One of the less useful tropes of the current California uproar is that "Education should be free!" Exactly what could this mean, if taken seriously? The best I can make of it is either a silly plea that facts be turned upside down by magic, like "Brussels sprouts should taste good!" or a proposition that it should be offered at a price of zero. Carry all the signs you wish, but education consumes real economic resources, hence has a real cost no matter what its price. So we're talking about who should pay for whose, and how. European experiments with zero-price education have not gone so well; many European students are as well-trained and capable and interesting company as our best, but a lot more are flailing around for years, getting very bad educations in overcrowded and shabby facilities, from profs whose main concern is their second and third jobs. Even highly subsidized state schools here have significant prices that help students stay focused on finishing up and getting on with it, and minimum unit requirements to stay registered along with grading in which it is possible to fail. The problem is that subconsciously we understand price to be an important signal of value, and to some degree "what you get for nothing you value at nothing." Giving it away at the college level seems to signal for many students that it's an entitlement, and delivered to them, rather than an opportunity to invest their own effort productively.
The other is that shutting down prior entitlements suddenly is a very bad thing, even if you're the kind of heartless conservative who hates entitlements:
In sum, if we were setting up the system from scratch, there's no reason it couldn't be based on full-cost tuition, discounted by some estimate of the external benefits the educated provide to all of us (but no fair loading unreasonable amounts of research cost into it), lots of loans, and salaries that better reflect the public benefits of employment choices of people like poets, schoolteachers, and luthiers. However, we go to reform our schooling with the social and economic structures we have, not the one we wish to have, and especially in California, that structure has several iterations of a deal whereby generation t receives a big endowment of personal, social, and physical capital from generation (t-1) that enables it to consume lots of resources and have a happy life, while still adding to (and maintaining) that kind of capital to bequeath to generation (t+1). The current generation of California voters has broken that deal, realizing it would be even nicer for them to just consume everything they earn and leave my students to fend for themselves educationally and in lots of other ways. They are making the transition to full-price education quickly, ignorantly, and heartlessly under the malign influence of leadership, especially Republican Party leadership, that has made an ignorant and idiotic worship of markets and private wealth into an ideology, and abetted by catastrophic constitutional decisions through an initiative process that was the solution to a problem Californians had at the beginning of the last century.
I'll leave the calumny about Republicans, and brussels sprouts, aside, and focus on the core, which is important. People plan their lives around public programs. Allowing an unsustainable program to run until it comes to a screeching halt is often worse than having no program. The UC system is very good, and I am in no way suggesting that we would be better off if it didn't exist. But many, many California students, and their parents, planned their lives around a reasonable expectation of what in-state tuition would be. The protests are childish, but the rage underneath them is understandable: if you suddenly have to leave school because legislators have broken your implied social contract, you're probably going to be pretty mad.
California could have dealt with its budget problems gradually--it's not like you couldn't see this mismatch coming, unless you thought that asset prices would always rise at 10% a year. But legislators wanted to give voters goodies now, and voters rewarded them for it. Now everyone's getting what they asked for: disaster.
Let the Californians price in-state tuition in some other states with high costs of living, e.g., NJ.
Furthermore, we should be charging tuition to all publicly-subsidized schools, including K-12.
The system of increased education subsidization through property or income tax increases has to end. It is unsustainable once the break-even of ROI on education expenditures is crossed. Consumers need to see the increasing cost of education hit their pockets in the form of tuition charges and not taxes and fines, so they can assess this ROI more explicitly.
UC does have a great public university system, but look a state like NY which pales in comparison. How much longer before SUNY students are shouting with signs? And NY-staters don't have a UCLA or Berkley to reference.
Tuitition requirements in K-12 education rather than general funding through taxes? Where in the US political landscape do you find a feasible testbed for this idea, and what would it really change in terms of quality of education and equal access?
Catholic and other religious schools. They'll take (almost) anyone as long as (1) the child behaves himself, (2) the child works, and (3) the tuition is paid. Some will even work on a sliding scale or find tuition assistance if you're poor. And no, you don't have to be Catholic to send your kid to Catholic school. You do have to be willing to let your child sit (quietly) through Catholic mass a couple times a week.
Sure, but one presumes that most parents who are interested in the specific advantages and trade-offs of Catholic schooling and/or can afford any inconveniences associated with it (say, a 35-minute round-trip drive instead of public bussing) have already self-selected accordingly. Same would apply for other forms of private schooling, and for home schooling.
