Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

How America's universities became debt factories

anandsanwal.me

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

401–410 of 564 posts

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#401

Post by IOT_Apprentice »

zozbot234 wrote: post #259
lapcat wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're correct except for one word: "lucrative". To this day, almost two decades after I left my philosophy PhD program (without a PhD), I still have massive student loan debt. Even if I had completed my degree, though, philosophy PhDs aren't particularly lucrative. Tenured professors at major universities do ok, but the road to getting tenure-track jobs and then tenure is littered with the bodies of grad students. I…

> It's worth noting, by the way, that the United States has a shortage of medical doctors. That's a pipeline problem. What the U.S. actually has is a severe bottleneck in available places at medical schools and for residency training.

Isn’t a limited pipeline intentional? Keeping the supply constraints keep wages higher.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#402

Post by lapcat »

BeetleB wrote: post #398
lapcat wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some departments have money, and some don't. Simple as that. I find it very odd that people are trying to deny my experience here.

They're not denying your experience. They are, however, pointing out you didn't do your research Well when picking programs to apply to. I've been in different universities and the experiences for the same departments very considerably. You specify on your application whether you want your admission to be conditional on funding. One communications department for example would typically admit only 2 to 3 students per…

> They are, however, pointing out you didn't do your research Well when picking programs to apply to.

That's presuming a whole hell of a lot, and it's insulting. You know absolutely nothing about me or my history except what I've already said, which is not much.

I'm not here to be second-guessed by anonymous rando strangers.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#403

Post by mbrumlow »

Izikiel43 wrote: post #236
mbrumlow wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You flew too close to the sun. You can’t argue with a bunch of people who are in debt and learned that playing the victim pays. It’s funny. That everybody is mad at the banks and schools. But the politicians and do good laws passed are what caused all of this. Banks did it want to give loans out for shitty degrees to people who would probably not pay them back. So laws were passed to force banks they had to give out…

> banks did it Banks didn’t?

No they did not. They threatened to simply stop offering loans for school. The only way to get them back on board was to make the loans they issue for school was to make it so such loans could survive bankruptcy.

Many banks were fine not offering loans if it meant they could not decline offering loans for specific degrees, schools or even based on the applicants grades.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#404

Post by next_xibalba »

seizethecheese wrote: post #300
next_xibalba wrote: post #243

I’ve said it before on HN and I’ll say it again: I don’t support any reform with respect to student loans that doesn’t see the academic institutions participate in the pain. I’d like to see a large number of universities get bankrupted by assuming some portion of the student loan liabilities of their alums, then allow the alums to file bankruptcy if they can’t pay off any remaining balances. Did you know that federal…

1) I do not agree with applying this retroactively. You shouldn’t change the rules in the middle of the game. 2) it would be unfair to make universities participate in the downside but not the upside. Perhaps the federal government should also turn the interest earned over to universities. This could actually go some way towards lessening resistance.

1) The game has been rigged since the beginning and the unis have been the biggest beneficiaries and the most malignant actors. You don't think they knew damn well what they were doing by charging $100k+ in tuition for an English degree to an 18 year with no hope of paying back the loans used to pay the tuition?

2) The universities have already gorged themselves at the greed-pig trough. How is it you think they can afford to pay all those $100k+ salaries to liberal arts profs, have a 1:1 ratio of admins to students, and pay their chancellors and presidents $500k+? All of it is funded by indebting students to the tune of $10s or $100s of thousands while granting useless degrees.

Let them suffocate under the weight of their sins. They are the worst actors in the entire ecosystem. Worse than the naive student borrows. Worse than the predatory lenders. Worse than the traitorous legislators. Why? Because they know they're in a position of trust. They wrap themselves in the clothing of the teacher and the philosopher while picking the pockets of naive teenagers who were told they're following the path to prosperity.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#405

Post by rr808 »

dgfitz wrote: post #79
lordnacho wrote: post #47

I don't know if this is some kind of heresy, but here we go. I don't think universities provide much value at all to the common student who is not going to be a PhD. I went to a very well-known institution known for putting the students in a room with the professors, maybe two or three students, to one professor. My economics professor taught me one on one. I still think, in the end, the work is mostly done alone, in…

> I still think, in the end, the work is mostly done alone, in a pile of books, on your own time. I feel compelled to link the quote from Good Will Hunting here, I will refrain. However I agree completely. I also went to a “great” school, and I learned everything from overpriced books on my own time. In fact, in my entire tenure of undergrad I never attended a full week of class, not even the first week.

Was it worth it then? Was there a benefit like meeting your classmates? I have to make the decision for my kids.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#406

Post by nkrisc »

adityamwagh wrote: post #268
ghaff wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plenty of smart people who get liberal arts degrees from top schools do just fine. I know plenty of them even though I have engineering degrees myself. They may not get FAANG salaries in general--unless they end up in management--but plenty of people I know are just fine.

I see a problem here. Why are English majors in Management positions? With LLMs, I don't see a value on an English degree anymore. So I personally believe it's just a money sink at this point. I don't believe art can be taught in universities as a degree program. Universities should only be for domains that have tangible value.

With the rise of LLMs an English degree may end up being desirable, considering the vapid drivel the models produce.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#407

Post by rr808 »

hiddencost wrote: post #19
advael wrote: post #12

I think it's really sad that we so reflexively consider universities vocational training that criticism of universities so often includes "offering degrees that won't get you a job" Actually academia predates the push to gate jobs behind undergraduate degrees, and trying to repurpose these institutions that mainly exist to train and employ researchers to be fully general vocational schools has been a disaster in ever…

At that time they were also incredibly exclusive and mostly the rich.

You mean if you are wealthy you can afford the best education available and that is a broad liberal arts curriculum.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#408

Post by in_cahoots »

csa wrote: post #278
Yaina wrote: post #30

It's somewhat besides the point of the piece and might be unfair, but I can't help to feel an immediate sense of distrust for any piece of writing that uses AI images. Anyways, tying lending terms to the value of the degree sounds like a horrible idea, because how do you even determine that? Seems to me the big issue is A) that the loans are managed b private companies with ridiculous terms and that even public state…

> It's somewhat besides the point of the piece and might be unfair, but I can't help to feel an immediate sense of distrust for any piece of writing that uses AI images. Im guessing that you’re probably not representative of the target audience, or the author doesn’t know his audience well. The image is thematically appropriate. I don’t think the author is trying to bamboozle anyone with that image.

My problem is that it’s extremely poorly-done. The chain seems to sprout from the first student’s hair. If the author couldn’t be bothered to pay attention to the first thing people see when they click on the webpage, how much thought is put into the rest of the article?

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#409

Post by rr808 »

alephnerd wrote: post #7

It depends on the type of university tbh. Getting a BA in Underwater Basketweaving from your local commuter state university is much less financially damaging than at Duke or UChicago. I'm not a fan of the idea of "useful" and "useless" degrees (ime, the best predictor for success is critical thinking skills, not major), but I do find private universities don't make as much financial sense, especially given that well…

> beyond your first job.

That's the twist though. If your first job is better, the second job is likely better too. It took me a decade before I made it to a first class job, sitting next to people who worked there straight out of college.

Post reply on HN