7 ms·

Meanwhile, other rich countries offer college that is significantly more subsidized, sometimes even free. How do Norway, Sweden, Germany, France and Slovenia of

Meanwhile, other rich countries offer college that is significantly more subsidized, sometimes even free. How do Norway, Sweden, Germany, France and Slovenia offer almost free university tuition without the same problems [1]? Certainly those countries have politicians. EDIT TO ADD: Argentina, Brazil, Poland, Spain, Turkey, Panama, Kenya, Egypt and more [2] [1] https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/080616/6-countries-virtually-free-college-tuition.asp https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/08061... [2] https://www.edvisors.com/plan-for-college/money-saving-tips/colleges-with-free-tuition/countries-with-free-tuition/ https://www.edvisors.com/plan-for-college/money-saving-tips/...

joejerryronnie 7y ago
I’m pretty sure the way these countries provide much cheaper education is not through unfettered access to loans.
- moorhosj 7y ago
  If you give something away for free, you don’t need to hand out loans. Why is it so much cheaper? What can we learn from their policies?
stale2002 7y ago
The answer is that the colleges in other countries offer significantly less to the students. It's easier to do stuff for cheaper when you just provide less stuff.
- moorhosj 7y ago
  Then maybe that is the real discussion we should be having. Do publicly funded colleges really need brand new student unions, exercise facilities and dorms every 10 years?
  - vonmoltke 7y ago
    That is the real discussion we (US society) should be having. Unfortunately, things like giving up fancy new facilities or making admissions stricter are a very hard sell as nobody is willing to make those sacrifices, so the conversation revolves almost exclusively around who should be paying for an increasingly unsustainable system.
- rightbyte 7y ago
  Are there any proof of say german university degrees offers less than american?
badpun 7y ago
As a Polish person who got a free CS degree in Poland, I want to add a counterpoint, namely, as usual, when people are given something for free, they don't appreciate it. In Poland's case, there are stupendously large numbers of people studying various branches of humanities (literature, psychology, pedagogy, law) which have poor job prospects in our country. After graduating, a lot of these people just work service jobs or emigrate to Western Europe (to work the same crappy jobs there, but for more money). It's an enormous waste of taxpayer's money, which is happening because the the students are spending out of somebody else's pocket. Meanwhile, the governing parties eviscerated the trade schools, because "we need educated people", "we're entering knowledge economy" etc. The result being, a median plumber making more than a median law graduate.
- moorhosj 7y ago
  ==In Poland's case, there are stupendously large numbers of people studying various branches of humanities (literature, psychology, pedagogy, law) which have poor job prospects in our country. After graduating, a lot of these people just work service jobs or emigrate to Western Europe (to work the same crappy jobs there, but for more money). It's an enormous waste of taxpayer's money, which is happening because the the students are spending out of somebody else's pocket.== This leads to an entirely different discussion about whether universities exist to educate the populace or to train future workers. ==The result being, a median plumber making more than a median law graduate.== Which should entice more people into the trades. Is that happening?
  - ivanhoe 7y ago
    It will eventually, but public perception on what jobs are "cool" has a lot of inertia - especially since students are under a huge influence and pressure from their parents whose perspective is usually lagging 10+ years behind the actual situation on the job market...
    - badpun 7y ago
      Yep, that's exactly the case. Parents know that blue-collar work is back-breaking, and they want their children to have a "better life", which they associate with a college degree and office work. The memo that this office work will sometimes pay as little as stocking shelves in Tesco has not reached them yet. On top of that, the trade schools were criminally neglected over the past 20 years, so it's very possible to go there and not learn much practical skills...
manigandham 7y ago
Subsidizing the education is different, and far easier and cheaper, than guaranteeing the loans which students use to purchase that education. Taking out those extra layers, bank transactions, interest fees, and incentive for universities to charge more can drastically reduce the total price. In the US, there are thousands of community/local/junior colleges where people earn degrees for a fraction of the cost. This can easily be covered by govt if there was political will to do so.
- TheBeardKing 7y ago
  Yes but who in private industry is demanding these community college degrees which are now free and provided by the government? The only reason 4-year community college degrees are de facto requirements and readily accepted is because they're so commonplace and subsidized. If there were less 4-year graduates, the demand would diminish at all the smallish businesses wanting bachelors and associates in business where they provide little to no value beyond just working for those few years anyway. Community college is junk, go to trade school or into a real profession and stop inflating entry-level job requirements at tax-payer expense.
  - moorhosj 7y ago
    ==If there were less 4-year graduates, the demand would diminish at all the smallish businesses wanting bachelors and associates in business where they provide little to no value beyond just working for those few years anyway.== Or companies may shift their workforce into higher-educated countries. ==Community college is junk, go to trade school or into a real profession and stop inflating entry-level job requirements at tax-payer expense.== The idea that 2 years of post high-school education is "junk" is alarming. What is a "real profession" and who gets to define it? Wouldn't all the new trade school graduates just inflate entry-level job requirements in those fields and decrease wages?
    - TheBeardKing 7y ago
      Removing subsidies will produce more accurate education demand than the current situation. We have too many college graduates who are under-employed, and that's simply because we've subsidized and cheapened the quality of college education. Sometimes community college is worse than junk, it's downright harmful. The most-recommended method in the US to get an engineering degree is to transfer 2 years of core credits from an easy community college to a harder engineeering school. That cheapens the quality of the degree, as the resulting degree is the same. I've done it - physics at engineering school and physics at community college is night and day. Apart from that, unless you're going to get a teaching certificate or something else in STEM, the resulting degree would not be in demand from private industry if they weren't so commonplace. Those kids would've been better off working for those 4 years or learning a trade. But instead we have people pushing to fund those 4 years completely at taxpayer expense further inflating the problem. edit: Hell yeah wages in trades would decrease, they need to. Have you not paid a plumber or electrician lately? The guys going into plumbing right out of high school are a lot smarter than the history majors working at Starbucks.
Qasaur 7y ago
>Meanwhile, other rich countries offer college that is significantly more subsidized, sometimes even free. It's not free, it's financed by exorbitantly high tax rates, which in the long-run is arguably more expensive.
- smileysteve 7y ago
  > it's financed by exorbitantly high tax rates You mean like 35% Federal, 15% Payroll, 5-10% state? and then a 9% sales tax? And then still "needing" to save 15% for retirement, company paying 15% for healthcare? Seems pretty short sighted to be thinking other places having higher tax rates when the middle class top marginal is approaching 90%.
sgeisler 7y ago
German student here: sure, university is mostly free, but that leads to people taking their time, resulting in regulations about how long you are allowed to study, leading to all kinds of bureaucratic tricks like switching majors, getting your semester counter decremented for work in the student council, etc. But generally my life as a student is quite pleasant (didn't fail exams, so I'm still on track time wise). The thing that I'm worried about is the reaction of these all-inclusive countries once they see a rise in "education arbitrage": get your degree in Germany, then move to the US to pay less taxes (and make more money in case of CS) and optionally move back once you want/have children. On a long time scale that could bleed a country of resources. And I fear they could get the idea of making people stay somehow.

