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We really need to educate students potentially starting college that they shouldn't major in something that pretty much has no chance of ever paying it back. T

We really need to educate students potentially starting college that they shouldn't major in something that pretty much has no chance of ever paying it back. This applies to most liberal arts programs. A college education is a major investment. It's sad that culturally, our financial education is this poor. I majored in a science and had all of my debts paid off within 5 years. I have friends that majored in things like history and still haven't paid their debts off after 10 years. The popular thing to to is blame society, the university, or even high school teachers for recommending someone go to college. But, students need to take personal responsibility for taking out a loan and being unable to pay it back. When this happens, we will have less students making foolish decisions.

whitegrape 11y ago
Education on the individual level just doesn't work. People are too dumb. (I had the pleasure of rereading this recently: http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/07/stupider-than-you-realize.html http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/07/stupider-than-you-real...) Those that aren't too dumb lack personal responsibility, which is a separate problem I fully agree is pretty big, so more education might fix that, but that's sort of something you can't learn from a book, and arguably the game of chicken at teaching responsibility by making it illegal to discharge student loans in bankruptcy has just made things worse. The solutions I think have the best shot are those that involve authoritarian decrees one way or another (that is, going full free-market or going full nationalized colleges), but that requires a government with an actual interest in governing.
- pink_dinner 11y ago
  "Education on the individual level just doesn't work. People are too dumb." Honestly, If this is the case, drugs should never be fully legalized. People just can't handle the responsibility. Will addiction be the fault of the company that sold it to you? "and arguably the game of chicken at teaching responsibility by making it illegal to discharge student loans in bankruptcy has just made things worse." It hasn't really made things worse. If it wasn't illegal to discharge loans, students would know full well that they most likely would never have to pay it back and just declare bankruptcy when they graduated. That would be a much worse situation for our economy. On top of this, banks would never even take on these loans knowing full well that they would probably never get their money back. The student debt problem has been bad for at least a decade. Students continue to knowingly put themselves in this position and then cry afoul when they can't pay the debt back. Lack of knowledge is no longer an excuse. Anybody with half a brain and an Internet connection can clearly see the risks (and nearly everyone now is connected to the Internet 24/7 through their phone). I see it more as a millennial problem: the culture is to no longer take responsibilities for your own actions and blame others for all of your failures. "full nationalized colleges" I can't see this working out with the current climate, unless it completely ruins the intent of a university. Fully national colleges aren't based on money any longer, they are based on making the grade. IE: if you can't pass the entrance exams, you won't get into school (as seen in pretty much any country with nationalized universities). The system we have setup now was a response to people complaining that not everyone has a chance to go to school (back in the 50s, college was a luxury only the wealthy could afford). Now that pretty much everyone does have a chance, there are further complaints that some people made an irresponsible decision. You can't force someone to major in something that will make the ma decent living. When I was in college, I met many people that really had no business being there (didn't care, didn't put the effort in, or just couldn't handle any of the subjects). With the dumbing down of the SATs and many other measures to make it easier to get into school not based on academics, it seems we are well on our way to ruining our institutions. The ultimate form of anti-intellectualism.
  - bitJericho 11y ago
