And here’s the proof.
Goddamnit, I can’t wait for this tower of greed to collapse. And it will, my friends. It most definitely will.
Hat tip: Marc Randazza.
Higher education is a scam
About Ferdinand Bardamu
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That is why I keep on saying- “it won’t end well”.
We are now close to a perfect storm- demography, income, jobs, technology, loss of traditional institutions, major collapses of prevalent socio-economic paradigms and lots of bad faith. There is no real precedent for what we have already entered.
Better not click on those education/study ads under your banner!
I hate how on top of all this you have to buy the professors’ and the professors’ friends’ books for about 200 dollars each and that these mediocre humunculi only are there to regurgitate the political ideology du jour, having got there not by intelligence, creativity, depth of thought, critical thinking, etc, but by bullheaded persistence and administrative asskissing.
I think the college thing has become a scam. The majority of professions should not need a degree. Many graduates will still need on the job training when they start. A one or two-year training course for the occupation of their choice would better serve most.
It is sad that people have to spend four years and build huge debt just because employers want a piece of paper that probably says little about an employee’s ability to do the job.
Given some of the courses offered, college probably does not even offer the intellect expanding opportunities of previous liberal arts education.
For many it just delays adulthood and the start of their productive life. It adds debt but cuts four years of earning. It has become an industry and thus has gathered all the lobbyists and rent-seeking behavior of other industries.
The problem is that there are no returns to education; there are only returns to human capital. For many students that four-year degree may not add to their human capital. Sadly, the people with the lowest human capital (smarts, ambition, discipline, etc.) will probably gain the least from extra years in school. Many of those with high existing human capital would still do well without four years at college (i.e., quickly learn on the job).
As the linked graph shows: education is now a big business. Too many would lose with a more rational approach that limited intake to those who could really benefit.
PS
I am not down on education. Indeed, I feel it should be a constant and continuing part of our lives. It should not be something we are forced to do for four years after which we stop forever. I believe that everyone, to the best of their ability, should try to get a liberal arts education. They should do this by reading and discussing history, philosophy, economics, etc. as part of their lives not as a four-year jobs-training, adulthood avoiding program.
[I edited this from comments made on my own blog a long time ago. The every one must go to college thing annoys me.]
The education racket is based on the rigid credentialization of the economy. Many jobs today require a college degree even though those jobs do not utilize the knowledge that you get from the university and were done 30 years ago by high school graduates. This creates a “catch 22″ for young people today. The actually performance of most jobs do not require university acquired knowledge at all. Yet, those jobs require a college degree that has become increasingly expensive for young people to get. Hence, young people going into serious debt to get a credential to get jobs that they should be able to get without the credential. This is the modern-day version of the “guild” system of medieval Europe or the buying of a taxi “medallion” in New York City.
I believe this rigid credential system is inhibiting economy recovery and growth in the U.S. in the same manner as the over-regulated, cartelized industries in Japan has inhibited economic growth in that country.
This is institutionalized fraud and corruption. But because it is instigated by the political leaders of our country, it is perfectly legal and the criminals do not go to prison.
The results of this are predictable. Facing increasing costs and the increasing rigidified economy, middle-class people will respond by having fewer and fewer kids. Some people will decide to bin it all and take the “Fred Reed” approach to life and live as a laid back expat. At least until the system collapses and something else takes its place.
”””””buying of a taxi “medallion†in New York City. ””””
Yea but last I heard a taxu medallion only cost a 100 g’s
Then you can rent it to a taxi driver and get a return on it for doing nothing.
Sounds like a sound investment.
Glad I’m in a math department, with tuition waiver and such, and professors who are genuinely brilliant and make real contributions to the world. Wonder what will happen to math departments in general as the shit hits the fan…
Several more thoughts:
1) Wide spread student indebtedness combined with the rampant credentialism that essentially mandates such indebtedness does make military conscription relatively easy. Serving in the military for 4 years with the write-down or cancellation of debt as a reward makes a military draft unnecessary.
2) Having a substantial percentage of educated young people in deep debt will work wonders to permanently reduce the birthrate of the educated class. Some of these people, realizing the “catch-22″ nature credentialism coupled with debt service might come to view refusal to procreate as a form of personal and political rebellion against this “system” that has condemned them to financial slavery. A reproductive “strike” meme could propagate among the young adult population and would dove-tail nicely with both feminism as well as the MRA marriage strike against feminism. I believe such propagation is called “viral” marketing.
