Higher education

The college-cost calamity

Many American universities are in financial trouble

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In 1974 it cost me $633 per year in tuition to attend U.C. San Diego. I think today it is north of $12,000. Add housing and books, and a kid may graduate with $80,000+ in loans. Most undergraduate degrees do not lead to a related job of profession, so it is off to a low wage job or ????

Think long and hard in choosing your major and what it really means to make $12 per hour.


The obvious solution is to return to the core curriculum of 1960. But you can't cut back the psuedo-disciplines that have infested academia since 1960, because the professors of Jewish Womyns Studies and Post-modern Deconstructionism are all tenured. Just imagine if the employees of GE or IBM were tenured: they'd both be bankrupt.

Josef Hoffman in reply to inflationist

There is no reason the relevant content contained in Womyn's studies can't be incorporated into one lower division English course. If you can think of a pseudo discipline, it's probably taught as part of an English major's critical approaches to literature course. If it's actually worthy of it, there might even be a course title dedicated to it, but usually it gets incorporated into another course title with more substance. Most of the scholarship that originates these stupid majors comes from English professors who write a cultural analysis that metastasizes into a monster. I'm thinking of Judith Butler and Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick in particular. Students who write poorly and fear the wrath of the English professor's critical eye and merciless pen decide to major in Gender Studies, or Queer Studies, or Womyns Studies to escape academic rigor. Their professors, wanting for students, return the favor of attendance with grade inflation as an incentive for other students to take their stupid classes. I resent that those "disciplines" are often lumped into the liberal arts with my English degree. I actually had to work for my degree.

Todd T

The cost of education is high precisely because of free government money in many forms such as grants to students but also grants to programs run by universities but even more so the fact that government hands out loans. Just like anything else where money is handed out for nothing, the universities start racking up tuition all the while telling themselves it is free money and who cares of the student has to pay it back in a decade.

Why would government do this? Well in America, since government now is the sole and only source for student loans(it is not legal to obtain a student loan that is not government backed) the politicians have their greedy criminal, parasitical hands in the money of a student from the day they start college. Since the tuition is about 10 times more than it should be, the politician is guaranteed most students will never succeed because at first the small money they get when entering the workforce is stifled and sucked a way by student loans and when these loans get paid off, the former student is now in welfare or in the middle class where the government taxation kicks in to ensure the most number of people stay in the middle class and lower. Why, because this is the group the politicians can steal the most money from. If everybody became well off, the government would lose all of their power and money because there would no longer be a reason for welfare, including student loans in a society where nearly everyone is successful.

Add to this the proliferation of pointless degrees and the government and education industry having an active role in preventing a proliferation degrees in useful subjects like engineering and an outright ban on trade schools, starting with the removal of such lessons in highschools and the governments total lack of support for these and by support I mean providing credentialing so a man can learn a trade in a way that doesnt bind him to ridiculous medieval, apprenticeships and guilds or the control of certifications left in the hands of associations in the industry that have a conflict of interest in being both the issuer of a certification and controlling where someone can work and how much they are paid.

Want to fix education and this debt problem, get government money out of education, increase the status of trade schools to be equal to a university and allow freedom to dictate what majors and classes are offered. Not only would we have less expensive education, these kids will come out as scientists, engineers, plumbers, mechanics, programmers, farmers and many other useful jobs and we will have far far less useless community organizers and occupy wall streeters running around living off welfare.

inflationist in reply to Todd T

I agree. We are graduating high school and college kids with no marketable skills, including such obscure subjects as literacy and arithmetic. Basically, the high school graduate of 1960 was better educated than many of todays illiterate "college graduates". Oh, and as an employer it is illegal to give an applicant a written test because of "disparate impact", which forces employers to look for other markers of intelligence or achievement. And we are coming close to the day when discrimination on the basis of relative intelligence or achievement will be illegal. They have already outlawed asking for SAT scores because they are "discriminatory".

Josef Hoffman in reply to Todd T

It is still legal to get a private loan. The government just stopped backing loans provided by private banks who then pocketed the profits. Congress decided it made more sense for us, the taxpayers, to pocket the profits from interest instead through direct loans. So really, they just stopped the banks from mooching off us taxpayers. There is no law stopping you from using a private lender if you wish.

I agree that easily available student loans lead to education inflation. But the federal government only provides somewhere around 46,000 dollars in undergraduate aid for all four years. Anything past that has to be made up with private loans, and because the government made private college loans impossible to discharge in bankruptcy (back in 2005), they have proliferated, allowing colleges to keep raising tuition with no limits.

I graduated in 2006, and it seemed like my college was always building something new. It was ridiculous. Have you seen the 4 star hotels they call "dorms" these days? Whatever happened to sagging old sofas in basement rec rooms with chipped foosball tables? My tuition kept going up and they kept doing capital improvements. I mean, the buildings are gorgeous and all, but I didn't learn more because of them wasting my tuition dollars on palaces.

I remember trying to get into the electrician trade. Talk about a medieval guild! Dang! If you don't know someone, you don't have a chance. And it takes a five year apprenticeship! Like, really? It does NOT take five years to figure out how to lay conduit. Now THAT is an entitled group of tradesmen!

CnKQ7pSia6 in reply to Josef Hoffman

Barriers to entry in the form of licenses or apprenticeships make perfect sense in some professions. In many, they are simply ridiculous. Your example of an electrician is one of those. Other inane requirements that come to mind in the US at least are license to be a beautician and the ridiculous requirement for insanely expensive medallions to drive a cab. There are also more sophisticated "moats" erected around professions like medicine which lobby to block the entry of foreign physicians, many of whom I have personally known and have cleared the US medical license exam at or above the 95th percentile!

On a couple of other minor notes, $46,000 in aid is a very significant amount when you consider that most state universities have fees for in-state residents are between $10-15,000 per year. That amount is then good enough to cover all four years.