Trading some of the general tax burden for an individual tuition burden my shuffle things around a bit, but at the end of the day, those who can afford to choose their child's education will still do so, and we're still going to need a way to publicly pay for the educations of those in the lower income brackets, and net equality of access will likely appear very much as it does now. For example, Megan has previously discussed the impact of parents bidding up home prices in neighborhoods with desirable school districts; remove the property tax burden but implement a tuition burden, and those who can most afford to pay will still do so and get the best opportunities.
This is why I don't really hate politicians that much. They only perform the will of the people. Change the people, and you will change society.
Where you been? That's what immigration reform/amnesty is about, isn't it? Changing the people?
I remember reading about German students who stayed in school into their 30s.
I also remember stories of unemployed German women who were told they had to either accept (legal) jobs as prostitutes or give up their unemployment benefits.
So apparently if you're into extremely well-educated prostitutes who resent having sex with you, you should visit Germany. Surely a tourism campaign is in the offing.
I could emulate Andrew Sullivan and ask questions, but I won't.
Derek
Happily single. Just have yet to have a married guy tell me "[Fraggle], you should get married, it's great!" instead of "Never get married!".
The stories about losing unemployment benefits for refusing to prostitute are just that, stories.
Thus far.
Wonder how long that will last.
Ah, apparently those initial reports were somewhat dubious:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany
Early in 2005, English media reported that a woman refusing to take a job as a prostitute might have her unemployment benefits reduced or removed altogether.[24] A similar story had appeared in mid-2003; a woman received a job offer through a private employment agency. In this case however, the agency apologized for the mistake, stating that a request for a prostitute would normally have been rejected, but the client mislead them, describing the position as "a female barkeeper". To date, there have been no reported cases of women actually losing benefits in such a case, and the employment agencies have stated that women would not be made to work in prostitution.[25]
Although I generally agree that abrupt changes are bad policy and raise issues of intergenerational equity, I cannot find any sympathy for someone who is outraged by having to pay $10,000 tuition for college as opposed to $7,000. Many college students elsewhere are being charged far more than $10,000. It is unfortunate that this has gone on as long as it has but the last thing California should do is hold off on the adjustments. Hopefully it will provide a lasting instruction to all the future taxpayers of California.
I'm in a 2-year "fast-track" MBA program at a top-20 b-school (depending on which rankings you look into). I work full time and I'm finishing up 10 credits this semester.
I paid $9500 in tuition for those 10 credits for the fall, plus $8300 for another 8.5 credits this spring. I'll pay another $6-7k for the summer.
Though this is a private school, it's about the same rate as what the public schools charge in PA.
Many schools, public and private, look at things like MBA and Law programs as money makers. that's why there's been such an increase in such programs.
But legislators wanted to give voters goodies now...
Actually, they wanted to give their friends goodies now--not voters in general. So the public sector union members in California (prison guards, police, firefighters, teachers) have made out very well.
As for the tuition increases? Tuition in UC schools will go from $7,788 to $10,302. And, of course, low-income families will continue to have their actual costs determined by their ability to pay (via the FAFSA form) rather than the 'retail' tuition rate. For purposes of comparison, undergrad, in-state tuition and fees next fall at the University of Michigan will be...$11,659.
Yeah but in fairness, I believe that Univ. Michigan receives a very small proportion of its funding (on the order of 15%) from the state of Michigan. Not certain about this but I seem to remember reading it somehwere.
In-state undergrad tuition and fees at Michigan State is almost exactly the same: $11,434.
What happens in the real world with free or very cheap tuition is high demand for an underfunded resource. Few available seats for a poor educational experience.
Derek
It depends how one defines "poor educational experience," but most UC campuses rank in the top 50 nationally. The ones that do not are newer (Riverside and Merced), emphasize a more individualized approach to higher learning (Santa Cruz), or focus on graduate/professional education (San Francisco, which compares favorably against elite basic and clinical science programs).
There are big differences between UC (or Michigan or Wisconsin, among others) and the Ivies, Amherst, University of Chicago, Cal Tech, Stanford, etc. Some of those differences, such as better student-faculty ratios and super-elite prestige, favor the private institutions. But there is merit, too, to the combination of tenacity and humility borne of realizing your educational well-being is your responsibility, since the place is too big and chaotic for anyone to care if you sink or swim.
I am sad but not surprised it has come to this. California's public higher education system has helped so many, including my family, find success. The Cal State college system was my father's path out of poverty. I remember how overjoyed he was when I enrolled at UC. The only thing that more exceeded his hopes for me was when that afforded me the opportunity to attend a prestigious graduate program after graduation.
