4 ms·

Trampled by what? A stampede of equally qualified candidates? That's exactly my point. Also I'm not sure my point about food was clear. I'm saying give a poor

by Tycho 10y ago

Trampled by what? A stampede of equally qualified candidates? That's exactly my point. Also I'm not sure my point about food was clear. I'm saying give a poor family an extra $5k to spend for healthier food, and it could make a significant difference. But give them $50k (for food) more and it has no additional health benefit. But give them $50k, $250k, $500k to spend on schooling and suddenly it leads to great differences in outcome.

chaostheory 10y ago
> Trampled by what? A stampede of equally qualified candidates? That's exactly my point. From my understanding, your point is that people are doing this with malice with the conscious intention of hurting other people. That's very different from survival. I still also feel that's a baseless accusation. > But give them $50k, $250k, $500k to spend on schooling and suddenly it leads to great differences in outcome. The flaw in your logic is assuming that all or even most education is equal. Of course, because even if you don't take into account 'signalling' not all education is equal. Spending 160k on a technical diploma mill (yes these exist and they target the poor) is obviously going to net vastly different results from spending the same money on an Ivy League institution. In reality, the Ivy League university is probably going to cost a lot less if you're poor. (For the record, I attended a public uni). This is even more evident when you start looking at education outside of the US.
- Tycho 10y ago
  This has got nothing to do with 'survival.' Nobody is going to starve because they didn't get a university degree. We're talking about relative status within a class system. More specifically menial jobs vs. nice jobs. Not all education is equal but there's no particularly good reason for the runaway costs. Quite simply, the middle class are willing to tolerate ridiculous tuition costs because it lets them stay ahead of the poor.
  - chaostheory 10y ago
    > This has got nothing to do with 'survival.' The meaning of survival will vary from person to person. imo 'survival' for the middle class means not living paycheck to paycheck or having to work multiple part time jobs i.e. having a 'nice' job. While it's possible to achieve this without a degree, it's also a lot more difficult to do so without a degree. Again regardless of what survival means for different people, my point stands: most people don't value education in order to 'keep the lower class down', they value it so they can 'get by' > Not all education is equal but there's no particularly good reason for the runaway costs. There IS a good reason for it. Given the success of 40k and up a year diploma mills that target the poor; everyone, including the poor, has access to easy credit when it comes to funding education. Hence the runaway education costs. http://blog.credit.com/2015/07/are-student-loans-causing-college-tuitions-to-skyrocket-120860/ http://blog.credit.com/2015/07/are-student-loans-causing-col...
    - Tycho 10y ago
      When survival = nice job that's exactly what I'm talking about. Someone has to do the menial jobs. Overpriced education ensures that it won't be the people in the middle class. Loans explain why it is possible for tuition fees to rise so much, but not why we have them, ie. why people accept them. The diploma mills are just a side-effect.
pkaye 10y ago
I mentioned this earlier but in my city, the school district consists of 5 high schools which all get common funding yet there is a huge difference between performance. The top school is in 99% ranking in the state and the other schools are in middle tier. Though there is equal funding, it didn't make much of a difference. I have see all the schools are they look equally shabby having been build 50 years ago. The main thing that happened is nearly 15 years back (I think) standardized testing was passed so all schools were ranked. Then parents started sending their kids to the best schools they could afford. This started to give a divergence where the best schools started be become better. It also created demand for housing in the best school areas and the housing prices went up. In our city, the houses near the best schools are 2x the price. Quality wise everything else is the same. Now you have highly educated parents who are paid well how try to send their kids to the best school possible. So I don't think funding is the entire answer. We need safe schools. Parents need to be motivated for their kids to succeed. And kids will learn better in an environment where peers also value their education. But throwing money at the problem in the the entire answer. I believe there is a Freakanomics article about this issue and what they believed mattered the most for kids to succeed is that the parents cared enough about their kids education.
- Tycho 10y ago
  I agree with you. There's no inherent reason why education should be getting more and more expensive. With all the technology we have and the large pool of highly educated potential teachers[1] it should actually be getting cheaper or better value for money. But the explanation I'm giving is that the middle class like to use education as a filter that keeps the poor away from the nice white collar jobs. So they are highly insensitive to price. Meanwhile, all the broken things about education (in terms of actual teaching/learning) go unfixed. [1] although there is an interesting argument that women who were previously forced to settle on teaching for a career are now going into industry instead (since industry became less sexist) , leading to a drop in teaching quality (especially for things like maths)