As for the dorms, I went to an Ivy League university (admittedly private) where the rooms and food mess were complete and total crap. And the rent and board were ridiculously high. I remember each meal working out to some $7-8 and this was in the year 2001! One of the funniest jokes was the school publishing the participation rate of students in the food program extolling its quality - something like 99% of students in year 1 (!), way less than 50% in year 2. And in the corner next to an asterix in small print the note: students in year 1 are compulsorily required to enroll in the university meal plan!

aftrglw in reply to inflationist

"...including such obscure subjects as literacy and arithmetic". Seriously? If the rest of your post didn't scream against it, I would think that you were being sarcastic. Literacy and arithmetic are necessary life skills that everyone should have. Everyone should be reading before they vote or be able to calculate how much extra they'll pay if they get a loan for 30 rather than 20 years. Besides, you can't study science, engineering, mechanics, etc without a strong grounding in mathematics. Assuming you meant 'literature' rather than 'literacy', most high school English classes spend as much time teaching grammar and vocabulary rather than discussing the finer points of A Tale of Two Cities. Most high school graduates still don't understand their language well-enough after graduating too, which is why so many colleges require a few English classes as general ed, and many have students in remedial ones. Thus, if you're anything to go by, it does not really seem that "the high school graduate of 1960 was better educated than many of todays illiterate 'college graduates'".

I do agree that there is far too many degrees in 'underwater basketweaving' type subjects and not enough in things that are more useful. I studied English and went back to get a masters in something more serious. But there is a need for most humanities and social sciences, it's simply that there's too many people studying these subjects and not enough demand for them, particularly in the humanities and to a lesser extent the social sciences. There's a need for English and History graduates as teachers, writers, editors, etc. We need criminologists in law enforcement. IR, area studies, and language graduates as diplomats. We need social workers. It's not that these people 'don't have marketable skills', it's simply that there's too many people with such skills for a limited number of jobs. It's not all the colleges' fault, people should stop telling their children that they must go to college, and high school students should be educated about the job paths and opportunities that await them after school, whether they go to college or become an electrician. That seems to be the best way to stop hoards of students studying subjects that there's little demand for in the job market.

aftrglw in reply to inflationist



Todd T in reply to Josef Hoffman

Even back when I was in school which was over 2 decades ago, they were spending money on everything you can imagine, except of course education.

However, today, having been through this with my son, you cant get a loan for education except through the government. Sure you can get a private loan as long as you dont tell the lender the reason for the loan is tuition at a college. The minute I said this is for my son to go to college, the lender stopped everything and referred me to the FAFSA government website.

You are right on about the medieval guilds and various trades. One thing I recently found out, in some states, certification is only a test for plumbers and some other trades. However, no one seems to know this, so the people still going through the ridiculous apprenticeships are really being scammed. They could just learn it themselves and take the test. Not all states are like that. Then even if you get licensed, now you have to deal with some ridiculous wannabe government like associations. So even if you become an electrician or plumber, you are still stuck with having your prices set by an association, or they try to prevent you from getting work.

I think it gets back to government. Get their money out of the system and their financial backing and not only will tuition go down but we will get better quality, since colleges will have to actually compete for students. Plus students will be free to pursue their actual dreams or goals, including trade schools and universities will have to offer classes in what people want. Such as a physics degree like mine, without all the BS classes that have nothing to do with physics. That is my favorite, 4 years of university and the first two are total crap classes that are effectively a repeat of high school. The only excuse for that is they want to force you in for 4 years or not have to actually teach much that is related to your major.

All around this education system is set up to be degree factories in the cheapest and most useless degrees they can find taught to as many people as possible, many of which who dont really belong in college, and they get paid by the government to perpetuate this nonsense.


The cost of college education has some basis in supply and demand. On the supply side, when was the last time that a new elite college was created. On the demand side, you need to go back to the Reagan Administration which set the US on a path of lower marginal taxes which in turn led to the rich getting much richer which in turn began to drive up the cost of many things such as housing and college education. You only need a small fraction of the population able and willing to pay to sustain the kind of tution increases we are seeing. However, as a country, we run the risk of creating an under-class of have nots because at some point, the middle class just can't pay and only the rich get an education. Is this good policy?

The other key factor is that college tuition is like being on an airplane--you never know what the guy in the seat next to you actually paid to be there. So, who really knows what is the rate of increase in what students are actually paying as compared to the sticker price of the tuition. I agree it is a bubble that breaks at some point but who knows when.

Blaming Reagan for the mismanagement of state colleges and universities is partisan noise. And blaming increased housing and college prices on the "rich" is silly. The "rich" don't breed fast enough to be a demand factor.

Empire building, fat retirement plans, and misdirected government loans are much greater factors.

Please would you care to name any major industrial sector - goods or services - where a tiny proportion of customers, who account for an equally tiny proportion of sales, determine pricing?

Do 10% of customers willing to pay $75,000 for a Toyota drive the average prices of its cars up?

Do the "rich", even assuming the top 10% of income earners, have so many kids that their progeny account for a disproportionate % of college kids?

The middle class needs to ask exactly WHY it is that college prices keep increasing at rates that are way above the rate of inflation. Because it is they who are the main bulk of paying "customers".



The awful for-profits receive tens of billions USD yearly in subsidies? I think the government may just have found something even more harmful to the poor than corn to subsidize...

Rob S in reply to 2mdbv82xzB

The "for profit" rant is a hoax, spouted by their competitors and the political supporters. They are ALL "for profit". Costs associated with explicitly defined profits make little impact on total cost.


It's fascinating, and entirely predictable, that the Economist would accurately identify administrative empire-building and infrastructure gold-plating as the main source of cost increases in American higher education - and then say that the remedy must involve axing of academic departments. Never miss the opportunity of a good crisis, eh?