UC has always been a place where smart middle class kids priced out of private schools because their parents made too much to qualify for grants, but not enough to cover tuition, could get a good education. I used to worry about what rising UC tuition meant for social mobility in California and beyond. Now I worry that UC's woes are one more threat to the middle class, especially in California.
There are big differences between UC (or Michigan or Wisconsin, among others) and the Ivies, Amherst, University of Chicago, Cal Tech, Stanford, etc.
Meh -- Is the difference in student and faculty quality between Stanford and UC Berkely or the other public ivies (Michigan, UCLA, Virginia, North Carolina) all that significant? I'm skeptical. In some cases, the Ivies don't rate all that well -- engineering, for example. Four of the top 10 graduate engineering programs are at public universities, and none of the top 10 are in the Ivy League:
http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-engineering-schools/rankings
I would suggest people only look at hard sciences and engineering when judging quality. Most liberal arts programs at colleges are trash pretending to be education.
I look back in wonder that people actually paid so much money for their degrees in history, English, social sciences, etc.
I don't think there is any reasonable way to make higher education more affordable and more equitable without selective use of government funds. Most universities in the US are not terribly selective and accept most students who apply. In addition, rapidly growing for-profit universities accept nearly all students with the knowledge that federal loan guarantees will protect them from high default rates if students drop out or do not succeed after graduation. Combine this with feel-good ideas about everyone attending college, and you a huge funding problem. Without any restrictions on college attendance, university becomes a universal entitlement program that promises more than it can deliver.
Jobs that require a college degree (as a percentage of all jobs) are not growing much at all (see BLS projections). Yet, we want to drastically increase college attendance. It is not a good use of money, and many of these students would be better served to receive these funds in other ways.
Is ignorant and factually-challenged Republican-bashing a mandatory part of the house style at Mark Kleiman's blog? Absolutely *nothing* which happens in California politics can be blamed on Republicans (except possibly the decline of the CA Republican Party), or its "leadership". California's legislature has been controlled by the Democrat Party continuously since 1996, and effectively since the 1970s.
you don't undersand california politics very well. I'll let others explain in detail. But the problem is that the Republicans have enough seats to screw up the Democrats' plans (because there are weird supermajority requirements) but not enough to do anything constructive of their own. So they just muck up the gears in random ways, which, combined with the referendum process that mucks things up in random ways, creates a huge disasters. Like huge mismatches between revenues and liabilities, gubernatorial recall of a capable governor, budgetary crises constantly etc.
Which is not to let the Democrats off the hook, as they have their own problems.
California should be three states.
Yes,
CA republicans have thwarted Democrat plans to make all of CA resemble Detroit and Newark.
Thank God.
Oh, look, a minority power exercising its relative power is *still* to blame when the majority screws things up.
Only when they are the GOP, though, right? I mean, you surely don't think that minority Senators in the US congress carry and responsibility for what happened, say, circa 2001-2007?
Californians are to blame for California's plight. That means Democrats, Republicans, and independents. All.
So why should I hold them blameless for California's budget woes?
Yeah but your side just keeps bashing Republicans 100%.
Arnold is a Republican?? - don't think so. That is one problem with today's politics. The Arnolds and the Michael Bloombergs call themselves Republican while following Democratic policies.
But its nice for you liberals to have your boogiemen. Keep driving California into the dirt and blaming Republicans. -- What a joke.
There are a heck of a lot of American college students who flail around for years, getting bad educations. This is especially true in graduate schools, but also in undergrad. Just look at Sarah Palin.
That said, I agree that education shouldn't be free. I also think that four year college degrees are too common. We have to stop thinking about college education as an important pre-requisite for employment. I don't know if it's still true, but back in the internet bubble, kids were leaving college and running out to the Valley where they could take programming jobs, and learn all they needed to know in 3 weeks. They could always go back to college if they needed specific skills.
Way too many people running around with college degrees that they didn't really need, didn't want, don't use and which offer them precious few benefits 10 years out. I have a good friend who majored in French in the mid 90s, who can't speak or understand French at all any more. What was the point?
Just want to note that I agree with muzzybelly, which is rare enough.
You'd probably agree with me on more issues than you think. I post a lot on health care and global warming, two hot-button issues on which I am liberal by the standards of this blog. But I am not the "ideologue" I have been accused of being by, you know, ideologues.
I once read an article that maintained that a B.A. or B.S. became the next-best available proxy for skill/hire-ability/aptitude once tests for prospective employees were marginalized because of discrimination litigation. I'm thinking of Duke Power in particular. I honestly can't remember where I read it, but the idea stuck with me.
