The Misuses of the University

It does seem like we agree for the most part.

> I notice that you didn't address my remark about "adult daycare service". The presence of directionless "students" attending only to tick a box has serious negative impacts on the rest of the system. Add in student loans that can't be discharged and you've created an absolutely bizarre and (IMO counterproductive) set of economic incentives.

I didn't, because it seemed like a cheap insult. I don't know that directionless students have serious negative impacts on the rest of the system. They can have serious negative impacts on themselves due to student loan debt and a lack of a financially viable skillset when they stop attending college (with a degree or not).

What do you propose people who are 18 - 22 or so do to figure out what they want to do with the rest of their lives? And I'm not defending the status quo, which certainly can be improved.

Classes and more importantly practices get watered down to accommodate them. The situation gradually looks less like university of the 1950s and more like highschool.

Loans that can't be discharged removes lender hesitancy thus removes some degree of downward price pressure from the market. Institutions then have an incentive to capture this money due to the sheer quantity of it - ie not to let marginal students wash out. Hence the changes.

They even start attempting to attract based on amenities rather than prices. I won't belabor the subject. Others have written about it in incredible detail over the past several decades.

> What do you propose people who are 18 - 22 or so do to figure out what they want to do with the rest of their lives?

I don't know but bending what were once rigorous academic programs to accommodate them seems like the wrong answer to me. Do these people see any real benefit from taking on debt rather than working for that period? It seems to me the "benefit" is the diploma and that the requirement of a diploma to apply for a job is most often an arbitrary one these days.

As a thought experiment. Is there any particular reason an AA wouldn't have sufficed for the jobs that don't require specialized knowledge?

> Classes and more importantly practices get watered down to accommodate them. The situation gradually looks less like university of the 1950s and more like highschool.

Fair, though the solution there is to just flunk them out.

> I don't know but bending what were once rigorous academic programs to accommodate them seems like the wrong answer to me. Do these people see any real benefit from taking on debt rather than working for that period? It seems to me the "benefit" is the diploma and that the requirement of a diploma to apply for a job is most often an arbitrary one these days.

I'm not convinced this is happening at the scale you think it is, but higher education is an arms race to some extent and you'd need to get all parties to agree to de-escalate, but only for the ones who don't get much value out of the experience (a group that is somewhat hard to identify a priori).

> As a thought experiment. Is there any particular reason an AA wouldn't have sufficed for the jobs that don't require specialized knowledge?

For the jobs, probably not. I still think a portion of the "college experience" is just maturing, which I agree could be done while working in theory but there is some personal opportunity cost there.

It's not an easy problem or one that can be solved individually IMO. Something like mandatory public service could be an answer, but I don't have high hopes of that being enacted.