The main problem is all the building and extraneous residential luxuries going on at most top-tier schools. I realize that century-old buildings need to be updated and new technology needs to be accomodated. However, the expensive private schools already have beautiful campuses and student life is already like a country club. I went to two of these schools and it was great, but they keep trying to build more and more...stuff...when what they have is already pretty awesome. I know the schools need to attract the best kids, and it's a matter of supply and demand, but they don't need bigger dorms so each student can have a private bathroom. They don't need new academic buildings that they don't have enough professors to fill. If you keep this type of thing up you don't attract the best students, you attract the ones who care more about private bathrooms than the quality of their education and the cost of their tuition.

Puntmeister in reply to Bugs10

Having attended US universities, and having viewed European universtities, it is clear the astronomical cost of American higher eduction is all the 'fluff'.

Strip universitites down to core teaching facilities, administrative offices, and modest housing, and you'd slash costs substantially.

I, like most US college grads, cherished the college years - why wouldn't I? - it was the best, longest vacation one could ever expect in life!

Ernest J. King in reply to Puntmeister

Don't be disingenuous. It's not *all* "fluff." American universities also spend far more on R&D and, in turn, put out much more in the way of scientific and technological advancements than their old-world counterparts as a whole.

MySetDancer in reply to Ernest J. King

According to a previous Economist article which cited a study on university costs, on average, private research universities spend around $7,500 per student per year on non-academic "overhead." Read: costs not related directly or indirectly to teaching. And at least in California, very little real research is conducted in the State College system as their main focus is teaching undergrads but their tuition rates are skyrocketing anyway! Why?

Now, I don't care what the Ivy League spends on "overhead", but I do care what state-supported colleges and universities spend.

Ernest J. King in reply to MySetDancer

Funny you should mention California and their state colleges; that evil, progressive liberal democratic wasteland. According to the Academic Ranking of World Universities (compiled By the Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China), which is widely observed and considered to be one of the most thorough and objective rankings (and mainly criticized by its skeptics for being too focused on research and natural sciences), SEVEN out of the world's top 50 universities are part of the University of California system. That's 14% of the spots occupied by a single system. In fact, 4 out of the top 20 and the number 2 university in the world bear the name "University of California." That pretty much makes it the most reputable public college system in the world in terms of science and research, if you don't follow. To give you some perspective, there are 9 European public universities in the world's top 50, only 5 of which are in the EU — and 11 American universities in the same bracket *besides* the 7 I already mentioned in California.
Just to summarize, this is the breakdown of American and European public universities among the world's top 50 ARWU institutions:
American, excluding California: 11
Californian: 7
European, EU: 5
European, non-EU: 4
In the end, that old "Ivy League" argument is just not going to work.

Bugs10 in reply to Ernest J. King

I agree, and I also didn't mean to imply that *all* the spending was fluff. I was just suggesting that if they weren't all racing to build the fanciest buildings, it would save a lot of money.
When I donate (modestly, I have loans to pay!) to my fancy alma mater, I always specify the money be used for academic excellence or financial aid.

Bugs10 in reply to Puntmeister

Well, I'm not sure what you mean by European-- the only school outside the US I know much about is LSE. I know in the UK, a non-UK resident will pay the same amount as he would for a comparable program in the US. I got into a 3-term masters program at LSE several years ago and I looked at the tuition on the letter and was like, "$13,000! that's awesome!" then I was like, oh right...that's pounds. Given the conversion rate at the time and the cost of living in London, it turned out be much less expensive for me to go to a comparable (if not more comprehensive)4-term program in the US. And given that the LSE campus is really cool but not nearly as extravagent as a big-time US school, one HOPES all that money is going to professors and research and technology, but who knows?
And also, I LOVED college. LOVED IT. I loved being on a beautiful, secluded campus, learning from brilliant professors, meeting smart, interesting people...the life is idyllic. But I would never in a thousand years call it a vacation. I worked my butt off in college. Before I started I did the math and realized my parents were paying something like $200/hour of class time. I felt like it was my job to go there and learn everything I possibly could for that kind of money. If college is considered a vacation, then yeah, it is a HUGE waste of money. But that's up to the individual student.

Bugs10 in reply to Puntmeister

Oh I also wanted to mention that in Europe it is not as common for students to live on campus. Most kids live at home and go to school locally or share an apartment off campus. Thus comparing the "fluff" on US campuses to European ones isn't really fair. The European schools don't have to invest as much in dorms and dining halls and gyms and campus services and focus on making them all attractive to the majority of students.

Ernest J. King in reply to JM3

It is. The U.S. puts out significantly more scientific papers per capita than the EU, and its papers get cited more often. To my knowledge, there are very few countries in Europe with higher per-capita figures than the U.S. – Switzerland for sure, Denmark and Sweden likely, the Netherlands perhaps. But these are smaller countries with more specialized economies. You look at states of comparable economies and populations like Maryland, North Carolina, Massachusetts, or California, and they have similar per-capita scientific output.

Rob S in reply to Ernest J. King

A disingenuous response, Ernest. External research funding more than covers the cost of research programs. In fact, university administrators treat research grants as cash cows, bleeding off as much as half of the grants and diverting the money to their favorite projects and bloated overhead.


Though I don't think that majors like Women's Studies, Religious Studies, Chicano/African/Asian studies, American History etc., should be eliminated completely, they should at least remain very small departments with very *limited and competitive* slots for those who TRULY wish to pursue research and develop new ideas within those fields.

Or, at the very least, limit the social sciences to History, Political Science, Sociology, Anthropology and Geography with options to specialize within those fields through individualized and independent studies. Is there really a need to create a department for every sub-speciality and spinoff?

Though I most definitely believe in the pursuit of knowledge for knowledge's sake alone, a much more mature and intellectual society would realize that a subject does not need be taught at a university for it be pursuit with vigor and rigor. Self-taught intellects tend to have a better understanding of critical thinking anyways. Unfortunately, too much of our youth prefers to spend their time watching Jersey Shore and twittering, than pick up a book.

iThinker in reply to OrlandoDV8

How true that is. Most communities now have excellent public libraries where you can find practically any book on any subject and educate yourself. Online universities like Coursera, Khan Academy etc. will only continue to extend this trend. Univ. of Washington along with a few other colleges have started offering credits for online courses completed provided the students take an in-person exam administered by a certified testing agency at the end of the course. That, is the future.

