A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life • Hacker News Board

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#461

Post by rtx » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 6:13 AM UTC

grawprog wrote: post #393

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's interesting how few read to the end. The author is a "professor of the practice of public leadership." At a business school. It's worth asking what a "professor of the practice of public leadership" is, because - with my combined liberal arts and STEM academic background - I honestly have no idea. Which piques my curiosity, because this piece reads like a parable. Second son not interested in college? Ne…

That's pretty much what public leadership is have you ever seen a leader that doesn't do that? I've never had any liberal arts background, but we sure did learn to persuade people in my biology schooling. It's pretty much required to get anyone to care about saving animals and forests over making money. Public leaders do the same thing every day to get you to agree with laws or decisions they make. Corporate leaders…

Sounds like good old marketing and sales.

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#462

Post by rtx » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 6:16 AM UTC

michaelchisari wrote: post #353

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"This knowledge is valuable in itself. It will make you a better, more well-rounded person, who has a richer life." That's a completely reasonable statement. "This degree is valuable economically. It will lead to you having a well-paying job that will lead to you being economically successful". For many degrees, that statement is false. The problem is that, when we talk about the value of a college education, much of…

A degree used to show someone was capable of learning more advanced topics. Companies hired broadly regardless of major and trained for the tasks needed. Degrees as having economic "worth" comes from the shift away from career training and apprenticeship and towards an expectation of readily available career skills (and unpaid internships, a related issue).

Isn't that the result of increasing complexity.

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#463

Post by rtx » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 6:23 AM UTC

simplify wrote: post #264

bhupy wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making education debts dischargeable in bankruptcy sounds good in theory, but against what collateral do you take out a college loan? Most bankruptcy includes collateral liquidation. What's to stop someone from obtaining a useless degree that doesn't contribute to the nation's economy, and then discharges the debt in bankruptcy? I think a big part of the problem is that debt is so readily issued for degrees that over…

> What's to stop someone from obtaining a useless degree that doesn't contribute to the nation's economy, and then discharges the debt in bankruptcy? Nothing, and that's exactly why education debts need to be dischargeable like anything else. Dischargeable loans makes loan companies have actual responsibility and consequences in deciding who to give loans to. Otherwise, they blindly give out loans (why not, there's n…

This will increase inequality, people from richer background will get loans easily.

What America has now is a good system, where anyone can use these loans to pull themselves up.

What government or maybe banks need to invest is in more career counseling.

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#464

Post by jedmeyers » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 6:50 AM UTC

vaidhy wrote: post #396

daniel-s wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your list is a list of countries that also happen to be at the top of this one [1]. They are the countries with the most freedom and capitalism. People are generally happy when they're free to own property and become prosperous. [1] https://www.heritage.org/index/ranking

I think you are confusing social democracy and communism[1]. I agree with you that people should be free to own property and become wealthy. However, I do not think it should come at the cost of removing social net for the less lucky. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy

Is that the same social democracy as in Russian Social Democratic Labour Party?

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#465

Post by namdnay » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 7:20 AM UTC

diebeforei485 wrote: post #428

jrumbut wrote: post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The arts (TV, movies, music, and related fields such as tourism, architecture, design, advertising) are massive industries in the United States. Then of course there are the soft power benefits of having much of the world grow up staring at America at the movies, singing along to American music, wearing blue jeans, etc. Same goes for many other developed economies. I admit I am someone who appreciates art for its own…

The fact that a relatively small percentage of worldwide artists have a large chunk of the worldwide audience only furthers my point: mass arts are by definition based on popularity, so we can only have so many artists. But my point still stands: How many of these artists got art degrees? Rihanna didn't, Kanye dropped out early, Billie Eilish and Taylor Swift didn't go to college. Michael Jackson didn't go to college…

Not that I’m arguing against you, but it is interesting to point out that a lot of the music performed by Rihanna and the likes is written composed and produced by people from Sweden, which has a great music education system

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#466

Post by namdnay » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 7:23 AM UTC

vaidhy wrote: post #400

linuxftw wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most of the "golden age of civilizations" had this property I don't know what civilizations you're talking about, but the vast, vast majority of humans in the past were busy working in the fields to avoid starvation. The classical fine artists were wealthy or had wealthy patrons.

An era of relative peace, prosperity, and cultural production which will define an entire society is often called a golden age. It is rare enough that it needs a mention in history. Here are a few examples: https://sites.google.com/site/dobsonandphillipsinc/home/anci... - During this era, the economy, arts, architecture and even commerce, flourished. Golden age of Gupta empire: [ https://resources.saylor.org/wwwresou…

The parent’s point is that even in these “golden ages”, 99% of the population was slaving away on farms all day every day

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#467

Post by simplesleeper » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 7:32 AM UTC

pyuser583 wrote: post #450

linuxftw wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We should talk about free college education or heavily subsidized one It already exists. It's called the internet. You can learn almost everything you need, and in much greater detail, than a traditional 'higher education' offered by a brick and mortar institution. The problem is only convincing the gate keepers.

That is simply untrue. You cant learn, for example, advanced cryptography outside a classroom.

why couldn't you? of course you can

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#468

Post by simplesleeper » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 7:37 AM UTC

pyuser583 wrote: post #450

linuxftw wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We should talk about free college education or heavily subsidized one It already exists. It's called the internet. You can learn almost everything you need, and in much greater detail, than a traditional 'higher education' offered by a brick and mortar institution. The problem is only convincing the gate keepers.

That is simply untrue. You cant learn, for example, advanced cryptography outside a classroom.

what is stopping you from buying and reading books on cryptography, number theory, security protocols etc?

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#469

Post by MaximumYComb » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 7:39 AM UTC

vaidhy wrote: post #339

I have been reading through the comments and I am very curious about a few things - 1. What "bullshit" degrees people are talking about? Are they the liberal arts studies? If so, as a society do we not see value in the fine arts? Expertise in music, language, anthropology, history, etc do not necessarily lead to a well-paying job.. but they give intellectually satisfaction in and of itself. 2. IMHO, the pay you are l…

The golden ages of civilizations had the majority of their populations fighting for survival. The elite were free to pursue what they wanted.

Re: A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

#470

Post by iguy » Sat, Aug 01, 2020, 7:39 AM UTC

tracker1 wrote: post #343

mcguire wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note that the average (mean, I assume) student loan payment is $393, according to the article. The median student loan payment is $222 ( https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2020/02/03/student... ). $393 is 15% of $2620 which annualizes to $31,512, which is about the median personal income for full-time workers (whoops, before taxes). ($222 is 15% of $17,760 annual, about the poverty line for two.) That's not a…

20% pretax deduction would probably be sufficient for repayment. Of course loan reform in general would probably be a good idea. If there are 10k graduating with a degree in a field with only 100 jobs/year needing that degree, or likewise paying less than $40k/year, should probably not be granting loans for those degrees in the first place.

10,15,20% all plausible figures, the point is just to ensure that it can't get so large that it gets in the way of living your life.

> 10k graduating with a degree in a field with only 100 jobs/year needing that degree

What I'd live very much to avoid is having a centralized body which makes such decisions. Under my scheme, lenders who identify such fields will be reluctant to grant loans, but how they decide what's in the field, and what exceptions to make, the can do however they like.