Maybe we could finally take the problem at its origin and make tuition free for people. Education is a right.
On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
401–410 of 669 posts
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#402As a culture, we really need to stop telling 17 year olds to not worry about money, go to college, and figure something out. There is always someone ready with a romantic appeal to a classical education, and it is so frustrating for me. Wasting four years is a huge cost. Years, decades of debt is a huge cost. Going to college with no plan about money? The costs are assured. Plus, the degrees people are actually getti…
> Wasting four years is a huge cost. At college I: learned calculus, computer programming, advanced mathematics, urban planning, how to communicate like a grown up, and those are just the big topics. I also took acting classes and learned social skills and made lifelong friends. When I graduated, a professor arranged my first professional job which was an order of magnitude better than any blue collar gig I had ever…
Yeah lol very few people have such an experience. Most people study communications or whatever and waste 4 years.
Also highly suspicious re: your communication skills
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#403Earlier quoted context omitted.
So you're proposing regulation of the higher education market? Not a good idea at all, my friend. Look, public universities in other advanced economies like Japan, Germany, and France probably spend just as much as a typical US state university, yet tuition is basically free. We can argue about how to improve education all day, but let's fund it first so our students don't have to worry about their debts for years. H…
> Not a good idea at all, my friend. Do you have any justification for this? Or should this just be accepted because you said it's not a good idea? I don't see an argument anywhere in your post saying why not. Other than as a general rule you are against taxes. Does that mean we should eliminate the fire dept and police dept as well because they're funded by taxes? Or is it only services that already exist are grandf…
> Do you have any justification for this? Or should this just be accepted because you said it's not a good idea?
I can provide a counterexample: the best higher ed system in the world operates as a free market.
> Other than as a general rule you are against taxes.
And where did you get that from? In the future, make sure to carefully read comments before replying.
To recap:
I said that we should stop arguing about why school is expensive and instead focus on funding it so American college students don't have to carry a debt for the rest of their lives. I then said that the way to pay for their tuition is to increase taxes.
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#404I think a lot of people are looking at this as "maybe this article is offering advice" instead, the way I'm looking at it is this is giving us a rough quantification of what we all know intuitively: that college is so expensive it's reaching a natural ceiling. The way this manifests in reality isn't millions of people all doing a cost/benefit calculus like this and coming to the rational conclusion they can skip coll…
You're thinking of college by looking at the average. College doesn't work like that. It never did. You'll always find a "Jim" that went to college and did fantastically well for it. Elitism works like the lottery, or the Netflix prize, or the Olympics. When the aggregate resource spent is averaged out per head, it's never worth it. But for the winners it is always worth it.
The article averages all colleges, some major have significantly higher returns, choosing engineering for example you get both high returns but also a lower tuition cost and better outcome on average than, say, law schools where prestige and connections play a major factor in lifetime earning
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#405Earlier quoted context omitted.
I remember reading an article describing how college costs can be explained by an analysis of supply and demand. There have been a variety of historic reasons for demand rising at different times - mostly related to unemployment and lack of other economic choices. I keep hearing the meme that low-cost college is the cause of college expense - but college is free in many countries where they are doing quite well. So I…
College in the US is used by employers as a proxy for intelligence, something that's an outgrowth of laws and court rulings that date back to the '70s. So if you want to put yourself on the path to the C-Suite in a Fortune 500 company or to a partnership in a major law firm, you have to get into one of the very top colleges in the country. That, in turn, means top colleges can charge pretty much whatever they want an…
But wait. The more colleges charge for tuition, the harder it becomes for intelligent but poor people to get admittance. Therefore, the worse a college degree from a "top college" can act as a proxy for intelligence.
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#406[deleted]
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#407I do notice that this doesn't take into account race and gender. The premium White and Asian men get from a college degree are higher than for any other group (citation: http://images.dailykos.com/images/125386/large/wage_gap_race... ) This could be true for some people but not others, in predictable ways.
This assumes that all races and genders get advanced degrees in the same fields, which isn't true.
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#408Skip college, invest in stock market. People love to chart out how great it is to invest in the stock market and how historically it generates great returns. Nobody seems to remember everyone around them losing enormous amounts of money whenever the economy tanks. Where were all those 7.1% earnings going when the banks were getting bailed out and people were camping on wall street because their houses were foreclosed…
You know that 7.1% average doesn't mean 7.1% every year.
Anyone that didn't panic sell during the crash has recovered.
