How much is college in other places? It's free here in San Francisco. You don't pay anything. You can get an education at CCSF without a dime paid if you live here.
Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
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Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#22Over the past few decades, college tuition and fees have metastasized, hitting an average of nearly $11,000 a year for in-state students who attend public four-year institutions, and now undergraduate enrollment is plummeting. There is a solution: Congress and more states should adopt tuition-free public higher education. This will alleviate the student debt crisis and enable low-income students, particularly those of color, to go to college.
The article fails to make a case that the stated problem, "tuition and fees have metastasized," will be addressed by "tuition-free public higher education."
Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#23Just a reminder, free public college was the norm for a long time, and many people benefited from it before turning around and working hard to dismantle it. It's not some foreign concept. It's very much apart of America's history. The question we need to ask is whether it's a better system now than it was in the past, and I don't see anyone arguing that it's better now.
Free tuition at public college might have been the norm; but not free room and board and books etc. Unless you could pay for all of that, there were also no guaranteed loans which meant that college was still unavailable except to the relatively wealthy.
Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#24Even if college were free, I think limits on funding availability will actually make it harder for someone to get in because now they have to be selective. It might lead to less people going to college.
Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#25Nothing is “free”. Sometimes the costs are hidden from most people. It’s like immigration. If you say, “anyone who comes here can’t be kicked out and you instantly get access to healthcare, food stamps, and free housing” then your maximum payout is the entire planet and you are bankrupt once people realize this. For public college to be free, I want to limit access, like happens in Europe. Sure college can be free… t…
It's telling that people aren't willing to contend with the corollary of "free education" and "free healthcare": limited capacity. Edit: I should probably mention that I'm generally in favor of state-funded education, for a variety of reasons.
Healthcare capacity in the US is a function of your ability to pay for it. We contend with limited supply today, we just kick the limited supply to groups of people who by and large aren't posting on this website.
Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#26How much is college in other places? It's free here in San Francisco. You don't pay anything. You can get an education at CCSF without a dime paid if you live here.
https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college
That has a breakdown for you.
Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#27Nothing is “free”. Sometimes the costs are hidden from most people. It’s like immigration. If you say, “anyone who comes here can’t be kicked out and you instantly get access to healthcare, food stamps, and free housing” then your maximum payout is the entire planet and you are bankrupt once people realize this. For public college to be free, I want to limit access, like happens in Europe. Sure college can be free… t…
> Sometimes the costs are hidden from most people. [..] It’s like immigration
The costs of immigration are not hidden, nor are its benefits. Financially speaking and from the point of view of the state, immigrant are net negative in the first couple of years - and then they are net positive for the rest of their lives. Immigration exists because market demand for workforce exists... I always find hilarious that it is the most free market advocates who tend to ignore that.
Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#28We've been prioritizing military spending over education for decades. I'd love to see even a bit of that swing the other way. I don't think taking a small amount from the military, by requiring them to optimize a few budgets, would be impactful on our nations security.
The US spends more on education than the military, it is difficult to defend the idea that spending on education has not been prioritized. Per the OECD, US spending per student is among the highest in the world by a large margin, which raises the question of value for the money already being spent -- any deficiencies compared to other countries aren't for lack of money.
The US also spends a lot of money on the military. Whether prudent or not, at least that spending produces an objectively superior product. We spend even more on education with ambiguous results.
Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#29I don't follow the logic the author is using. Let's say we make all public colleges free for students. "Elite" schools will still exist, and top students will still target schools such as Ivy/MIT/Stanford/etc. One look at the people in executive offices or top political offices and you'll find a substantial portion are graduates from elite schools.
The logic is that a good education is actually useful for the student outside of signaling membership in a zero-sum social elite.
Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free
#30I don't follow the logic the author is using. Let's say we make all public colleges free for students. "Elite" schools will still exist, and top students will still target schools such as Ivy/MIT/Stanford/etc. One look at the people in executive offices or top political offices and you'll find a substantial portion are graduates from elite schools.
As an Australian who benefited from a great public college (or as we call it uni) if public schools were free and high quality what would motivate the demand for elite schools? Yes elite schools are still networking grounds. But wouldnt the hope be that if people who already came out of public schools weren't saddled with crippling debt, enough of them could pay it forward to the broader group than their own elite school buddies?