joejerryronnie 7y ago

I’m pretty sure the way these countries provide much cheaper education is not through unfettered access to loans.

moorhosj 7y ago
If you give something away for free, you don’t need to hand out loans. Why is it so much cheaper? What can we learn from their policies?

stale2002 7y ago

The answer is that the colleges in other countries offer significantly less to the students. It's easier to do stuff for cheaper when you just provide less stuff.

moorhosj 7y ago
Then maybe that is the real discussion we should be having. Do publicly funded colleges really need brand new student unions, exercise facilities and dorms every 10 years?
- vonmoltke 7y ago
  That is the real discussion we (US society) should be having. Unfortunately, things like giving up fancy new facilities or making admissions stricter are a very hard sell as nobody is willing to make those sacrifices, so the conversation revolves almost exclusively around who should be paying for an increasingly unsustainable system.
rightbyte 7y ago
Are there any proof of say german university degrees offers less than american?

badpun 7y ago

As a Polish person who got a free CS degree in Poland, I want to add a counterpoint, namely, as usual, when people are given something for free, they don't appreciate it. In Poland's case, there are stupendously large numbers of people studying various branches of humanities (literature, psychology, pedagogy, law) which have poor job prospects in our country. After graduating, a lot of these people just work service jobs or emigrate to Western Europe (to work the same crappy jobs there, but for more money). It's an enormous waste of taxpayer's money, which is happening because the the students are spending out of somebody else's pocket. Meanwhile, the governing parties eviscerated the trade schools, because "we need educated people", "we're entering knowledge economy" etc. The result being, a median plumber making more than a median law graduate.