Puntmeister in reply to OrlandoDV8

Agreed. I personally think many University applicants are ripped off by the whole system - no one ever clearly explains to them that liberal arts degrees have little practical value (this seems obvious to us now, but, bear in mind, most teenagers are just taught that they need a college degree - any degree, no matter what the major).

The reality is, the only degrees of value are technical in nature - engineering, biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, computer sciences, accounting, finance, medical, and, to a lesser extent, law.

Most of the other degrees have limited value. Certainly, there is personal value in learning about history, art, sociology etc - but, as you mention, there is no need to spend tens of thousands of dollars on University schooling for subjects one could just as readily learn by reading a book off a library shelf.

Shame on University administrations for failing to adequately steer students into productive degree programs.



No one has any grounds to cry and whine about being in debt and unable to find a job if they are stupid enough to major in religious and women's studies. Study that if you want to -- after all, study solely for the sake of personal enrichment is not a bad thing -- but endure the burdens of your personal choices in silence please. They are of your own making, and no one else wants to hear your bellyaching.

Puntmeister in reply to LexHumana

You are failing to hold the providers of such worthless degrees responsible.

Who should we hold more responsible:

1) Teenagers, who are brain-washed into thinking they just need a college degree, any degree? (rarely is it ever emphasized to college applicants that all degrees are not equal, even from the same school).

2) University administrations, which do the lion's share of the brain-washing, and gladly offer student's the chance to be fleeced?

Your argument is like saying we should hold (teenage) drug addicts responsible for their addictions, but drug dealers should never be held accountable.

CnKQ7pSia6 in reply to Puntmeister

You have to honestly ask what quality of high school students we are producing if it is so easy to brainwash them.

Why blame the universities? The employment rates, career paths and average pay for all types of majors are readily available, are they not?

We are no longer in the 60s or 70s era where such information was hard to get. Any student who bothers to do even a day of internet research will see what their future looks like if they want to major in gender studies, English literature or computer science. These are adults, not some 8 year old kids we're talking about.

Bugs10 in reply to LexHumana

Um, I know a women's studies major who is now a corporate lawyer and bringing in six figures. I know a religion studies major who went to Harvard Business School and makes more in a year than I, an economics major, make in five.
Any major is what you make of it. If you have the passion, any subject can be a valuable challenge. And don't forget, your major isn't your entire education. Most liberal arts and sciences programs require you take a range of disciplines. I took 37 classes in 4 years of college and 11 of them were in my major (one more than was required). I know a physician who was a French major but still fulfilled all the pre-med requirements. You can be a women's studies major and minor in economics.
It's not as if anyone *expects* that a women's study major in and of itself going to get them some six-figure job after graduation. That's not why you do it. You do it to learn about the world around you, to excel at something you care about. Maybe this person plans to get a PhD and go into academia. Maybe this person has a plan to parlay their reasoning and writing skills into a law degree. NO arts and sciences degree is supposed to stand alone as a directly corresponding vocation for the rest of your life. An economics major who goes into business isn't going to use that grueling econometrics class he took in college. A biochemistry major can't do much with her degree until she goes to grad school. You need a masters and extended certifications to get a lot of engineering jobs.
My first semester of college I took an art history class because it was the only class that still had spaces open. I had no interest in art and didn't want to waste my time taking something so "soft." Taking that class turned out to be one of the best things I ever did. I learned a TON about how to study at the college level, about how to gather a large amount of information and thoughts into a meaningful essay. I learned about something that's been a part of human life since cave dwellings. That class just made me a smarter, better person. To me that's why you pay for an arts and science degree.

LexHumana in reply to Bugs10

Yeah, yeah, I've heard it all before, and it is pretty much poppycock.

I am fully aware of what I am talking about, because I double majored in Philosophy and Sociology. I enjoyed being a beatnik for 4 years, finally sobered up from all the beer drinking and pot smoking, and tried to get a decent job. There were none for Philosopher Sociologists. After ping ponging from uninspiring job to uninspiring job, I went to law school, did well, got a great career started and made a lot of money.

If I have any advice to aspiring college students, it is that they have two paths they have to decide over which to take. They can be practical, and treat college as a skills development period, after which they have good prospects for finding employment, or they can take the path I took: study what you enjoy, broaden your horizons, then AFTERWARDS start worrying about how you are going to pay the bills. That second path is fun and expensive for the first 4 years, then becomes long and financially painful for the rest of your life, unless you are smart enough and financially savvy enough to put yourself into a graduate program that has some job prospects to it (like law or medicine).

Don't be stupid and major in women's studies, unless you are dead set convinced you want to become a college professor for the rest of your life. If you plan on becoming the next avant garde artiste, you don't even need to study art history, just like you don't need to study music to become the next great pop star. The choices you make as an undergrad can either make your future path easier or harder; it is a shame that people make their future lives harder all in the name of pursuing something that interests them as a callow 18 year old.

h120180 in reply to LexHumana

I would like to add my opinion to this discussion, with the caveat that I am still in college and thus have not accumulated the experience that would allow me to speak with authority about the job market. I think that knowledge about the professions combined with HIGHLY specific and relevant internship experience can make a liberal arts degree marketable. If a college student goes through four years of college and doesn't bother to learn about what professions are out there, what careers are available, what the job market looks like, then she's wasting her time and money. But if she takes the time to find a career path she will (theoretically) be qualified for with her B.A., the battle is already half-won.