    You don't even know what you're talking about. Just about every sentence you wrote has some misconception in it. > Honestly, If this is the case, drugs should never be fully legalized. People just can't handle the responsibility. Will addiction be the fault of the company that sold it to you? Clearly people can't handle that responsibility. That's why we have alcoholic and tobacco quitting programs and taxation to fund those programs along with education and educational advertising. It's done wonders to get people to quit. > It hasn't really made things worse. If it wasn't illegal to discharge loans, students would know full well that they most likely would never have to pay it back and just declare bankruptcy when they graduated. That would be a much worse situation for our economy. On top of this, banks would never even take on these loans knowing full well that they would probably never get their money back. Why is that? It never hurt the economy before. Banks stop giving out loans to uneducated idiots with no care in the world and no intention or ability to be able to pay it back? Banks not giving out loans for schools that couldn't even teach a monkey to do tricks? Oh the horror! > The student debt problem has been bad for at least a decade. Students continue to knowingly put themselves in this position and then cry afoul when they can't pay the debt back. Lack of knowledge is no longer an excuse. Anybody with half a brain and an Internet connection can clearly see the risks (and nearly everyone now is connected to the Internet 24/7 through their phone). A decade? You mean the exact amount of time all student (federally or otherwise) loans have been unforgivable? It's precisely why colleges no longer care to educate, and instead scam kids of every dime they have. In every angle, they get scammed, from student apartments (in my town, a shocking 2x the normal cost of a single bedroom apartment), to book stores, where you can't buy your books online with your own loan until after classes start, unless you buy them from the book store at 3 times the Amazon cost, to the classes themselves. These, by the way, are young kids who have no experience, and are told by the grownups who educate them that this is some kind of great deal for them. If course they keep getting scammed, it's a fresh batch every year! > I see it more as a millennial problem: the culture is to no longer take responsibilities for your own actions and blame others for all of your failures. It's too bad it's the 40+ year olds that have done all this scamming on their younger generation. > I can't see this working out with the current climate, unless it completely ruins the intent of a university. Yes, the conservative christian climate. > When I was in college, I met many people that really had no business being there (didn't care, didn't put the effort in, or just couldn't handle any of the subjects). With the dumbing down of the SATs and many other measures to make it easier to get into school not based on academics, it seems we are well on our way to ruining our institutions. The ultimate form of anti-intellectualism. This is entirely caused by the student loan situation and all the parents/teachers stressing their kids to go. What have I told my son? that student loans are a real form of slavery, and to not take them for any reason. Either pay your own way or don't bother going. If you do go, you'll probably get ripped off unless you go for an engineering, lawyer, or doctor degree.
bbarn 11y ago
No, we need to change the structure of education. There's zero reason to spend 4 years taking general ed courses at the same cost to pursue a history degree as you would spent pursuing a science degree. Stop focusing on the lettered degrees which are supposed to prove "overall knowledge" and then a specialty, and let people take courses a la carte when it comes to professional preparation. We need people to be knowledgeable in things like history, the arts, languages, even archaeology - things that pay almost nothing as careers. It's very easy to sit on a high horse with a well paying job in a STEM field and say things like you're saying. Actively discouraging people from pursuing study is not the answer. Changing the program and the institutionalization of education is. We need to stop worrying about how to pay for a program and start worrying about why the program is what it is.
alecbaldwinlol 11y ago
I majored in history at UNC and paid off my $26,000 in student loans with my first commission check from my first sales job. One's major and even one's skills are not an accurate predictor of ability to pay back loans. It is entirely a question of persuading other people to pay you lots of money quickly, and the requisite amount of luck it takes to find such a person quickly.

