter protesting" not just the Shabazz thugs. The rumblings are there and the thugs despise Beck so I fully expect the leftist nuts to be violent or to provoke violence. What ever happens and no matter how much they try to instigate, turn the other cheek.
Yeh, almost every automobile I see today has a Bumper Sticker that reads "My Child is an Honor Student" at some school or another. Are we really producing that many Geniuses?
You forgot the next line,Rebas."Those who can't teach…administrate."
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