Employers need some sort of signal about their prospective employees (the young ones without resumes and references) that they are smart (or smart enough), quick, reliable, etc. The ability to complete the course work for a B.A. or B.S. signals that the prospect has ambition and discipline.
I agree with muzzybelly that there are many who do not need college degrees to succeed and excel. They are spending huge amounts and getting themselves into debt for really nothing. What could stand in the stead of a degree that would serve the same sort of signaling purposes? I imagine it would open up new worlds of employment to those who simply do not have the funds for college.
Hey Excellent Sarah Bash!!!! Way to go!!!!
I mean, you could have used Al Gore as a prime example of a flailing, lackadaisical dolt of a student ....
Gore's undergraduate transcript from Harvard is riddled with C's, including a C-minus in introductory economics, a D in one science course, and a C-plus in another. "In his sophomore year at Harvard," the Post reported, "Gore's grades were lower than any semester recorded on Bush's transcript from Yale." Moreover, Gore's graduate school record - consistently glossed over by the press - is nothing short of shameful. In 1971, Gore enrolled in Vanderbilt Divinity School where, according to Bill Turque, author of "Inventing Al Gore," he received F's in five of the eight classes he took over the course of three semesters. Not surprisingly, Gore did not receive a degree from the divinity school. Nor did Gore graduate from Vanderbilt Law School, where he enrolled for a brief time and received his fair share of C's.
Or Teddy Kennedy....http://www.larryelder.com/Gore/goredubiousrecord.htm
-- Was turned down by Harvard Law School because of poor grades.
— Was arrested four times, while a student at the University of Virginia, for reckless driving, racing with a cop to avoid arrest and for operating a vehicle without a license.
http://www.theamericanview.com/index.php?id=536&print=1&PHPSESSID=50b43e855da0dd24578f017a62225d92
But as a college edumacated liberal, you only know that Republicans are dumb.
Don't forget Kerry.
"Just look at Sarah Palin."
Or Al Gore. Or John Kerry. Or possibly even President Obama, as he never released his undergraduate records, if I recall correctly.
Just sayin'.
Okay, let's ask the obvious question.
It seems that a college degree of today has about the same credential value as a high school certificate of 50 years ago. (i.e. generally accepted proof that the bearer has a modicum of brains and conscientiousness.)
Given that a college education has become a near requirement of all but the lowest order of jobs, what arguments are there for keeping primary education free that don't also apply to secondary education?
If it has no credential value and you made it not free, it wouldn't be a near requirement. By making a useless degree free, you do make it where all employers insist upon it. Anyone who doesn't get that free degree is suspect, especially the more people have it.
Yep! The public primary and high school education system has ruined itself. So now you have to waste a bunch of time and money getting a college degree. Any number of high school graduates are functional illiterates and even many smarter ones have far less knowledge than graduates of only 30 years ago.
If we follow your idea of making college free, then we can move the ball along and have functional illiterates with college degrees. Next you'll need a masters and then a PHD - to sell copy machines to business or to become a management trainee at Walgreens.
Alright, let's turn it around.
To John Thacker and ed,
Both your arguments would suggest that free primary education has had bad results.
Are you suggesting that we no longer pay for primary education? (this is not a gotcha, I'm curious about the logical arguments for what seems like an arbitrary dividing line between free/not-free)
Perhaps my initial question was not well phrased. I'm curious what arguments can be made for free primary education that can't be made for free secondary education and vice-versa, namely arguments *against* free secondary education that don't apply equally well to primary education.
I'll venture one. An approximately grade 6 education is required to function in modern society (basic 3R's), so providing that level of education allows all citizens basic functionality.
Can anyone justify 7-12 without justifying college?
I think I can. A high school diploma signifies a level of educational achievement that most people can attain. A college degree typically has implied something more rigorous and thus not a realistic goal for most or even many.
How about this: Kids who are between 12-18 years old need to be in school. Even if what they are learning isn't valuable, the fact that they are intellectually active helps their intellectual development. The ordered, structured environment is good for their preparation for the workforce. And school is definitely better than the alternatives.
Plus, there is value in primary education. Writing skills, for instance. Problem solving skills.
---Even if what they are learning isn't valuable,
Oh, how I wish they were learning to read. You describe a warehouse. No wonder schools in my inner city have two-day long riots. The bigotry of low expectations.
You want to know what's amazing? California has been dysfunctional for years and it's only now that the bill is coming due. Granted they had two seperate bubbles to stave off disaster but the bill is now due and Californians should "cowboy" up.