The other half of the battle is acquiring bang-on experience. I took the time to learn about the job market and discovered that the profession of nonprofit development and fundraising both met my desire to give back to my community and offered an extremely high probability of job placement, since most nonprofits in this economy are desperate for development people. Then I went out and offered my services as an intern (subsidized through the Federal Work-Study program) to whatever nonprofits would have me. I acquired an internship with a small grassroots nonprofit, and now am responsible for all of their fundraising efforts, including social marketing, an annual giving campaign, and fundraising events. You think that won't get me hired after I graduate? Think again. This puts me LEAGUES ahead of other entry-level applicants, even those from Ivy League schools. I took the time to analyze the job market, network, and get experience. College students need to be taught to do the same.


Funny, some people talk about focusing on trade and blue-collar skills...haven't they realized that good blue-collar jobs have gone?
What happens now is that the developing world is catching up, now we have a globalized world where competition is strong. Regardless of being an educated white collar or a blue-collar worker, from now on, to make a living, to succeed, one has to be very talented and hard working, and maybe work for less.
The era of easy, subsidized life, where any lazy average Joe could make a nice living in the rich world, while people in the third world starved, is over!

JM3 in reply to Christina0216

This is because of a higher percentage of the income going to profits instead of to employees. If this changed, people could make more and probably more people could be hired too.

h120180 in reply to Christina0216

Actually, no. It's not just that. It's not just that blue-collar jobs are gone, it's that, as Richard Florida said in his book The Flight of the Creative Class, even in states where blue-collar jobs are available, young people are eschewing them... even as cosmetology classes in those states fill up with working-class kids hoping to be hairstylists (direct quote). Globalization didn't do that. Don't go blaming the multinationals or the politicians for this state of affairs. The blame belongs to them, sure... but it belongs to us as well. We're ALL adultering, immoral, lazy tax cheats. They're just a reflection of us.

Not to say that the situation is right the way it is, but in a democracy, a people always gets the leaders it deserves. Somebody's getting a kick out of Snooki and the Real Housewives. Probably not the people on this site, but...


The 2013 BMW M6 starts at $102,350, a beautifully engineered sedan, yet in two years will likely be worth 60% that amount, and, of course, provides no future income stream for the typical. On the contrary, the M6 is probably one of the most expensive automobiles to maintain, requiring specialized services from highly train mechanics. Do the majority of buyers pay cash? Not likely. They pay some amount down and finance the rest.

An 18 year old high school graduate can finance a degree at less than the cost of the M6, pay a finance rate far less than the normal automobile loan, incur little or no operating costs, and acquire an asset likely to appreciate in value over time rather than depreciate, practically a sure thing with the M6 or any other car.


LexHumana in reply to RoyFan51

I am pretty sure a degree in religous and women's studies will be just as worthless 20 years from now as it is today. Economic appreciation in value only occurs with things that start out with some sort of an economic value in the first place. Multiply zero by 100% and you still get zero.

Rob S in reply to RoyFan51

Roy reinforces the principle put forward here many times. If you insist on judging the value of a degree by your ability to pay for it, then you had better choose a major that will give you a fighting chance to pay it back. That hypothetical 18 yr old he creates is part of a small fraction of American college students who graduate with a $100K debt. Their degree will NOT appreciate with time, unless it starts out with some value (say an entry job paying $50K). Most will never see the inside of an M6 - which is usually paid for with cash.

However, if you have other criteria for your choice, then accept the reality of your decision. And ignore those fallacious argument being promoted by the apologists for our higher education system.


Maybe some students just are not college material? Blue collar jobs are not bad, especially in the US where they consist of things like working in an automated factory, a mechanic, driving a truck, or being a police officer. Encouraging non-college level students to take those jobs lowers demand and alleviates a lot of pressure on school prices. There are plenty of those jobs available in the US today. Those jobs do require training, but the training to be a mechanic is more in line with a mechanic's salary than a college degree for an engineer who ends up as a mechanic.

Also a lot of kids graduate and then they have mountains of debt built up that take years to pay off. You can't even declare bankruptcy to wipe it away, because student loans stay with you until either you die or they are paid in full. So you have a college graduate with a $40,000 a year job who has $200,000 in debt and still has to pay for living expenses. You don't need to be a math major to realize that would take roughly 40 years to pay off (assuming you never get a raise relative to inflation and you pay $5000 a year off principal balance).

Something has to be done. One of my buddies who was roughly a C student in high school said it to me best. "I aint gonna get through college, so I am going to fire academy to become a fireman. The pay is good, the training isn't super expensive, and I won't have a ton of debt to pay off. Plus I will have a job when I finish."


I think the general direction of US universities' development is absolute right, the purpose of university is not to gain profits but to attract excellent professors and students, the guideline of education can promote the the development of society and enhancement of science and technology .However, chinese universities lack this guideline, many universities don't consider improving the quality of education as their most important goal, and many teachers and professors just think how they can make more money. Many students can not devote their time and energy to academic study because of the effect of this atmosphere. There are many things chinese universities can learn from us universities.

Rob S in reply to bigbenbear

Many Chinese universities are very active in driving programs for improvement. A friend recently spent a year teaching an advanced engineering course at a large but not well-known Chinese university, He came away very impressed.

American universities are much more "profit-oriented" than their foreign counterparts. However, they convert those profits into higher administration salaries, more administrators and other forms of empire building and the construction of expensive edifices.


We're only about a decade in to the online learning revolution and websites that offer high quality free instruction like Khan Academy (http://www.khanacademy.org/), Coursera (https://www.coursera.org/), and the Open CourseWare Consortium (http://ocwconsortium.org/) are already shaking things up.

Many traditional brick and mortar schools will not evolve quickly enough to survive the next decade - especially if they're burdened with debt and fail to recognize the bubble in subsidized tuition.

alecmuller in reply to jbunniii

Would I hire someone who ONLY had Khan Academy courses? No - and for the same reason I wouldn't hire a new engineering graduate from a brick and mortar school if he/she ONLY had classroom courses and no lab classes or internships.

Watching lectures (on a chalkboard or a computer monitor) isn't enough on its own.

