8 ms·
Its hard to take the conclusions of such an article seriously, especially with regards to the gender pay gaps, when they aren't normalized for degree program.
by brandmeyer 11y ago
Its hard to take the conclusions of such an article seriously, especially with regards to the gender pay gaps, when they aren't normalized for degree program. Unless you are comparing Engineering women versus Engineering men, or College of Eng. in school A versus CoE in school B, it is utterly impossible to meaningfully compare schools A and B as well.
- vlunkr 11y agoYou're right, there's not enough detail here to make any solid points. I wonder how many of these people 10 years later are stay at home moms/dads with little to no income? And is it meaningful to count them if they are?
- matthewaveryusa 11y agoMIT PhD authored article may float your boat a little more: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/11/upshot/new-data-gives-clearer-picture-of-student-debt.html?rref=upshot http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/11/upshot/new-data-gives-clea... Or http://www.brookings.edu/about/projects/bpea/papers/2015/looney-yannelis-student-loan-defaults http://www.brookings.edu/about/projects/bpea/papers/2015/loo... For those visual people like myself, this is the most telling: http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Projects/BPEA/Fall-2015_embargoed/Chart_LooneyYannelis_StudentLoanDefaults.PNG?la=en http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Projects/BPEA/Fall-2015_emb...
- douche 11y agoIt's terrifying to see so many online degree-mills sucking up that much money.
- matthewaveryusa 11y agoThe sinister in me asks "Well, who tends to make shitty decisions?" The innocent asks "How is this legal?" The realist middle-classer I am asks "Are my tax dollars going to be used to fix this shit again?" The Democrat in me says "well we should definitely introduce legislation to fix this." The Republican alter-ego laughs and says "we already fixed it because you can't get rid of that shit, even in chapter 7 and 13 bankruptcy."
- rizwank 11y agoThe Republican in you needs to look up IBR and ICR and debt forgiveness for student loan debt.
- paulhauggis 11y ago..or maybe students shouldnt choose a major that has no hope of giving them a well-paying job. Ive seen far too many people getting masters in worthless degrees.
- rayiner 11y agoRight now, taxpayers are in the black on those student loan programs, to the tune of $50 billion a year.
- tedunangst 11y agoIs that on a simple cash flow basis? The value of the guarantees being made should count as a "cost", since insurance isn't usually given away for free, even if it doesn't pay out.
- rayiner 11y agoI mean you have to compare like with like, right? If you're comparing the value of guarantees given out, you compare that with the value of the debt received. Or you can compare it on a cash flow basis (money out minus money in).
- cinquemb 11y ago"Many country and city governments in the United States choose to "opt out" of GAAP practices as they operate on a cash basis, as opposed to an accrual basis."[0] If publicly traded companies are expected to report GAAP numbers and our governments aren't, it has to make one wonder… it certainly makes it harder to determine how to go about effective resource allocation in a society, especially when we're asking kids to make informed investment decisions about their futures… [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generally_accepted_accounting_principles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generally_accepted_accounting_...
- revelation 11y agoI did actually have a scroll through that gov tool for comparison yesterday and 90%+ graduation rates were extremely common, even for the highest echelon of US universities. How are these not degree mills?
- douche 11y agoWe've made the college diploma the equivalent of the high school diploma - it's become the minimum bar for many jobs, even when it's not remotely useful. Outside of a few fields, if you want to escape low-paying, part-time service industry work, you've got to have that piece of paper. And a lot of institutions are happy to give it to you, if you (or your parents, or private lenders, or the government) are willing to fork over $50,000-$200,000.
- eli_gottlieb 11y agoSo you're saying that a proper university fails some amount of students who understand the material in order to acquire prestige from the appearance of stringency? Or that a double-digit percentage of admitted students are, for some reason, incompetent?
- revelation 11y agoNo, I'm saying a good university makes a large-ish proportion of students realize that this isn't what they signed up for.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- Riseed 11y agoI posit that a good university has an ethical admissions office, and an ethical admissions office helps students realize this isn't want they signed up for before they get to the "signed up for" part.
- CydeWeys 11y agoWhy do you think that a good university should necessarily be incompetent at telling students what they're in for? That they have to pull bait-and-switches? I knew exactly what I was getting into at my university.
- ghrifter 11y agoA coworker I know is attending such an online-degree like mill. He is graduating this fall with a Comp Sci degree and a Web Design? degree. He names his variables atrociously(MethodName(id) instead of something more descriptive like MethodName(organizationID), doesn't know what an enum is, and so much more. Gah rant. I wish online-degree mills were regulated well.
- darkxanthos 11y agoEasy there. I've seen people with BS and MS who do exactly what you describe. I don't have a degree at all and I don't do that. Cmon.
- jedmeyers 11y agoI have met a PhD in Computer Science from a major German university who asked what type casting is. Even PhD does not guarantee that the person will have a broad knowledge of everything related to computer science. However, some might argue that type casting is one of those things every CS graduate should know about.
- mbesto 11y agoIt's no coincidence these companies' revenues are not trending upwards: https://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ADV&fstype=ii&ei=Tt31VbHbBoa2iAKQgK5Y https://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ADV&fstype=ii&ei=Tt31... https://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ%3AAPOL&fstype=ii&ei=ft31VdmIOYa2iAKQgK5Y https://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ%3AAPOL&fstype=ii&ei=...
- avn2109 11y agoAlso this makes me wonder if we should recategorize NYU.
- siphor 11y agoIt doesn't look like that graph is averaged per student, so thats why a lot of big public schools are on there...
- ZanyProgrammer 11y agoFrom what I could tell, none of those articles really break things down by major.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- dcre 11y agoIsn't the fact that men and women do such differently-paying things after college itself significant? You seem to think the article is arguing something more than it is.
- zo1 11y agoWell, most discussions revolving around this try to frame it as if women are being paid less for the same job a man is doing. It's disingenuous, and needs to be scrutinized so that we can all be on the same page and not make knee-jerk reactions that can cause irreparable harm.
- Lawtonfogle 11y agoAt what point does the framing of the issue become disingenuous enough that the proper response is to stop the conversation?
- dcre 11y agoThis article did not frame it that way.