Wow, I agree with BD, too. Weird.
Which is again all the more reason to oppose the current health care bill now. And to oppose cash for clunkers. And the first time homebuyers credit. And everything else.
It's like the mortgage interest deduction; it would be better off to never have had it, but it's really hard to get rid of.
This is an excellent argument for why "screw[ing] up the Democrats' plans" (or the plans of any politicians) is very important. Democrats' plans somewhat more so, since they tend to have more plans for entitlements, which can't be ended. Since wars and tax cuts do end, there's a lot more margin for error.
I suspect the "War on Terror" is going to have a similar lifespan to the "War on Drugs" which means it's largely never ending.
Even the "War on Drugs" will have to end due to no money to pay for it. The bills are coming due and the only thing to be funded will be basic police/fire/911. Oh and now government bailouts due to hyperinflating, as the Fed won't go for that no matter how much Obama wants it.
It seems that a college degree of today has about the same credential value as a high school certificate of 50 years ago.
Depends on the field. I know that most engineering, science and medical schools have pretty good standards. Many MBA programs seem to have good student quality. YMMV.
We heard a lot from the president this week about encouraging students to go into science and engineering.
How about this, an extension of what our host mentioned above. Price college by social utility. Want a French BA? Pay full cost, or agree to work for the state dept or the military for a while for a discount. Want a science degree? Pay a discounted tuition. Want a BA in sociology? Pay full cost. Want a degree as a luthier? Pay full cost. Get a degree and agree to teach school for a while? Get a discount. Want a degree in education? Pay full cost +50%, based on how well the current crop of education majors have done in running public schools.
NB: I have a BA in science and master's in engineering, and was 6 hours from a sociology BA as well.
But we already have a mechanism that does just that, in the form of salaries. Engineering majors tend to get better jobs than literary majors, giving people the incentive to go into engineering fields. All your proposal does is adds a level of bureaucracy that would determine the level of social utility of each degree. I'm afraid this process will not be sufficiently elastic to change with the times (rewarding degrees that we no longer have use for) while also being vulnerable to political influence and favor peddling.
I just don't see how engineering & science degrees EVER stop having huge utility. But all the other ones are so much fluff.
The government has just recently attempted - and may yet succeed at - turning human engineering (aka medicine) into a relatively low-paying job for the benefit of society.
Megan - "But legislators wanted to give voters goodies now, and voters rewarded them for it. Now everyone's getting what they asked for: disaster."
Megan, Hopefully you don't think of all (California) voters as a single, homogeneous group.
In California, a significant minority (majority?) receive more in public benefits than they pay in taxes. Can you blame them for being angry when their demands for subsidies cannot be met?
(And yes, I am a California native.)
Yup.
I can blame them for accepting the goodies, too, if they're able-bodied adults.
Well, a modified yes to many of the points above but a few thoughts in the other direction.
1. Califoronia during the 1950-70s had widely available, good quality, cheap college education. It's an intractable econometric problem, but there's reason to believe that the social returns from the tremendous economic growth facilitated by an educated work force more than compensated for the state's expenditures on education
2. This probably is even true for City University of NY during the 1920s-1960s.
3. It's foolish to generalize about "European" education systems: Belgium's is excellent, Itlay's isn't.
4. I'm biased by profession, but it seems to me in general that societies where there is widespread universally available (i.e., affordable to the masses, even if not "free") education tend to be better places to live and have brighter futures than those where education is less generally available.
Morte generally, I find myself wondering about the links among this post by Megan, the preceding one (Black Friday) and the ones yesterday on the structural deficit. We as a society -- and to the extent that this characterizes individuals, I really don't think that it has much of anything to do with political preferences -- are increasingly characterized by personal debt, rapacious consumtption (bigger homes, bigger cars, and various forms of high-minded bobo over-consumption ranging from eco-tourism to power yoga) and the belief that we can get it all below full cost (including spillovers, externalities and social consequences). Why should it be a surprise that we run a structural deficit in government when we do the same on the private side?
Gene - "It's an intractable econometric problem..."
I respectfully disagree.
Just how much money does the State of California receive in return for the (tax payer funded) subsidized Chicano / Lesbian / Climate Change /etc study programs?
(And yes, I do have a PhD in Chemical Engineering.)
The problem with charging students full freight based on the utility of their degrees, etc., is that poor students cannot afford to have any catastrophes. My wife, who grew up in better situations than I did, thought nothing of us racking up consumer debt during our medical school and residencies. I was on tenterhooks the whole time. While I theoretically knew that the money could be paid back easily at the end, I would never have embarked on it myself. I would simply have lived a very, very meager life into my 30s.
