> From a "fair" point of view, the industries trying to hire engineers should fund education. They do, in a way, by paying higher salaries for the graduates th

> From a "fair" point of view, the industries trying to hire engineers should fund education. They do, in a way, by paying higher salaries for the graduates they really want. Some companies also pay tuition for employees going to school. > Since that is unrealistic, the ultimate solution would seem to be making higher education free, like the rest of the civilized world. Great Britain doesn't have free higher education. "Make higher education free" is certainly a worthy goal. But there needs to be some debate for how to get there. "The government pays your tuition" is unlikely to find much support outside of a certain age bracket. Something to consider: German universities are free to everyone who passes an entrance exam [1]. But German universities also spend half the amount per student per year as US universities[2]. $10,164 vs $23,064. They also spend more on R&D proportionally, and in absolute terms per student-year. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Germany#Tertiary_education https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Germany#Tertiary_... 2. https://www.oecd.org/edu/EAG2014-Indicator%20B1%20(eng).pdf https://www.oecd.org/edu/EAG2014-Indicator%20B1%20(eng).pdf (page 215)