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I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

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Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#151

Post by com2kid »

tester756 wrote: post #98
mind-blight wrote: post #58

I'm concerned that the majority of "should we fix college or should we circumvent college" conversations don't bring up one of the scariest parts of our current economy: STEM jobs are the main viable path for economic stability and freedom. All of the conversations I've seen implicitly assume that this is good, and that the solution to farmer workers (or other low paid workers) escaping poverty is to train them as so…

That's real problem Only one person (the oldest one) from my like 20-30ppl circle within age range of 20-30 gets close to IT salaries, that's ridiculous in most cases it is around 40% (around 2 minimal wages) of my *nothing special* salary by IT standards (4.5 minimal wages), people with better cards get 7-10 minimal wages here, top people like 15-20+ and they see no reasonably easy way to jump higher (e.g within one…

People doing low voltage cat6 wiring make bank. Friend of mine got quoted 10k to run wires in his single family house, and that was w/o any walls up.

Plumbers doing fancy installs, not plunging toilets, over $100/hr. Huge demand, not nearly enough workers.

Some of the trades pay very, very, well.

Heck live in nannies working 8 hour shifts don't have to pay for housing and they pull in 60k-80k.

I know a woman running her own cat nail cutting service who is making good money and looking to hire help.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#152

Post by nimithryn »

Some of these points are correct. College does seem to be providing less value in the US, etc. Maybe some third-tier universities could be in trouble if there's a decline in college attendance.

But, "collapsing"? Universities are one of the most long-lived types of institutions known to humankind. Oxford was founded in 1096. I suspect they will be around quite a lot longer.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#153

Post by kube-system »

0898 wrote: post #132

Some kid is going to stand up and say: “You can throw me in jail or cancel my degree but I’m not paying my student debt… who’s with me?” And then the whole house of cards that is higher education collapses.

About 1 million people do that every year in the US. None of them are thrown in jail or have their degrees cancelled. Those working in finance are well aware of the concept of a default.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2018/10/01/student...

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#154

Post by manuelabeledo »

flatiron wrote: post #145
Tretiotrr wrote: post #57

In Germany you study for free. There was a video (perhaps even from kurzgesagt) which describes how critical it is for our society to allow as many people as easy access to knowledge as possible and not only for obvious reasons but also to increase the chance for all of us that the hidden genius is finding a cure for cancer. You can even study for free in Germany as an non German. You know what happens? Those people…

I think the argument would be better if Germany was some sort of education haven. My cousin fosters study abroad kids in the US and most are German. They say the German education isn’t anything to tout and having an American education on your CV is a big +. I’m not saying this whole thing is perfect but I just don’t see anyone banging down the doors for a German education.

> They say the German education isn’t anything to tout and having an American education on your CV is a big +.

Having lived in Europe for 30+ years, I have never heard of this outside higher education at very famous institutions, e.g. Stanford, Harvard, MIT.

In fact, primary and secondary schools in the US are usually seen as quite insufficient.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#155

Post by snarf21 »

gruez wrote: post #93
mind-blight wrote: post #58

I'm concerned that the majority of "should we fix college or should we circumvent college" conversations don't bring up one of the scariest parts of our current economy: STEM jobs are the main viable path for economic stability and freedom. All of the conversations I've seen implicitly assume that this is good, and that the solution to farmer workers (or other low paid workers) escaping poverty is to train them as so…

>STEM jobs are the main viable path for economic stability and freedom. >We really need farm workers, and most of them live in poverty. I love having more engineers, scientists, and doctors, but we desperately need non-STEM work to be a viable option This is basically a non-problem because of the supply/demand mechanics of the labor market. If farm workers' job gets sufficiently bad from a value proposition perspecti…

It is not a non-problem for people without your privilege. Gig workers, immigrants and others with no viable options are forced to do these jobs or starve. All the while people complain about immigrants crossing the border and "taking their jobs". Graduating high school seniors aren't lining up to mow grass or pick fruit or work as a meat packer for $15/hour. They want to come out of college to a 6 figure job with no skills or training. It is going to be a long long time until we have enough automation to not need workers for things like picking apples, etc. A lot of people coming out of school with out a tech or medical disposition would be best served by picking a trade. We have a shortage already and it is only going to get worse. Running a 3 person plumbing company could easily compete with most tech jobs.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#156

Post by 015UUZn8aEvW »

tessierashpool wrote: post #72
crackercrews wrote: post #52

Definitely agree that removing the SAT appears to be related to the upcoming supreme court case about affirmative action. COVID was a good reason to delay it for a couple years. But schools are pushing it out further. That makes no sense. It seems the SAT is increasingly considered "racist" because it reveals racial disparities in learning. What's next? Get rid of the driver's license test because it turns that white…

that is entirely a guess, though. there's actual documented evidence of colleges admitting less Asian-Americans and Jews than the test scores of either group would suggest, and Altman refers to this phenomenon in the thread. > It seems the SAT is increasingly considered "racist" because it reveals racial disparities in learning. What's next? Get rid of the driver's license test because it turns that white kids pass i…

>the SAT's a way of laundering discrepancies in generational wealth, which is indeed due to racist public policy as well as racist private actions. it may be intended not that way, but that's how it functions.

I'm not aware of data on SAT scores and family net worth, but there is plenty of data on SAT scores and family income. Controlling for income doesn't come close to accounting for racial gaps; the richest black kids barely do better than the poorest white kids.

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ezekiel-Dixon-Roman/pub...

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#157

Post by manuelabeledo »

nimithryn wrote: post #152

Some of these points are correct. College does seem to be providing less value in the US, etc. Maybe some third-tier universities could be in trouble if there's a decline in college attendance. But, "collapsing"? Universities are one of the most long-lived types of institutions known to humankind. Oxford was founded in 1096. I suspect they will be around quite a lot longer.

Oxford is in the UK, though.

US universities famously have different priorities, compared to their European counterparts.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#158

Post by 4oo4 »

Really surprised no one has brought up that admissions are dropping (especially among men), and that almost all universities are built on the poverty labor of captive educators. Meanwhile administrators take all the money.

Case in point: https://futurism.com/the-byte/university-professor-unpaid

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#159

Post by edflsafoiewq »

crackercrews wrote: post #126
sometimeshuman wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an ancedote, I was told by my low income peer group that you get 600 points just for filling out your name on the SAT and that 800 points could get you into a great school like MIT. So I assumed it was a pass/fail exam in a sense and left early during the verbal part because I found it condescending and boring. Before the exam, I couldn't understand why the higher income kids were paying for SAT training classes.…

You get 200 points per section automatically. [1] And to get into MIT you'd need at least 1,000 points, no matter your race. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAT

Why does it have such a weird score range?

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#160

Post by dmurray »

nimithryn wrote: post #152

Some of these points are correct. College does seem to be providing less value in the US, etc. Maybe some third-tier universities could be in trouble if there's a decline in college attendance. But, "collapsing"? Universities are one of the most long-lived types of institutions known to humankind. Oxford was founded in 1096. I suspect they will be around quite a lot longer.

I don't think he's suggesting universities will go away completely. A 10% or 30% or 90% in US university attendance/revenue/headcount over a period of a few years would objectively be a collapse no matter how well Oxford or MIT continues to thrive.
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