moorhosj 7y ago
==In Poland's case, there are stupendously large numbers of people studying various branches of humanities (literature, psychology, pedagogy, law) which have poor job prospects in our country. After graduating, a lot of these people just work service jobs or emigrate to Western Europe (to work the same crappy jobs there, but for more money). It's an enormous waste of taxpayer's money, which is happening because the the students are spending out of somebody else's pocket.== This leads to an entirely different discussion about whether universities exist to educate the populace or to train future workers. ==The result being, a median plumber making more than a median law graduate.== Which should entice more people into the trades. Is that happening?
- ivanhoe 7y ago
  It will eventually, but public perception on what jobs are "cool" has a lot of inertia - especially since students are under a huge influence and pressure from their parents whose perspective is usually lagging 10+ years behind the actual situation on the job market...
  - badpun 7y ago
    Yep, that's exactly the case. Parents know that blue-collar work is back-breaking, and they want their children to have a "better life", which they associate with a college degree and office work. The memo that this office work will sometimes pay as little as stocking shelves in Tesco has not reached them yet. On top of that, the trade schools were criminally neglected over the past 20 years, so it's very possible to go there and not learn much practical skills...

manigandham 7y ago

Subsidizing the education is different, and far easier and cheaper, than guaranteeing the loans which students use to purchase that education. Taking out those extra layers, bank transactions, interest fees, and incentive for universities to charge more can drastically reduce the total price. In the US, there are thousands of community/local/junior colleges where people earn degrees for a fraction of the cost. This can easily be covered by govt if there was political will to do so.

TheBeardKing 7y ago
Yes but who in private industry is demanding these community college degrees which are now free and provided by the government? The only reason 4-year community college degrees are de facto requirements and readily accepted is because they're so commonplace and subsidized. If there were less 4-year graduates, the demand would diminish at all the smallish businesses wanting bachelors and associates in business where they provide little to no value beyond just working for those few years anyway. Community college is junk, go to trade school or into a real profession and stop inflating entry-level job requirements at tax-payer expense.
- moorhosj 7y ago
  ==If there were less 4-year graduates, the demand would diminish at all the smallish businesses wanting bachelors and associates in business where they provide little to no value beyond just working for those few years anyway.== Or companies may shift their workforce into higher-educated countries. ==Community college is junk, go to trade school or into a real profession and stop inflating entry-level job requirements at tax-payer expense.== The idea that 2 years of post high-school education is "junk" is alarming. What is a "real profession" and who gets to define it? Wouldn't all the new trade school graduates just inflate entry-level job requirements in those fields and decrease wages?
  - TheBeardKing 7y ago
    Removing subsidies will produce more accurate education demand than the current situation. We have too many college graduates who are under-employed, and that's simply because we've subsidized and cheapened the quality of college education. Sometimes community college is worse than junk, it's downright harmful. The most-recommended method in the US to get an engineering degree is to transfer 2 years of core credits from an easy community college to a harder engineeering school. That cheapens the quality of the degree, as the resulting degree is the same. I've done it - physics at engineering school and physics at community college is night and day. Apart from that, unless you're going to get a teaching certificate or something else in STEM, the resulting degree would not be in demand from private industry if they weren't so commonplace. Those kids would've been better off working for those 4 years or learning a trade. But instead we have people pushing to fund those 4 years completely at taxpayer expense further inflating the problem. edit: Hell yeah wages in trades would decrease, they need to. Have you not paid a plumber or electrician lately? The guys going into plumbing right out of high school are a lot smarter than the history majors working at Starbucks.

Qasaur 7y ago

>Meanwhile, other rich countries offer college that is significantly more subsidized, sometimes even free. It's not free, it's financed by exorbitantly high tax rates, which in the long-run is arguably more expensive.

smileysteve 7y ago
> it's financed by exorbitantly high tax rates You mean like 35% Federal, 15% Payroll, 5-10% state? and then a 9% sales tax? And then still "needing" to save 15% for retirement, company paying 15% for healthcare? Seems pretty short sighted to be thinking other places having higher tax rates when the middle class top marginal is approaching 90%.

sgeisler 7y ago

German student here: sure, university is mostly free, but that leads to people taking their time, resulting in regulations about how long you are allowed to study, leading to all kinds of bureaucratic tricks like switching majors, getting your semester counter decremented for work in the student council, etc. But generally my life as a student is quite pleasant (didn't fail exams, so I'm still on track time wise). The thing that I'm worried about is the reaction of these all-inclusive countries once they see a rise in "education arbitrage": get your degree in Germany, then move to the US to pay less taxes (and make more money in case of CS) and optionally move back once you want/have children. On a long time scale that could bleed a country of resources. And I fear they could get the idea of making people stay somehow.