Germany has nearly-free higher education. Shouldn’t this make its costs much more expensive than US universities? Yet it doesn’t seem like this is the case.
The United States spends nearly twice as much per student as Germany does. Two-thirds of American universities’ revenues come from private sources, compared with just 15% in Germany.
What does it mean by private sources? Student tuition that comes from loans guaranteed by the government?
Are German Universities for profit? It would seem to me a for profit univeristy combined with unlimited government student loans is the recipe for the highest tuition.
I don’t know what it means by private sources. I will look into it.
As to German universities, from what I hear they’re publicly owned, not-for-profit.
“No German institution is among the leaders in global rankings, and money is part of the problem”
And there is this to consider also.
True, but then the argument would be “at least they have it (generally) free”
lets also not underestimate how much the GI Bill is impacting the tuition. The post 9/11 GI Bill matches ANY state tuition it also gets subsidized with a program called the ‘yellow ribbon’ which matches for private schools if the school participates.
also tuition assistance for active duty which pays for kids to go school. i did it while on active duty and most school just so happened to cost the EXACT same as what the tuition assistance pays. which is $750 per class (3 hour credit)
I would lump this in with the same sorts of arguments as the US’s “Free Market” in Health Care compared to the “free” Health Care in other countries.
Subsidies (Student Loans), Government Accredidation/Licensing, IP Law (extremely expensive books), etc etc.
Education is one of the sectors with the MOST government intervention in it… it is preposterous to believe it is “Free Market” at all.
Here are a few things I quickly gathered:
https://forum.freecapitalists.org/t/rising-tuition-costs/18680
The Case against Student Aid:
The Education Bubble:
I assume the university system in Germany is homogenous whereas it is not in the U.S. You have to consider state funding as well. How do the costs compare with states that have affordable tuition? How much research is involved in Germany? etc.
Also, the eligibility requirements in Germany are more strict, relatively speaking. Not just anyone “qualifies” like they do here with affirmative action, quotas, etc.
As a rule of thumb German Universities do not build and operate giant football stadiums. They neither rake in large sums of money from selling tickets and TV rights to the matches, nor do they spend large sums of money organizing sporting spectacles which have nothing to do with giving their students an education. This could be an additional factor.
This article completely ignores the question of what German students are studying. Are they studying subjects like finance, engineering, and science? Or subjects like performing arts, sociology, and art history? How do they compare to those of college students in the US?
Is it that you go to college in Germany in order to get a “well-rounded education,” where you learn things like basic algebra and composition skills? If so, why is that necessary; are primary and secondary schools defective? What then of all the wasted time at primary and secondary schools? How much of a German’s student’s curriculum is actually devoted to his or her area of study? How much of it is unrelated material from the years at primary and secondary school that didn’t sink in?
It doesn’t have to mean anything. How many institutions you have among the leaders in global rankings is a reflection of the quality of your very best institutions. It does not have to say anything about the quality across the board.
Being they have socialized higher education all their universities are supposed to be roughly comparable which is not the case everywhere. So you end up contrasting highly elite instituions around the world, which are head and shoulders above the run of the mill insitution in their country/system with renowned, but actually just somewhat better than standard colleges in Germany. The comparison useful for us would be one between the average college of a country host to such elite institutions and the standard in Germany.
I feel these are rhetorical questions? No, the well-rounded education is what the secondary schools are for, by the time the Germans are at a university it’s all very focused.
The difference is that students in Germany make the decision whether they are going to go to college, or at least try for it, at an earlier age. Students in the US decide after graduating from secondary school, whereas students in Germany de facto make a decision when applying to a secondary school, because it is possible to apply to college later on only with a diploma from certain types of secondary schools.