Brick and mortar schools are kidding themselves, though, if they think they can go on offering mediocre lectures with minimal interactivity for $2,000 per course when sites like Coursera are can offer higher-quality lectures and improved interactivity (http://www.aei-ideas.org/2012/08/ted-talk-daphne-koller-co-founder-of-co...) for free. Lab classes and other "can't be done online" elements of learning will need to make up a bigger chunk of their revenue.

iThinker in reply to alecmuller

That is changing. Univ. of WA and other colleges are now offering credit for online courses completed if the student passes an in-person exam administered by a certified testing agency. This is the future. Eventually more and more degrees will be conferred through online universities. There will also be some consolidation. We don't need 1,000 online universities all offering their own version of Sociology 101.


It's no wonder studying in US is not a great business if you want to save money. If you have the desire of pursuing a degree in a English-speaker country, you should search other English-speaker countries (like UK and Canada, per example), in which the cost are lower than in US. Or, as the best way to get away of high amount of fees nowadays, paying a little bit less or even nothing, apply for a scholarship, keeping good grades and solid academic perfomance. But not all are able to get them, since they require a level of intelligence and capacity higher than normal, in a way. Then, I see that it's very difficult to one not piling on debts (even for being the colleges in a game of interests with big companies, financial institutions, governments, i.e, with many capitalist and political markets of influence and power). The access to credit is very flexible and easy (and colleges end up by raising their eyes on loans) as well, based on the premise that everyone wants their dreamed degree and grow professionally. It's simply the total seeking of everyone for having their "place on Sun", as it's always been, sometimes with critical consequences on economy.

OrlandoDV8 in reply to Rukawa_BR12

Unfortunately, as a lower-middle class American, foreign universities aren't truly an option as the foreign-student fees are exorbitant and scholarships to study abroad (in completion, and not just for a semester) are rare and few for Americans.

As I was in the International Baccalaureate program in high school, I was considering applying to schools in the U.K., Germany, and Canada, but the more I looked into it, the less of an option it became (due to finances.)

Rukawa_BR12 in reply to OrlandoDV8

It seems the foreign universities have been passing by the same situation than north american ones... having a degree, has simply became a luxury, power and status item, involved on market interests. It's not easy. For you have an idea, in Brazil, all federal universities are on strike. And the claims are the same: better working conditions, salary increase, more investments ...no classes during 3 months already. The problem is not you invest a strong amount (and Brazil invests 5,1% of its GDP, higher than China, Japan, Germany and Canada... but doesn't have some intelligence to convert this in pratical results and really make a revolution in its outlays) in higher education or education itself. The point is how you use this, as there's no free education anywhere. Let remember that, the poor people, as a proportion of their income, pay more taxes than the rich ones in both emerging countries and advanced countries.. It's a really complicated situation. May we have some luck due to all these problems and not giving up, because the reality is hard to face but we get to overcome.

JM3 in reply to OrlandoDV8

Previous to last year, students from all over the world could study in Sweden for free if they were accepted. Additionally, a large portion of the instruction was in English and over 90% of the population speaks English.


Maybe not all of those students should be students because, maybe, the economy simply doesn't need this huge numbers of people with a college education.

You US guys should consider to introduce the German dual education system for blue collar workers, see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_education_system

Ulenspiegel in reply to VerySeriousSam

IMHO - as German having to kids in Austrian highschools- another useful alternative for the USA could be some aspects the Austrian highschool system, here the highschools which are specialized in technical disciplines (Höhere Technische Lehranstalten, HTL) provide very good results: their graduates can join without any problems the blue collar workforce, can combine this with universities of applied sciences (Fachhochschulen) and have the qualification (Abitur, Matura) to attend universities.

jbunniii in reply to VerySeriousSam

All parents like to believe that their kid is above average. It would be a blow to their ego to acknowledge that they have sired a second-tier offspring.

Also, they look around them and recognize that most successful people have a university education and wrongly conclude that a university education will bring success.

LexHumana in reply to youngspartan

Maybe not, but think about it from the opposite perspective -- if success were NOT correlated with getting a university degree, I think you would see a major drop in enrollment. For better or worse, the two factors ARE linked. A college degree may not guarranty success, but NOT having a college degree is strongly correlated with lower income, and I think most people recognize that.

Synonymous in reply to jbunniii

Imagine how much bigger of a blow if you are that offspring. Sorry kid, you're second rate and aren't capable enough to play with the big boys. Its not your fault, blame your dna and your upbringing.

iThinker in reply to Synonymous


That is a load of crap. This kind of political correctness is what's killing America. We can't say to a slacker kid who flunk 5th grade math in 12th grade "Sorry kid, you just arent' cut out for a career in medicine", but it's okay to tell a 5' tall kid who can't shoot, "What the hell are you doing here? Get off my basketball team!"

Puntmeister in reply to LexHumana

This is true - but the problem is that the time's they are a changin'

Although it is still true that for optimal success, one needs a college degree, it is no longer the case that a college degree guarantee success.

College tuition has been going up exponentially while, at the same time, the percentage of college grads obtaining mid/high paid careers has been going down.

CnKQ7pSia6 in reply to jbunniii

Most successful people have a university education and it is entirely correct to conclude that one of those would bring success to their kids.

The key is what kind of university education most successful people have. If success is to be defined by income (pretty much the only objective standard outside academia), the highest income levels are attained by people with skills in the hard/semi-hard sciences whether those be engineers, doctors, even nurses and accountants. An education in these hard sciences will more often than not bring success and is a very good monetary investment.

The problem rather is not that parents and students seek a university degree, but rather that they seek ANY university degree.

CnKQ7pSia6 in reply to iThinker

You couldn't be more correct on that one. In fact I would take it one step further (and may even sound cruel in doing so).

You give an example of a slacker kid. But I say even if a kid works hard but unfortunately does not meet the standard, its no good enough. Political correctness has taught kids today that "if you try hard enough, anything is achievable" and that "its the effort that counts".

