Bernie Sanders's Charming, Perfectly Awful Plan to Save Higher Education

[Angry Floof]

I looked it up and it turns out going to college is still entirely voluntary.

Here is the perfect example of childish self-interested thinking.

Having as many people as educated as possible is a public good, something good for society as a whole.

Certain ideologies grow and breed much better within stupid, uneducated, unaware populations.

 

[dismal]

I bet in college they teach people the meaning of the word "voluntary".

Teaching something is one thing and very smart people are taught, er schooled, every day. Doing something is very hard to prove especially when free will is party to the doing.

But, sir, the question is did you 'choose' to go before or after your parents encouraged you to go. Of course.

This topic isn't actually about me. I know that can get confusing, having to rebut actual points being made instead of going after people.

But since you are so curious about me: I didn't go to college and grad school, but that seems like a different lifetime now. Back before I was ruined.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Do you detect any disconnect there?

Does the number enrolled have any actual connection to the amount of debt they're incurring? Or is it more of a red herring?
You'd think that a discussion of the costs of an education would be replied to with numbers of dollars. Perhaps the debt load of the class of 2016?
"There's bums in seats" does seem to be completely disconnect from whether or not the cost is ruinous or whether or not one can dependably earn a decent living without a degree....

 

[dismal]

Do you detect any disconnect there?

Does the number enrolled have any actual connection to the amount of debt they're incurring? Or is it more of a red herring?
You'd think that a discussion of the costs of an education would be replied to with numbers of dollars. Perhaps the debt load of the class of 2016?
"There's bums in seats" does seem to be completely disconnect from whether or not the cost is ruinous or whether or not one can dependably earn a decent living without a degree....

It suggests many people do not deem paying for college so ruinous that they avoid going to college (aka , they think it's worth it not a voluntary self-inflicted ruination.)

 

[Ford]

We are living in a rotting capitalist economy after all.

People are desperate.

They have fewer and fewer options.

I'll try again.

What good is served by making college unaffordable to many and ruinous to many?

I don't think anyone should be forced to pay anything to go to college. It should be a strictly voluntary transaction between a willing buyer and a willing provider of a college education.

Why even make college affordable, then?

A college education should be something only the wealthy can purchase! Not only will that make professors more available to their smaller number of students, but it will make sure that poor people can't dirty up our institutions of higher learning.

College should be like a Gulfstream Jet. Nobody is forcing anyone to buy a private aircraft...it's just a transaction between a willing buyer and a seller...of a product far out of the reach of anyone in the middle or (shudder) lower class.


We should also stop giving scholarships to smart kids. If they can't afford college, fuck 'em. I mean, if you're low-income, it shouldn't matter how good your grades are...colleges have a product to sell!


Or alternately, we could just make college exclusive to those who own land.

 

[dismal]

I don't think anyone should be forced to pay anything to go to college. It should be a strictly voluntary transaction between a willing buyer and a willing provider of a college education.

Why even make college affordable, then?

If it's not affordable no one will go.

People are going so it must be affordable.

 

[untermensche]

Why even make college affordable, then?

If it's not affordable no one will go.

People are going so it must be affordable.

Are you three years old?

The next financial crisis is going to be the student loan crisis.

What we have are millions with huge debt and no jobs to pay off those debts.

A tipping point is coming.

 

[Ford]

Why even make college affordable, then?

If it's not affordable no one will go.

People are going so it must be affordable.

People take out payday loans, so they must be a great idea. Let's make all loans just like payday loans!

 

[ksen]

I don't think anyone should be forced to pay anything to go to college.

I agree with my good buddy dismal that college should be free.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Why even make college affordable, then?

If it's not affordable no one will go.

That's what they said about the New World too until the East India company discovered "Indentured Servitude."

 

[Togo]

I don't think anyone should be forced to pay anything to go to college. It should be a strictly voluntary transaction between a willing buyer and a willing provider of a college education.

Why even make college affordable, then?

A college education should be something only the wealthy can purchase!

Well of course it should. Most people don't need a college education. It should be reserved as something that only the rich have, as a ticket into elite employment. That way people can comfortably hire on the basis of education, rather than social class, and no one will bat an eyelid.

If you have too many people going to college, people start looking at the value of college degrees, not all of which stand up to scrutiny. Worse still, the great unwashed might start competing with the rich for those elite vacancies.

 

[untermensche]

Most people don't need a college education.

That is only because the educational system is tied to an amoral destructive economic system.