Paying a few hundred bucks isn’t that bad as long as you didn’t major in some kind of bullshit degree like communications or psychology. If you’re making 40k a year, and paying only $300 per month on student loans, then you should be fine as long as you live within your means.
And you might like this link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/04/your-money/04money.html
A man calls off a wedding due to a woman’s student loan debt.
I’d say the majority of degrees are pretty much bullshit.
Unfortunately also, many a non-bullshit degrees are risky anymore, like Computer Science or Mechanical Engineering, that no longer have very many entry level positions for graduates.
Then of course if you do get a good job people often grow to the size of their cages, and spend what they have. A reduction in employment or wealth from catastrophe can send a manageable debt spiraling out of control. I’m sure most defaults aren’t even caused by people not finding jobs after graduating, but losing their jobs, severe illness, divorces, and natural disasters.
Lindsay has it right (except it’s not called viral marketing). College degrees are more valuable because of overcredentialism. Fact of the matter is, it doesn’t matter how well you as an individual manage your resources, or how generally responsible the population may be. When you push such a huge portion of the population to take out loans just to enter polite society you are going to have a significant portion of them not make the cut in the workforce (or even finish their degrees), because they were never cut out for it in the first place.
I’m convinced that the prerequisite that one have a college degree for jobs filled with tasks that come nowhere near to actually requiring the thinking skills of that degree is a reflection of employers essentially outsourcing their HR. That is, it’s cheaper and easier for an employer to simply require a degree (since the degrees are so plentiful anyways) than it is to put job candidates through a gauntlet of tests and interviews designed to elicit whether the candidate has a modicum of discipline, persistence, and an IQ above 80. Indeed, employer tests such as these would only invite discrimination lawsuits whereas a degree requirement doesn’t. Completing college is now just a simple indicator of these basic qualities–with the more discerning colleges a more reliable indicator of such. The actual course material is irrelevant!
I’m also convinced that the wrong conclusion gets drawn from statistics showing how 4-year college grads have a higher annual income than “mere” High School grads. And college institutions have no incentive whatsoever to dispel the myth. Fact is, many of those who complete a 4-year degrees have the discipline and raw smarts to do well even without that degree. Factor in the opportunity cost of the lost wages while one pursues that 4-year degree and the kid at the right-side of the bell curve who becomes a plumber, machinist, electrician, or firefighter will do damn near as well as he would if we went through 4-years of college simply in order to meet society’s expectations.
…But of course, if s/he was so dumb as to pursue Womyn’s Studies during those 4 years at college, then I’m pretty sure that’s evidence the raw smarts were never there to begin with.
How is it possible that Universities are able to offer an undergraduate degree in psychology knowing full well that it takes a Masters in order to even become licensed as a counselor? The same goes for the Sociology Department. Who is able to finance $60,000 with compounding interest set at 7% while making $35,000 a year? How can the cost possibly be justified?
Meanwhile the professional advisors of these departments keep promoting these worthless undergraduate degrees as highly marketable to future employers. I was told by my advisor when I asked about future career opportunities that my psychology degree would be viewed by many companies as a sign of a well rounded education. She even said that my degree would allow for a variety of employment opportunities. What she meant was that Chili’s is hiring.
I hope all the Presidents of all the Universities in America have a disastrous life going forward. This also goes for all the board members and every other stake-holder promoting this scam called higher education.
I have had my communications degree for over thirty years now. Thank goodness I went to a state university, where a full semester of education cost — and I will never forget this figure — $297.50 for an in-state student. I went straight through school — summer, interim and all, earning my B.A. in two years and ten months. My father paid for my tuition & books, and gave me ninety dollars a month for living expenses. I held down two jobs in school, earning minimum wage at both, and loving it — because I was a fairly popular deejay at night, and a television cameraman during the day in between classes — i.e., I was working in my field while maintaining a B+ average, and I thought I was well on my way to a very rewarding broadcasting career.
Deregulation and the creation of the “corporate conglom” broadcasting property owner changed all of that … and now, that “BSBA,” is not worth the paper it is printed on — not because the degree itself is necessarily “bullshit,” but because, in this case, the broadcasting industry has turned into what can best be described as a 15-story whorehouse in the desert, with no air conditioning & completely stopped-up toilets.
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