Sorry but that's a bunch of baloney, the real world simply does not work that way. May sound cruel, but I bet the next time they are operated on by a surgeon, if he botches it up, it won't matter him saying that he tried his best. I don't care how much effort you put into solving a math problem, if the answer is incorrect, it is incorrect. No two ways about it. A survey about a couple of years ago showed that a majority of US kids believe that they should get at least a B grade simply for effort and attending classes regularly. Such nonsense.

Not everyone is smart enough to be a doctor, nuclear physicist or computer scientist. Just as not everyone is gifted enough to be an Mozart or Cezanne.

Martin Mahler

Am I the only one who doesn't necessarily consider education solely as an investment? What about studying out of passion, interest or nosines?

But maybe it's because I am living in Germany and I don't have to pay tuition.

Jake Goode in reply to Martin Mahler

It's exactly because you are living in Germany and not having to pay tuition. I have German friends who studied into their 30s, switching majors, studying abroad, and living the carefree student life following their passions. Most did not work at all, except part-time work.
If you had to account for every euro you spend pursuing your passion, you would choose to get your University studies done as soon as possible, and spend more time at the public library, where there is no tuition to worry about.

SamED in reply to Martin Mahler

Enjoy the gravy train while it lasts. For the majority of the people in this world we don't have the luxury of screwing around trying out different classes for years and years like many on the continent seem to do.

LexHumana in reply to Martin Mahler

I firmly believe in the idea that people should study for the sake of personal enrichment. However, if you want to study basket weaving because it interests you, you are the one that should foot the bill for your enrichment, not anyone else. I studied music AFTER my college degree and AFTER my law school degree, and I paid for my own music instruction and study. I love it, and would happily do the exact same thing over again, but I recognize two basic fundamentals: 1) I first studied something that would pay my bills (the law), and 2) my studies for personal enrichment came out of my own pocket, not anyone else's.

Ernest J. King in reply to Martin Mahler

Through your comment you show little grasp of how the economy works. You ARE making an investment as a country, paying in taxes what we pay in the form of tuition. Whether one system is better than the other is an entirely different matter.

Plus, it's not like no one in the U.S. has ever gone to school without paying a dime. Tens of thousands of lower-income students go to top-rated universities every year making no "investment" of their own other than time and effort. That's because these private schools give them full financial aid in the form of grants and scholarships. I know it because I was a recipient of such aid.

Maybe that's one of the reasons why the U.S. ranks second in the world in terms of the percentage of adults with four-year degrees (fifth if we count technical degrees -- still higher than Germany). Because things aren't as awful stateside as Europeans make them out to be.

Ulenspiegel in reply to Ernest J. King


The reason is, that many professions which are taught in colleges in the US are not found at universities (of applied sciences) in Germany, Austria and Switzerland but are in these countries still part of the dual education system and do not count as four-year degrees in international statistics. :-)

Ernest J. King in reply to Ulenspiegel

That's a very good observation, my friend, but it's a bit of a moot point, considering we are talking about access to, and successful passage through, college. If U.S. colleges were really as inaccessible as they are made out to be, The country wouldnt have such high postsecondary-degree rates. I doubt the dual-education programs aren't computed when technical degrees are also counted in, though — a measure by which the U.S. still ranks high.

Ulenspiegel in reply to Ernest J. King

You are right that some dual-education programs are computed but only if they require the first tire highschool graduation (Abitur, Matura, 12 years) or include internal qualification programs.

However, a large grey zone exists because highschool students with Abitur attend a 3 year training in a discipline which in principle only requires third (Hauptschulabschluss, 9 years) or second tier (Realschulabschluss, 10 years) graduation, the result is -as Austrian/German Abitur is on avarage a little bit more than a US highschool graduation- comparable with an US college degree but does not count as one.
E.g. for banker ("Bankkaufmann/Bankkauffrau") only third tier highschool is mandatory, however, more than 60% have Abitur, the rest Realschulabschluss, you will not find somebody with third tier Hauptschulabschluss; their US couterparts usually would have college degrees.

Therefore, I do not see that these statistics have a real value as they compare minimum requirements, not the quality/value of the product. And I strictly oppose the political pressure in Germany and Austria to increase number of university students (we do not have real colleges) in order to reduce the deficit in college degrees compared to anglophone countries.

Rob S in reply to Ernest J. King

You seem to believe that having more people with a 4-yr college degree than Germany is some sort of advantage. Why do you believe this, Ernest? Perhaps you are a "potato farmer" who believes that the world would be better off if we only raised more potatoes.

The reality is that we have a lot of college grads stumbling around without a means to support themselves, demanding that the government create jobs for them. Meanwhile Germany has focused on training highly skilled workers. Which group of people are better off? Which country?


This policy of everyone needs a college degree needs to change.Its based on a myth that ALL jobs in the future will require adanced thinking skills.
Well here's news not more than 25% of any given population have the ability to productively and consistently engage in higher intellectual activities.Unless there is a breakthrough in Gene therapy this is unlikely to change.
The rest should be given good training so that they can become highly skilled and highly paid blue collar workers or craftsmen.
An assembly line worker at BMW in Germany earns $50/hour + benefits!
What we don't want is people who are less able graduating with useless college degrees and considering blue collar work beneath their dignity and leading frustrating miserable lives as a result.
This sorry state of affairs more than anything else probably explains the hollowing out of the Industrial base in US and other anglo saxon countries.
Being a white collar bank clerk selling iffy mortgages is considered more socially acceptable than a highly skilled blast furnace operator...

GSamsa in reply to vishnugupta

Saying again, where are the "highly skilled and highly paid blue collar workers or craftsmen jobs"? They hardly exist in most Western Countries anymore and the ones that do either pay very low or are closely protected by Unions.

iThinker in reply to GSamsa

In the US, the "highly skilled and highly paid blue collar workers or craftsmen jobs" are at Boeing plants, the Big 3 auto plants and their suppliers, assembly plants for BMW, Honda, Toyota and other Japanese automakers, at Honeywell autoparts, airplane engine plants. Google is now making their Nexus Q home entertainment gadgets in the US. These mid to high skilled blue collar jobs still do exist in the US. The factory jobs moved offshore are mostly the low skilled, low paid, high polluting kind. The US is still the #1 manufacturer of goods in the world.