by Tycho 10y ago

chaostheory 10y ago

> Trampled by what? A stampede of equally qualified candidates? That's exactly my point. From my understanding, your point is that people are doing this with malice with the conscious intention of hurting other people. That's very different from survival. I still also feel that's a baseless accusation. > But give them $50k, $250k, $500k to spend on schooling and suddenly it leads to great differences in outcome. The flaw in your logic is assuming that all or even most education is equal. Of course, because even if you don't take into account 'signalling' not all education is equal. Spending 160k on a technical diploma mill (yes these exist and they target the poor) is obviously going to net vastly different results from spending the same money on an Ivy League institution. In reality, the Ivy League university is probably going to cost a lot less if you're poor. (For the record, I attended a public uni). This is even more evident when you start looking at education outside of the US.

Tycho 10y ago
This has got nothing to do with 'survival.' Nobody is going to starve because they didn't get a university degree. We're talking about relative status within a class system. More specifically menial jobs vs. nice jobs. Not all education is equal but there's no particularly good reason for the runaway costs. Quite simply, the middle class are willing to tolerate ridiculous tuition costs because it lets them stay ahead of the poor.
- chaostheory 10y ago
  > This has got nothing to do with 'survival.' The meaning of survival will vary from person to person. imo 'survival' for the middle class means not living paycheck to paycheck or having to work multiple part time jobs i.e. having a 'nice' job. While it's possible to achieve this without a degree, it's also a lot more difficult to do so without a degree. Again regardless of what survival means for different people, my point stands: most people don't value education in order to 'keep the lower class down', they value it so they can 'get by' > Not all education is equal but there's no particularly good reason for the runaway costs. There IS a good reason for it. Given the success of 40k and up a year diploma mills that target the poor; everyone, including the poor, has access to easy credit when it comes to funding education. Hence the runaway education costs. http://blog.credit.com/2015/07/are-student-loans-causing-college-tuitions-to-skyrocket-120860/ http://blog.credit.com/2015/07/are-student-loans-causing-col...
  - Tycho 10y ago
    When survival = nice job that's exactly what I'm talking about. Someone has to do the menial jobs. Overpriced education ensures that it won't be the people in the middle class. Loans explain why it is possible for tuition fees to rise so much, but not why we have them, ie. why people accept them. The diploma mills are just a side-effect.

pkaye 10y ago

I mentioned this earlier but in my city, the school district consists of 5 high schools which all get common funding yet there is a huge difference between performance. The top school is in 99% ranking in the state and the other schools are in middle tier. Though there is equal funding, it didn't make much of a difference. I have see all the schools are they look equally shabby having been build 50 years ago. The main thing that happened is nearly 15 years back (I think) standardized testing was passed so all schools were ranked. Then parents started sending their kids to the best schools they could afford. This started to give a divergence where the best schools started be become better. It also created demand for housing in the best school areas and the housing prices went up. In our city, the houses near the best schools are 2x the price. Quality wise everything else is the same. Now you have highly educated parents who are paid well how try to send their kids to the best school possible. So I don't think funding is the entire answer. We need safe schools. Parents need to be motivated for their kids to succeed. And kids will learn better in an environment where peers also value their education. But throwing money at the problem in the the entire answer. I believe there is a Freakanomics article about this issue and what they believed mattered the most for kids to succeed is that the parents cared enough about their kids education.

Tycho 10y ago
I agree with you. There's no inherent reason why education should be getting more and more expensive. With all the technology we have and the large pool of highly educated potential teachers[1] it should actually be getting cheaper or better value for money. But the explanation I'm giving is that the middle class like to use education as a filter that keeps the poor away from the nice white collar jobs. So they are highly insensitive to price. Meanwhile, all the broken things about education (in terms of actual teaching/learning) go unfixed. [1] although there is an interesting argument that women who were previously forced to settle on teaching for a career are now going into industry instead (since industry became less sexist) , leading to a drop in teaching quality (especially for things like maths)