Why? If she ever had a catastrophe - something costing $10k or so - she could have gotten it from her parents. It would mean a hardship, but not a serious one. I, on the other hand, simply could not have done so. I would have had to go to a bank and hope that they would grant me an unsecured loan.
CA, and then the rest of the USA will have to adopt Swedish or Chilean style controls on government spending that limits its rate of growth, rate of growth of public employee salaries, etc.
The spending has been mainly in public employee salaries and pensions in CA, I believe. Guess who their unions donate money to politically?
Whoever is in power.
You can't be serious. I doubt you can show me a public sector union in the entire country which sends a substantial portion (greater than 20%) of their contributions to Republicans, even in deep-red states such as Utah and Oklahoma. I am positive that there are no public sector unions which donate a majority to the GOP.
MM: When the Public Coffers Run Dry
When California collapses completely,
the collegian's challenge will be coping
with the Prison Guards Union goons acting
as police auxiliaries; Hear they play rough.
Rule of thirds:
1/3 a _real_ college education.
2/3 a trade school.
3/3 a NIT instead of a job.
Welcome to the 21st century.
On the flip side, you can get a full MIT education online (MIT OCW), completely free: Videos of all the lectures on every course they give, homework with answers worked, tests ... everything.
http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Global/all-courses.htm#Special Programs
Presumably they used their best lecturers, and presumably that's very good.
There is no longer any need or reason to go to college to learn.
Now, if we could just find a replacement for the entrance pass aspect of college. I believe Charles Murray suggested something like actuarial exams in other fields, showing mastery of particular subject matter.
There's no reason to turn this thread into a "let's bash humanities education." I have degrees in science and humanities, and both are valuable in their own way. We would be poorer as a society without the study of literature, history, philosophy etc. And those are certainly worthy fields of endeavor for people who are interested.
The problem isn't the curriculum, but putting people into that curriculum who don't have much interest in learning. Some of those people end up majoring in humanities, but at my undergrad school, poli sci, econ and psychology were the majors of choice for the party crowd.
Change "California" to "United States" ... and "education" to, well, pretty much everything, but especially weighted to things of import to people over 50 who have planned all their working lives to rely on them ... multiply the rage, for good reason ... and you have our future of about 20 years from now.
"The U.S. could have dealt with its budget problems gradually -- it's not like you couldn't see this mismatch coming..."
The analysis is fine, but the facts are wrong. Generation t-1 didn't pay for generation t's education - they borrowed money and stuck generations t, t+1, and t+2 with the bill. Calling a Ponzi scheme a social contract doesn't make it right.
I find it hard to believe you call this change for California "sudden". Really?? Sudden?? Any person who balances their checkbook knew what was coming 5 years ago, heck - 10 years ago. A state can't tax their residents to death, tax their business base to death, give everything to everyone and expect anything other than a specticular crash.
Sadly, this same thing is being repeated in NJ, Michigan, NY, IL - what "color" are those states again, oh, yeah, Blue! And, of course, the California fiscal model has been at work in DC for way too long. The price we are about to pay, as a country and as individuals, will be breath taking.
Another $3000 a year is not going to force anyone out of UC schools.
It's about time those spoiled brats started paying more of their own way.
Dude,
that's like $300 a month,
do you expect them to do without brew and weed?
or get a job?
RE: "Social Contract".
This term is wielded often by public sector recipients. It may be a contract, but it is invalid, since public sector recipients are both parties to the contract. By way of analogy, would you consider your mortgage agreement binding if the bank signed for you agreeing to a 30% mortgage? In the same way, they vote themselves resources and expect others to respect the "contract".
College costs have escalated far beyond the rate of inflation due to the same bubble economics at play in housing. The USG makes available loans and grants and the schools respond by increasing salaries, staffing, facilities spending and pension benefits. In the face of the worst recession in 70 years, the UC system (180,000 employees) has cut less than 2% of their staff.
Before getting snarky and sanctimonious about how others can afford to pay an extra $3,000 per year, why not look at the absurd levels of spending going on at public universities the way a CEO in the private sector would? Can you even begin to imagine somebody saying "Another $3000 a year is not going to force anyone out of buying an automobile. It's about time those spoiled brats started paying more for their cars"? And yes, I understand that the full cost of education is not borne by tuition and fees while the cost of an automobile is borne by its price (or used to be before bail-outs), but the mismatch between education cost and price is the fault of the administrators, not the students. When the supplier does not satisfy the customer, it is the supplier who must make adjustments. Current fees and tuition adjusted for inflation would have more than likely paid for most of the cost of the UC system of 1970. Is UC better than when I graduated in 1974?