Many factories in the US actually can't find enough qualified technicians for their job openings. Most of the unemployed today are either high school dropouts, high school grads or liberal arts majors from college. They either do not have enough math and science knowledge to operate machines, or do not want a back breaking factory job, to be on their feet all day. The college dropouts and LibArt majors would rather go work at Starbucks, handout towels at health clubs, or work at menial retail or adminstrative jobs for $25k a year. The high school grads/dropouts are barely good enough for McDonald's. Meanwhile, Boeing machinists make over $100k a year with overtime.

Our unemployment problem is exacerbated by a mismatch of skills, chalk that up to failure of education. Kids are still having it way too easy in K-12, especially when it comes to math and science curriculum. Our top colleges put more emphasis in their admissions on extra-curriculars like sports or volunteering than they do actual academics under the guise of "well-roundedness". Our school system, from K-12 to colleges, are churning out ever more lazy, uncompetitive financially-illiterate know-nothings who are highly in debt. Not a good way to sustain a superpower economy.

Puntmeister in reply to iThinker


So how to facilitate a shift?

There are two general possibilities:

1) A needed shift is predicted, and proactively put in place.

2) A needed shift is ignored until the damage is so devastating, a shift comes about by force, or the damage is so great a succesful shift becomes impossible.

I think we are well on our way to #2. Although most educated adults understand and agree with what you have stated, most will still seek for their children to get a college degree. The cultural stigma of blue collar work, no matter how high paid, is tough to overcome.

Plus - to most people - the path to becoming a highly skilled machinist is alien. In Germany, where high-tech manufacturing is pervasive, it may seem an obvious choice to a teenager deciding which direction to go in their education. But to most Americans, unless their parent works for Boeing, the idea of a high-paid high-tech manufacturing career is totally unheard of.

MySetDancer in reply to iThinker

I sincerely don't believe your facts are quite complete. Boeing has outsourced most of its machinist work to lower paid non-union shops (I have direct experience on this) including China. China's current Industrial Plan includes building full-sized airliners to compete with Boeing, so eventually there will be many fewer commercial Boeing jobs . . .

My observation is that employers really mean "we can't find qualified workers who will work for $12 / hour so we will send the jobs to China."

And as for your reference to "back breaking" labor, well, that one is obvious to anyone with the ability to think . . .

GSamsa in reply to iThinker

Mysetdancer is correct. The picture you painted is an America in your own opinion from 30 years ago. Certainly not 2012 America.

For starters, just a quick look on internet job boards for the BMW, Honda, Toyota and other Japanese automakers, show few openings, the ones that are open start at $15-18 hour.

Yes the mid to high skilled blue collar jobs still do exist in the US, but these are only available to seasoned, experienced tenured and most notably UNION workers. You seriously think that a High School grad or College Grad with training can just waltz into Boeing or GE and snag a 100k job just like that? Especially when an Software Engineer grad from MIT will make far less in their first five to ten? Show where this is possible?

FYI, BMW, Honda, Toyota and other Japanese automakers, at Honeywell, GE, and etc don't use Unions and hence why the AFW-CIO among others have been protesting about this for years.

I fell over laughing when mentioned the Nexus Q. You mean the Nexus Q that was discontinued for underselling? That alone underscored that your post was mostly your opinions only and not exactly reality.

And while you are correct as far as Liberal Arts majors having the highest unemployment it seems that Sciences are having the hardest time as well. The lowest unemployment rate: Education at 5% versus over 8% for science and engineering.

h120180 in reply to vishnugupta

Wow. This is SO TRUE. It sent shivers down my spine. For many years, I was unable to pursue higher education or professional work due to intellectual incapacitation. And yet the idea of being a bus driver, mechanic or electrician was anaethema to me. It repulsed me. Growing up, I saw myself as a lawyer, a doctor, a professor, or bust. I truly believed I was "too good" for anything else, even though my aptitudes were clearly in the areas of creative abilities and anything having to do with textbooks bored the living Christ out of me. I believe I had much in common with most of my generation in this belief.

Most of the people I have known in my generation feel they are too good for manual labor. And yet so many of us cannot spell "generation". I would refer people to Jean Twenge's seminal book "Generation Me: Why Today's Young Americans are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled... And More Miserable Than Ever Before." Vishnu is right. He couldn't be more right. Any cursory look at the intellectual products of 75% of the members of my generation will quickly convince any naysayer that these people are simply not capable of advanced-level thinking skills. Look at their e-mails. Look at their blog posts. He needs to speak to Obama, pronto.


Universities got into this greasy poll stuff when they were suckered into the for profit business mentality.

Rob S in reply to teacup775

"Profit" in a general sense - if you include the generation of revenues needed to support bloated administrations, unnecessary and irrelevant programs, inflated salaries for prestigious professors and expensive building projects.

teacup775 in reply to C.W.

I would agree, but the prestige and reputation arms race accelerated around the same time for-profit sensibilities became fashionable. University staff then began to become for profit oriented, administrative staff grew in size and gained ever increasing compensation, that campuses embarked on a building spree to further attract more business. This was the same time higher education became one of the other economic bubbles -- way over priced for ROI.


"Necessary" does not mean sufficient. Provided a student has a sense of direction, sound ambition and pesonal dedication, university can be a great benefit. Trouble is, all those attributes would be uncommon in a 18- year- old freshman. There is an element of consumerism in a university education now. It is being sold like an investment to those who have to pay for it. One argument, specious, but common among academics with vested interests, is that "everyone has a right to a tertiary education and should not be denied the chance owing to inability to pay". Hmm. Convinced now? Just hand over your money and shut up then.



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