Unless you attend a local community college why does getting a college education require most people to spend 10-20 years paying it off? Why do the costs keep going up? Didn’t going to college a few decades back used to cost significantly less than it does now even accounting for inflation? And why does such a greater percent of the population have to attend college these days compared to decades past, it seems like anyone with a pulse is encouraged to attend college. Do all of those people really need a full college education?
Why does it seem like any decent career these days requires a full college education? Even if half or most of that you learn in college has nothing to do with what your going to be doing in the work force? For example requiring someone going to college to be an architect to take English and history classes. Wouldn’t that time be better spent learning about architecture?
I don’t know a lot about this issue but at a glance it seems like a giant money making conspiracy between the college industry and the busnisses that hire college graduates. Are the federal/state/local governments somehow behind this?
In the UK, this is largely due to two factors: 1) the government’s goal to make sure everyone (that is to say, at least 50% of the population) is educated up to higher education and 2) firms seeing this as an opportunity to externalize their training costs. What is the result? Well, not everyone is suited to higher education. So the quality of the programmes offered drops. The degrees become more commercially oriented… except for the minor problem that firms are now discovering that universites suck as training centres. With a price of next to zero and a huge student clientele, universities are swamped. Add to this the requirement not to “discriminate” against lower class, minority etc. families and voila, you have the current system. As a corollary of it, BTW, given that possession of a degree is now commonplace, it becomes necessary to have a good degree to even get a job. Government at work, as usual.
Hmmnnn, time for somebody to write a “Robinson Curriculum” for the various college majors. A student brought up on such a curriculum would be more than capable of educating himself all the way up to a Ph.d if necessary. Obviously, not possible in fields that require extensive hands on training, such as medicine. Perfectly fine for fields such as law.
I enjoyed college. But really it ended up being a very expensive drink.
I got a degree in Anthropology History and then right after drinking my way accross Europe on a Eurail Pass I got a job as an archaelogist and then got laid off one month later.
Since then I have been a dishwasher, DJ, cook, social worker, farm hand, truck driver, fact checker, art installer, janitor and loads of other little jobs that had little to do with my degree.
I got into computers by getting a used 486 in 1998 and installing Linux on it just because I was poor and bored and needed a hobby. Now I have a great profession that pays well and I find that college was one of the most useless things I have done.
I would recommend is to research what a degree is going to get you. Things you are interested in you can study on your own. Sometimes you can teach yourself a proffession and people will hire you with no experience, no degree and no certifications…sometimes.
College costs so much due to state level accrediting agencies and due to federal grants.
Grants are a third party payment scheme and since someone else is paying college attendees dont really care how much the grant level rises. This allows colleges to demand higher tuitions since there is an artifical increase in the amount consumers are willing to pay. This screws over people with smaller grants or with no grants to cover the tuition increase. Also it should be noted that these government grants are funded by higher taxes on people paying for their kids tuition, people paying off their tuition, and lower income folks who did not attend college.
Accrediting Agencies drive up the cost of tuition by demanding certain structures in the building, type of classes and a slew of other requirements that drive up the capital costs of the school. For instance they can withdraw a school’s accredition if they do not construct a new dorm or a pool hall which they have done just check out what happened to the Colorado University of Law. Colorado’s law school was offering very competive rates and new dynamic forms of educational structuring that cut costs so they demanded all this new construction to raise their rates up. Accrediting agencies also control the ability of a school to operate out right. These agencies are quasi state government departments organized and controlled by the schools already in the market, including public schools and state colleges. For instance in my state the department of educations accrediting board does not allow the University of Phoenix to teach ANY course other than business.
Also what connects these agencies with the massive amount of tuition grants are that schools and colleges need to be certified by specially recognized accrediting agencies in order to recieve students who have government grants to pay for their education. If the school does not take in these federal grants they will leave themselves out of a large pool of potential money.
I’ve always regarded college as a complete waste of time. Unless you’re wanting to be a doctor or a pharmasist or something along those lines there isn’t much need for it. Why have a degree in finance or economics? One of the best financial advisors I’ve ever met used to be a pipeline welder who hurt his back and had to do something else. I like that quote from Good Will Hunting: “You dropped a hundred and fifty grand on an education you coulda’ picked up for a dollar fifty in late charges at the Public Library.” I guess the cost of education goes up because of government interference and regulations as well as the fall of the dollar.
Economics is difficult to teach oneself. It’s one of those subjects that I think can justifiably be taught at university - though not in its present form. The pure theory of the science, on the other hand, is what ought to be taught on a degree, with any historical and mathematical subdisciplines as optional. Thus I can see the pure sciences, humanities and professions being taught at universities (all of which correspond roughly to traditional academic degrees.) For everything else, degrees are a waste of time (I mean a degree in “sports management”? Come on!)
True. Many fields of study are best done in a university setting. I know a mining engineer and it seems that hiring a self-taught mining engineer would be quite a risky thing to do. Hiring a self-taught Sports manager would probably be bettert than hiring someone with a phD in sports management.
My formal economics education <i.e. public high school and later college> was, shall we say, deficient. I didn’t truly gain a knowledge of economics until I self taught myself the Austrian School. So I disagree on that. I think economics can and should be self taught. A homeschooler could incorporate it into his/her curriculum. An adult could read his way to an education, same as I did.