Based on my experience as a UC student's parent: no.
Michael O'Hare is biased and it shows. As others have pointed out, the Legislature in in California has been dominated by the Democrats and their Big Union culture of corruption for a very long time. The Republicans share some of blame, but let's take it by percentage, shall we?
"The California State Legislature currently has a Democratic majority, with the Senate consisting of 25 Democrats and 15 Republicans; and the Assembly having 49 Democrats, 29 Republicans, 1 Independent, and 1 vacancy. Except for the period from 1995 to 1996, the Assembly has been in Democratic hands since the 1970 election (even while the governor's office has gone back and forth between Republicans and Democrats). The Senate has been in Democratic hands continuously since 1970."
Yes, the Governor should have vetoed every budget since 1970 and made the Democrats submit one that was balanced, but Michael O'Hare blaming our current situation on the minority party is downright Obamanistic.
One other slice of California political reality to help everyone get this into perspective. When Bruce Hirshensen (R) was running against Diane Fienstein (D) he won majorities in almost every California county except San Francisco and Los Angeles, but still lost the popular vote. The big city population in California have been dominated by the tax and spend cabal for a very long time. No state with worlds 6th largest economy should have money problems like we have. The politicians care more for their lobbyists, union bosses and illegal aliens than they do about the citizens and their families. As far as the college students are concerned, last election they pushed hard for a high speed train because it was a "green" project. The fact that it was going to cost the state 10 billion dollars should have been examined a little more, given the warning signs were well lit up at the time. The students didn't care about the cost, I guess. They live in a world where most of the money always comes from somebody else.
Raising tuition will force some of them into employment, which will help bring them back down to earth.
There is a basic point missing throughout this thread. Higher education is never free to the recipient. It uses some of the recipient's very limited supply of potentially productive years of life. One of the failings of 'free' systems is that they tend to waste more of these precious years than do systems which charge.
The proper basis of a price of higher eduction on top of the years spent in it is as set out by Michael O'Hare. Exactly how it should be charged is endlessly debatable. There is no unquestionable best mix of making the recipient bear his own costs and covering the low earning recipient against an unreasonable liability. (The best I have ever seen was an old Yale student loans plan which had all those taking out loans in a given year mutually guaranteeing the lender for the whole of the loans to all of them.)
When and as (not if) a governemnt gets itself into a hole where it cannot meet the entitlements it has promised, the way to get political assent to the necessary cuts is to spread them over as wide a range as possible; and cut the entitlements of the wealthier visibly more than of the poorer. Even California might just manage that; even though they have not done so yet.
To the extent that this issue is about the University of California, there's an important point that has been well documented in the last decade, but that none of the other commenters have brought up. That point is that there is clear evidence that the University of California is run by -- in the alleged words of federal investigators -- people with "a culture of noncompliance with the law." A shorter description might be "criminals."
The University hospitals have engaged in "routine misbilling," charging for hospital procedures done by people who were not in the hospital at the time. After this came to light, the University paid $22.5 Million to settle such charges.
After Governor Schwarzenegger ordered a surprise audit of the University, auditors found approximately $850 Million in "unauthorized compensation" (apparently a polite term for embezzlement) to University officials.
More recently, the University simultaneously run a sham liver transplant program without a surgeon "in the immediate vicinity of the hospital." Dr. Marguis Hart, the surgeon they claimed was the U.C. Irvine surgeon was actually on staff at UC San Deigo 100 miles away. This program also allegedly did not have transplant qualified anesthesiologists. Dr. Glenn Prevost, an anesthesiologist who arranged for half the U. California, Irvine, anesthesia staff to sign a petition to that effect, was allegedly fired for his troubles. Meanwhile, the University ran a a real, effective, spare-no-expense transplant program, with actual transplant surgeons, and including transpacific house calls to Japan, for high ranking Yakuza.
Until 2006, the University hid the very existence of children (now young adults) who had apparently been sold, without their parents knowledge or consent, after being harvested in an embryonic state as part of reproductive endocrinology procedures. Having just learned of the existence of their now young adult children, the parents are still trying unsuccessfully to find out to whom their children have been sold.
Dr. David Kessler, MD, JD, claims that he was recently fired from his post as Dean of the Medical School at UC San Francisco because he uncovered and documented "significant financial irregularities." The ranking member of the US Senate finance committee, Senator Charles Grassley has initiated an investigation into such irregularities at multiple U. California campuses.