There are ways to handle the risk of a crash. #1 is to not play the high risk-high reward game if you are near retirement or already in retirement.
You can't handle big swings at that point, since recovery could take 10 years and you're already 70.
#2 is to have a liquid emergency fund, so you don't have to sell low if you have a big problem during a crash.
#3 is to not panic sell during the crash...
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#409As a culture, we really need to stop telling 17 year olds to not worry about money, go to college, and figure something out. There is always someone ready with a romantic appeal to a classical education, and it is so frustrating for me. Wasting four years is a huge cost. Years, decades of debt is a huge cost. Going to college with no plan about money? The costs are assured. Plus, the degrees people are actually getti…
> Wasting four years is a huge cost. At college I: learned calculus, computer programming, advanced mathematics, urban planning, how to communicate like a grown up, and those are just the big topics. I also took acting classes and learned social skills and made lifelong friends. When I graduated, a professor arranged my first professional job which was an order of magnitude better than any blue collar gig I had ever…
Hi! While we're trading anecdotes, allow me to share mine to counter your point.
I skipped my bachelor's degree entirely - I simply don't have one. I am currently a graduate student in one of the best universities for cryptography. I have absolutely no debt and I earn about $300k per year. I've finished all coursework and I'm currently working on research for my thesis.
I have a good understanding of computer science and advanced mathematics. All those things you mentioned you learned in college - you don't need to be in college for them. You can take acting classes, network with influential professors and learn social skills without college. You can also do these things in college, but you don't need to pay for them.
Your job - or one approximately identical to it in salary, benefits and personal fulfillment - is absolutely possible without college, because all the things you did to actually earn that job can (and mostly do) happen outside the context of a college classroom. More importantly, you cannot realistically expect people to take full advantage of their college environments the way you did, because they lack the requisite maturity, sense of direction or dedication.
I'm not saying college isn't valuable, I'm saying that it is what you make of it, and a significant number of attendees no longer no how to make anything of it. To that point, I take issue with your tone, because it assumes that your experience is what should be expected, and that the onus of failure to meet these expectations can be on college-aged students. Especially here:
> So, ... what the fuck did you do at college that you are calling it a "waste"?
> Even though I was a returning student, I grew up in a very educated professional world, and that was not hard for me.
So you were comparatively lucky in your ability to maximize the college experience, but you ask the commenter why they felt their college experience was a waste. Your experience may be similar for all your friends, but let me share with you what the frightening reality has become for many millenials outside the bubble of tech exuberance, since you have elsewhere mentioned that of 100 friends, they all have a similar experience to yours.
My girlfriend's friends are all college graduates. Of them, one has been homeless after graduating college. She has no substance abuse issues or mental illness. Another currently works full time as a baby sitter. A few of them work jobs that allow them to make ends meet but which they are not proud of and they do not call "career jobs." Only one of her friends is actually in the field she majored in - that friend is, predictably, in STEM.
Of my own friends not in tech, all but one are college graduates. The friend who is not a college graduate has no debt, owns a condo and has a household income of close to $100k. None of the others are in as stable a position. One technically earns more money, but has well over $100k in student loans. Another graduated and is working as a sysadmin for a nonprofit for $40k because it was the best job he could get. And so on and so forth.
You and I have atypical college experiences. You shared your experience, and I'm genuinely happy to hear that it worked out for you. But I find it particularly distasteful to try and reply to someone else's argument about why they didn't find utility in something by talking about how excellent your own experience was, and in doing so dismissing their point to assign blame.
As a society, we have continually built up college as an ideal to strive towards, with little thought about personal maturity or a longer term view. Some kids - whether due to exceptional talent, work ethic, socioeconomic class or whatever else - excel in a college environment. Others do just okay, and make it through without any particular sense of direction. Many others completely flare out and end up worse for it. It is what you make of it, and your anecdotes of personal success do not contest that fact.
Re: On average, skipping college and investing tuition costs nets a higher return
#410Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Very few colleges will leave with student loan debt an order of magnitude greater than $20k. ... Average student loan debt is around $30k You must realize these statements are fundamentally at odds. If the average is $30k, then very clearly most colleges will leave you with $20k+ in debt. The University of Mississippi is an affordable public university that happens to be where I earned my degrees. They estimate $23…
Reread my comment and the OP's: Very few colleges will leave with student loan debt an order of magnitude greater than $20k.
Ah, then yes. My mistake. Very few people will leave with $200k in loans.