We have completely forgotten the concept of education as a means to make people more capable citizens in a representative democracy that relies on the intelligence of voters. Education as a means to make people less vulnerable to the lies of politicians and the corporate media.

Right now higher education is just a system to make people more employable, more exploitable, and delay their entry into the workforce.

But capitalism pollutes everything eventually. People should know that already. It is clear.

 

[Canard DuJour]

Worse still, the great unwashed might start competing with the rich for those elite vacancies.

Well, there are other ways to keep the riff-raff out :

'Poshness tests' block working-class applicants at top companies

http://www.theguardian.com/society/...ock-working-class-applicants-at-top-companies

Top firms set 'posh test' barrier : Young people from working-class backgrounds are systematically excluded from jobs in top legal and accountancy firms, an official report has found.

http://www.expressandstar.com/business/city-news/2015/06/15/top-firms-imposing-poshness-test/

 

[coloradoatheist]

Most people don't need a college education.

That is only because the educational system is tied to an amoral destructive economic system.

We have completely forgotten the concept of education as a means to make people more capable citizens in a representative democracy that relies on the intelligence of voters. Education as a means to make people less vulnerable to the lies of politicians and the corporate media.

Right now higher education is just a system to make people more employable, more exploitable, and delay their entry into the workforce.

But capitalism pollutes everything eventually. People should know that already. It is clear.

Why even have a society that works? Just have everyone sipping cocktails, reading books and being taught what those books mean. Work is boring and a drain on the soul, and it would be great if nobody worked.

 

[+or-1]

The cost of a college education is ruinous.

I looked it up and it turns out going to college is still entirely voluntary.

Voluntary but almost absolutely necessary in today's society.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

I looked it up and it turns out going to college is still entirely voluntary.

Voluntary but almost absolutely necessary in today's society.

Indeed. Imagine how gauche you'd seem if you couldn't make a valid contribution to the discussion about ontological empiricism that your fellow burger flippers are having.

 

[Togo]

ontological empiricism that your fellow burger flippers are having.

It's a surprisingly popular position here, considering how unpopular other ontological arguments are. The idea that science is not useful and correct because it follows the rigours of the empirical method, but rather by the mere fact of it being science is an important trap not to fall into, and lies behind much of what we refer to as pseudoscience.

So yeah, a fair % of this board is about ontological empiricism.

Much easier to just tell the burger flippers what to think, right?

 

[untermensche]

That is only because the educational system is tied to an amoral destructive economic system.

We have completely forgotten the concept of education as a means to make people more capable citizens in a representative democracy that relies on the intelligence of voters. Education as a means to make people less vulnerable to the lies of politicians and the corporate media.

Right now higher education is just a system to make people more employable, more exploitable, and delay their entry into the workforce.

But capitalism pollutes everything eventually. People should know that already. It is clear.

Why even have a society that works? Just have everyone sipping cocktails, reading books and being taught what those books mean. Work is boring and a drain on the soul, and it would be great if nobody worked.

Work is good when workers are respected, when workers have a say and real power in the workplace.

Work is not so good under present day American capitalism.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

ontological empiricism that your fellow burger flippers are having.

It's a surprisingly popular position here, considering how unpopular other ontological arguments are. The idea that science is not useful and correct because it follows the rigours of the empirical method, but rather by the mere fact of it being science is an important trap not to fall into, and lies behind much of what we refer to as pseudoscience.

So yeah, a fair % of this board is about ontological empiricism.

Much easier to just tell the burger flippers what to think, right?

Ya, there's a lot of stuff that tries to glom onto the legitimacy of scientific inquiry while avoiding doing any of the things which make scientific inquiry legitimate.

Once we're able to roll out robots that can flip burgers automatically, the problem will just resolve itself, though.

 

[Togo]

It's a surprisingly popular position here, considering how unpopular other ontological arguments are. The idea that science is not useful and correct because it follows the rigours of the empirical method, but rather by the mere fact of it being science is an important trap not to fall into, and lies behind much of what we refer to as pseudoscience.

So yeah, a fair % of this board is about ontological empiricism.

Much easier to just tell the burger flippers what to think, right?

Ya, there's a lot of stuff that tries to glom onto the legitimacy of scientific inquiry while avoiding doing any of the things which make scientific inquiry legitimate.

Once we're able to roll out robots that can flip burgers automatically, the problem will just resolve itself, though.

Economics, for example . The problem won't really be gone though, we'll still be faced with what % of our population should be trained for elite positions. 1%? 100%? Somewhere in between?