Stossel on College as a Scam
Monday, August 21, 2023
John Stossel recently provided a short, sweet synposis of the past and present of the college cost crisis brought on by the federal student loan program.
Regulars here will likely already understand why that program has caused college costs to skyrocket, but Stossel has a good, simple explanation for anyone who hasn't thought much about the issue before.
Spolier: The same perverse incentives that are making college expensive are also causing many to spend five or more years there without graduating, or to leave with degrees that are worthless to employers.
Most interesting to me is Stossel's report on conditions on the ground in today's job market, in light of this:
Mike Rowe, of Dirty Jobs fame, started a foundation to support students interested in vocational education, and has said similar things in the past. It is interesting to see some of the companies whose actions are speaking louder than words in agreement.College students take on loans and spend decades in debt because they believe they must get a degree to be hired. But that's no longer true. IBM, Accenture, Dell, Bank of America, Google and other big companies, recognizing the uselessness of many undergraduate degrees, recently dropped college-degree requirements. So have state governments in Maryland, Utah, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Alaska, North Carolina, New Jersey and Virginia.
College not required! (Image by Elvert Barnes, via Wikimedia Commons, license.)
Good jobs in the trades, like welding and plumbing, don't require a college degree. Trade school programs often take less than two years and cost much less than college.
-- CAV
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2 comments:
Hi Gus,
For my sins, when I was a freshman in college, I was a member of the Freshman Cabinet, a position that was half-representative, half-appointed.
I had the pleasure to sit through meetings, as, for instance, a sociology group making a pitch as to why bringing in a 'Noted Marxist Scholar' was in the 'General Interest' and why the Student Gov't should Pony Up Funds for the event.
As it turned out, the honorarium the 'Noted Marxist Scholar' (heh) required could have been easily covered by half of the mandatory 'Student Activities' charge (that all students had to pay) from the numerous members of the the Sociology Club that the pitchmen purportedly represented. Then they wouldn't have had to come begging for a handout.
Of course, given that it was in the General Interest, the Student Senate voted to approve said handout. Which was a concrete example as to why we really shouldn't finance student gov't at any level. Let them pay themselves for their anti-social behavior.
However - and more to the point - one of my fellow cabinet members - and in the same High School graduating class - rose to propose that a non-binding resolution be passed, asking for State and Federal loans for college students because "it's too hard to work and go to school at the same time".
I rose in counterpoint and said that the only thing that that would accomplish would be to raise the cost of tuition to the point that it would be impossible to work your way through school and thus you would graduate with massive debt.
His reply? "Oh, no, the government wouldn't do that to us."
Well that sorry excuse of a human being is still a gov't flunky 40 years later and, according to his latest pontifications, hasn't learned a damn thing in the interim.
c andrew
C.,
I don't have as good a prophecy as yours, but I do have a similar "go figure" moment.
I wrote a column back when I was in grad school, and in its early days often attached positions held by a leftist club member who had a column. A friend forwarded a reaction to my work by that lefty to which he was privy. Total projection and caricature.
The guy has a distinctive enough name that he's easy to find. I checked once years ago, and he ended up a bureaucratic functionary in DC.
Gus
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