I’ll take a different stab at this since everyone else just seems to want to blame government…
One of the demands of a post-industrial economy is the necessity of a highly educated workforce. When you sell services people expect a certain level of competency and knowledge from the professionals providing this service and the easiest way to do this is to just trust that they learned (or are at least capable of learning) this while pursuing their degree.
There are companies that take a different view on this and demand more from their prospective employees than just a piece of paper – they also pay extra to hire the ‘best and the brightest’. Google is a prime example of this, to even get an interview you need to take a test that shows more than just your abilities in your professional field. This may also have a lot to do with everyone and their dog wanting to work there and they need to weed out the duds but the point still stands.
Charles Schwab on the other hand will hire anyone with a (non-art) degree and send them to their training camp to teach them what they need to know to be an entry level sales droid…err, financial adviser.
Unfortunately the public education system is still geared to churn out compliant 9 to 5 factory workers and since these jobs are few and far between these days people who wish to do more than ‘manufacture’ hamburgers need to increase their competitive stature and go on to college.
My argument against college credentials has a lot to do with time preference and self interest. Who actively seeks out a job they know little about? What brick mason applies for an astrophysics teaching job at Harvard. Easy. The one who knows astrophysics. I think creating degrees only encourages the con artist who are out to make a buck, because they have authority NOW! Most people are not con artist and want an easy life, so they will not be stupid in something that they think will further their well being.
I would not waste my time “learning” about something that I already know about. Education seems to be legitimate only if you have a piece of paper with a stamp on it. I could be learning more about my subject in depth on my will than be pushed into BEING EDUCATED in the things I already know.
The public school has failed us partly by government and partly by its very existence. The natural order in a free market was the specialization of labor, next will be the specialization of education. Free market do not have standards, but public schools do. The role of the public school in the future, god help us if there is one, will be to make people skilled for the economy. And if government is worse, it will be nothing than middle age guilds all over again
I get your point here, but I don’t see that your conclusion follows. Certainly, more than a high school education (or less - you might do better without one) is needed. But do colleges do the best job of delivering that? A better job than 4 years spent working part-time and spending the rest of your time in the library? That’s what I doubt.
I am not sure how to link to another thread, hope this works:
You can also search mises on “autodidact” to find the thread if the link doesn’t work.
I believe that there was an external link in this thread to an article that compared Training to Education. The point of the article was that college used to be much more self directed and was used to teach people to think with dispassion. It contrasts this to the modern definition of college “education”, which is really more of a training exercise for basic skills. One of the major points was that just about everyone is trainable, but that very few people are capable of being educated in the classical sense. On that plank it sounded quite elitist to me, but when I look around my poor old USA I perhaps find evidence that the statement is true. I believe that the principles on which freedom rest are reached with cool logic. It seems that cool logic is in short supply, and that entertainment, herd mentality, “protect me from myself”, and misplaced trust in officials are everywhere. Too many people don’t want to think for themselves.
I wasn’t defending the system as it stands but only calling it as I see it…
A whole lot of time is wasted by trying to make someone a ‘well rounded person’. The whole point of college is to gain specialized knowledge on a certain subject but they force you to take a bunch of crap that has nothing to do with accomplishing that goal all because some accreditation body has determined that it will make you a better person.
To diverge from the subject a bit, I’ve been looking into the University of London External System and am thinking about signing up for their BSc Economics Program(me). Looking at their syllabus, all that is required is to take courses that directly apply to the program with some flexibility to specialize. Then again I have no idea what a “traditional ‘A’ levels” is which is a requirement to get accepted, that might be where they turn you into a well rounded person under the UK higher education system. I’m kind of assuming that a BA from an American university will get me in but haven’t really looked into it too much since I missed last years deadline because I was unemployed and poor.
I do agree with you about the level of education of a person not having a direct bearing on how much they know about a certain subject but the system as it is uses that as a yardstick to reduce the amount of potential employees that get interviewed for a position.
Without a degree a lot of doors are just plain shut.
British education in general is more focused. You apply not just to a school, but also to a major, and you can’t change once you’re in without reapplying. You basically only study your major, as well. A-levels are exams you take for high school graduation.
What is your BA in? If you have a non-economics BA, the program that you’d probably fit in best is the diploma for graduates. If your BA is in economics, then why not look into a masters? There’s not really much of a reason to get a second undergrad degree - the diploma covers the same material, but is considered a higher-level credential.
A levels are like your AP schemes, if not a bit more advanced. Traditional A levels would be in subjects like Economics, Mathematics, History &c. You should be able to get in with a BA, easily. Just make sure you know much Maths. I have no idea why anyone would want to do Economics with a UK university though. Given the chance, I’d attend GMU or NYU.
Yeah, if I were independently wealthy and a model student that would be nice.
I looked around and they seem to have the best distance learning program since I can’t afford to go to school full time or get on the financial aid gravy train.
Also, part of the reason to do the BSc is so I can re-learn math since I haven’t had a math course in something like 14 years. I’ve been watching my sister do all her pre-reqs over so she can even apply to pharmacy school and figure why bother, just spend the extra time and go the easy route. Plus I don’t think I know half enough math to make it through the degree program – don’t need a whole lot of math to get an art history degree.