The University allegedly ran the National Labs under its supervision in such a way as to generate routine breaches of national security. In one case, a trove of top secret documents was discovered at a house raided as part of a methamphetamine bust.
All these stories have been in the papers. I have collected a number of them at tryingforsense.blogspot.com. There are others who have started similar websites. Perhaps an organization with such a well documented "culture of noncompliance with the law" should not receive taxpayer funds. Not only are taxpayers apparently funding allegedly criminal behavior, but the value (degrees, studies, papers) received in return for those taxpayer funds is diminished by the unsavory history of the University.
If taxpayers are to fund education, perhaps it would be better to provide the funds to students or private institutions directly, rather than to a failed government program.
I don't mind the calumny about Republicans, brussels sprouts, and social sciences educations, all well-deserved, but where would the world be without us luthiers? Would you really want a world with nothing but banjo music? 8D
"Allowing an unsustainable program to run until it comes to a screeching halt is often worse than having no program." Indeed, and it appears we're all going to find out what that's like when social security and medicare come crashing down in the near future. The unfunded liability in those two programs makes Cali's budget problems look like pocket change. It's a problem we've all seen coming for many years, but somehow the train keeps chugging toward its inevitable wreck. We'll all be Californians then.
Canada has incredibly cheap universities by American standards but does not fit that European trashing that is described here. Queens, McGill, UBC, U. of Toronto, etc. are all world-class schools. I have many friends that went through the British schools, (and not all just Oxford, Cambridge, LSE, etc.) for a fraction of the US price and received great educations.
Where I have been most disturbed is at the $55k per year school I teach at now where the students drive Lamborgini's and wear $25k Rolex watches and expect to get an A without doing one bit of work because hey, everything else in life was just handed to them, so why not their college diploma as well?
I am more and more convinced that every school in the US is increasingly just a diploma mill. For tens of thousands of dollars per student, per year, a school will take just about anyone and lower their standards to just about anything. Its a lot of cash! But, go to a school where a students is more of a financial burden than a cash cow, and the university expects both the student and the faculty to live up to their separate ends of the bargain to prove the money-losing endeavor has some merit.
Think of it not unlike the National Review, Weekly, Standard, Washingtn Times, etc. that lose money year in and year out, but stay open because the people that fund them find their non-monetary aspects worth the loss in money.
I am more and more convinced that every school in the US is increasingly just a diploma mill
What do you call Harvard, Princeton, Yale etc. circa 1890? Before the days of the SATs elite colleges almost exclusively accepted children of privlage. They weren't really interested in anyone unless they had gone to the right boarding/prep schools, came from the right families, were the right color, sex and religion, etc.
By "increasingly just a diploma mill" do you mean as compared to some idealized past that never really existed?
@ jmo3: some idealized past that never really existed
We are not talking about AGW on this thread. :)
There are records covering what was taught when, and where.
There are studies of how the WWW has changed over time.
Extremely simplified but adequate summary:
Hard sciences and engineering are still real world effective.
Humanities are gone; Too damn dangerous to PC propaganda.
when my brother went to cambridge, there was outrage because it switched to being free to being (iirc) 950 pounds (~1300$) a year. there were practically riots, politicians w 30 year careers were swept out in landslides, etc. from our american view a grand and change for arguably #1 in the world seemed like a pretty sweet deal and we simply couldn't understand the fuss. go figure
Another poster wrote: "Combine this with feel-good ideas about everyone attending college, and you (have) a huge funding problem. Without any restrictions on college attendance, university becomes a universal entitlement program that promises more than it can deliver."
College isn't for everyone but for a lot of 18 year old kids there's really not much else for them except the military or McFastFood. Several younger members of my extended family would have made terrific plumbers or HVAC installers or auto mechanics or medical technicians. Failing any sort of apprentice programs, they floundered around for a couple of years of college before dropping out and taking low paying jobs. With some way to get a foothold in a non-degreed field they'd be doing so much better now. (Not to mention how much better they'd be than the cousin who earned a degree in finance in 2003 and then went on to work for AIG. Ouch.)
Well, maybe but this is from the 'If the shoe pinches protest and maybe the Kabuki will catch on' land of California. They'll be able to make the money up on parking tickets in Berkeley from out of state students who haven't sufficient psychoanalytic appreciation for the appropriate compulsive interpretation that parking meters with the heads cut off mean you have to pay at some centralized meter that you can't work.