whitegrape 11y ago

Education on the individual level just doesn't work. People are too dumb. (I had the pleasure of rereading this recently: http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/07/stupider-than-you-realize.html http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/07/stupider-than-you-real...) Those that aren't too dumb lack personal responsibility, which is a separate problem I fully agree is pretty big, so more education might fix that, but that's sort of something you can't learn from a book, and arguably the game of chicken at teaching responsibility by making it illegal to discharge student loans in bankruptcy has just made things worse. The solutions I think have the best shot are those that involve authoritarian decrees one way or another (that is, going full free-market or going full nationalized colleges), but that requires a government with an actual interest in governing.

pink_dinner 11y ago
"Education on the individual level just doesn't work. People are too dumb." Honestly, If this is the case, drugs should never be fully legalized. People just can't handle the responsibility. Will addiction be the fault of the company that sold it to you? "and arguably the game of chicken at teaching responsibility by making it illegal to discharge student loans in bankruptcy has just made things worse." It hasn't really made things worse. If it wasn't illegal to discharge loans, students would know full well that they most likely would never have to pay it back and just declare bankruptcy when they graduated. That would be a much worse situation for our economy. On top of this, banks would never even take on these loans knowing full well that they would probably never get their money back. The student debt problem has been bad for at least a decade. Students continue to knowingly put themselves in this position and then cry afoul when they can't pay the debt back. Lack of knowledge is no longer an excuse. Anybody with half a brain and an Internet connection can clearly see the risks (and nearly everyone now is connected to the Internet 24/7 through their phone). I see it more as a millennial problem: the culture is to no longer take responsibilities for your own actions and blame others for all of your failures. "full nationalized colleges" I can't see this working out with the current climate, unless it completely ruins the intent of a university. Fully national colleges aren't based on money any longer, they are based on making the grade. IE: if you can't pass the entrance exams, you won't get into school (as seen in pretty much any country with nationalized universities). The system we have setup now was a response to people complaining that not everyone has a chance to go to school (back in the 50s, college was a luxury only the wealthy could afford). Now that pretty much everyone does have a chance, there are further complaints that some people made an irresponsible decision. You can't force someone to major in something that will make the ma decent living. When I was in college, I met many people that really had no business being there (didn't care, didn't put the effort in, or just couldn't handle any of the subjects). With the dumbing down of the SATs and many other measures to make it easier to get into school not based on academics, it seems we are well on our way to ruining our institutions. The ultimate form of anti-intellectualism.
- bitJericho 11y ago
  You don't even know what you're talking about. Just about every sentence you wrote has some misconception in it. > Honestly, If this is the case, drugs should never be fully legalized. People just can't handle the responsibility. Will addiction be the fault of the company that sold it to you? Clearly people can't handle that responsibility. That's why we have alcoholic and tobacco quitting programs and taxation to fund those programs along with education and educational advertising. It's done wonders to get people to quit. > It hasn't really made things worse. If it wasn't illegal to discharge loans, students would know full well that they most likely would never have to pay it back and just declare bankruptcy when they graduated. That would be a much worse situation for our economy. On top of this, banks would never even take on these loans knowing full well that they would probably never get their money back. Why is that? It never hurt the economy before. Banks stop giving out loans to uneducated idiots with no care in the world and no intention or ability to be able to pay it back? Banks not giving out loans for schools that couldn't even teach a monkey to do tricks? Oh the horror! > The student debt problem has been bad for at least a decade. Students continue to knowingly put themselves in this position and then cry afoul when they can't pay the debt back. Lack of knowledge is no longer an excuse. Anybody with half a brain and an Internet connection can clearly see the risks (and nearly everyone now is connected to the Internet 24/7 through their phone). A decade? You mean the exact amount of time all student (federally or otherwise) loans have been unforgivable? It's precisely why colleges no longer care to educate, and instead scam kids of every dime they have. In every angle, they get scammed, from student apartments (in my town, a shocking 2x the normal cost of a single bedroom apartment), to book stores, where you can't buy your books online with your own loan until after classes start, unless you buy them from the book store at 3 times the Amazon cost, to the classes themselves. These, by the way, are young kids who have no experience, and are told by the grownups who educate them that this is some kind of great deal for them. If course they keep getting scammed, it's a fresh batch every year! > I see it more as a millennial problem: the culture is to no longer take responsibilities for your own actions and blame others for all of your failures. It's too bad it's the 40+ year olds that have done all this scamming on their younger generation. > I can't see this working out with the current climate, unless it completely ruins the intent of a university. Yes, the conservative christian climate. > When I was in college, I met many people that really had no business being there (didn't care, didn't put the effort in, or just couldn't handle any of the subjects). With the dumbing down of the SATs and many other measures to make it easier to get into school not based on academics, it seems we are well on our way to ruining our institutions. The ultimate form of anti-intellectualism. This is entirely caused by the student loan situation and all the parents/teachers stressing their kids to go. What have I told my son? that student loans are a real form of slavery, and to not take them for any reason. Either pay your own way or don't bother going. If you do go, you'll probably get ripped off unless you go for an engineering, lawyer, or doctor degree.

bbarn 11y ago

No, we need to change the structure of education. There's zero reason to spend 4 years taking general ed courses at the same cost to pursue a history degree as you would spent pursuing a science degree. Stop focusing on the lettered degrees which are supposed to prove "overall knowledge" and then a specialty, and let people take courses a la carte when it comes to professional preparation. We need people to be knowledgeable in things like history, the arts, languages, even archaeology - things that pay almost nothing as careers. It's very easy to sit on a high horse with a well paying job in a STEM field and say things like you're saying. Actively discouraging people from pursuing study is not the answer. Changing the program and the institutionalization of education is. We need to stop worrying about how to pay for a program and start worrying about why the program is what it is.

alecbaldwinlol 11y ago

I majored in history at UNC and paid off my $26,000 in student loans with my first commission check from my first sales job. One's major and even one's skills are not an accurate predictor of ability to pay back loans. It is entirely a question of persuading other people to pay you lots of money quickly, and the requisite amount of luck it takes to find such a person quickly.