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You arguments are bit like: if you can't afford a car just move to place with good public transportation. Problem solved. Yet in the US that's not possible to d

You arguments are bit like: if you can't afford a car just move to place with good public transportation. Problem solved. Yet in the US that's not possible to do a larger scale. There are just not enough places to accommodate everyone that needs that. Hence you end up with people paying predatory car loans. I am not questioning that for one particular individual, it is possible to get a good education for far less than the average. Good for them. But that approach neither scales well nor is applicable to population levels, hence people try to game the system to get ahead. This is an example of gaming the system after all, we're looking at what leads here. As a note to the career prospects, how much you make in 10 years is not such an optimal measure. 10 years is a long time, and you do benefit more early on. The opportunities and overall quality of life is more impacted.

scarface74 7y ago
You arguments are bit like: if you can't afford a car just move to place with good public transportation. Problem solved Guess what? People decide every day that they want or need to live near public transportation because they can’t afford a car. Also, relevant to the conversation, people also decide not to buy a car that cost a lot to purchase and maintain because it’s not in their budget. There are just not enough places to accommodate everyone that needs that. Hence you end up with people paying predatory car loans. There are plenty of non elite cheaper colleges in every state. People choose to live near public transportation and buy cheap cars every day. I am not questioning that for one particular individual, it is possible to get a good education for far less than the average. Good for them. But that approach neither scales well nor is applicable to population levels, Since most college graduates aren’t graduating from “elite colleges” and the sum total of graduates from non elite colleges is much larger, and I posted statistics at the population level, again, it’s easy to show that you don’t need to graduate from an elite college to earn a better than average wage. As a note to the career prospects, how much you make in 10 years is not such an optimal measure. 10 years is a long time, and you do benefit more early on. The opportunities and overall quality of life is more impacted. This is also provably incorrect. There are plenty of statistics about where the peak earnings years are for most Americans. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_earning_years https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_earning_years
- glofish 7y ago
  Let me ask this, is your underlying argument that the $1.5 trillion student debt in the US is merely a result of ill-made choices? All these people chose not to enroll in that super-affordable yet on-par-with-the-best-over-long-term local educational institution, instead, they chose to pay a lot more for marginal benefits at best.
  - scarface74 7y ago
    I am saying from a pure ROI standpoint, it is simple to determine whether the cost of the education was worth it. By using a few criteria. 1. On average, was the cost of the education worth the difference between not going to college at all vs going to college. We know the answer to that question: https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/research-summaries/education-earnings.html https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/research-summaries/education... 2. Once you determine whether going to college vs not going to college is worth it, is the cost of going to an expensive college versus a cheaper college beneficial based on the difference between the discounted future cash flows of your lifetime earning potential? You can figure that out on average by looking at the median ten year earnings after graduating from college. It doesn’t make any sense to spend more than the minimum to get a degree in certain fields - like teachers, social workers, and even pharmacists. Yes I’m saying that most people don’t choose colleges strictly based on the ROI. I think that is either a mistake or a luxury depending on your viewpoint.
    - glofish 7y ago
      as luck would have it here is plot I saw on reddit https://www.payscale.com/college-roi https://www.payscale.com/college-roi

scarface74 7y ago

You arguments are bit like: if you can't afford a car just move to place with good public transportation. Problem solved Guess what? People decide every day that they want or need to live near public transportation because they can’t afford a car. Also, relevant to the conversation, people also decide not to buy a car that cost a lot to purchase and maintain because it’s not in their budget. There are just not enough places to accommodate everyone that needs that. Hence you end up with people paying predatory car loans. There are plenty of non elite cheaper colleges in every state. People choose to live near public transportation and buy cheap cars every day. I am not questioning that for one particular individual, it is possible to get a good education for far less than the average. Good for them. But that approach neither scales well nor is applicable to population levels, Since most college graduates aren’t graduating from “elite colleges” and the sum total of graduates from non elite colleges is much larger, and I posted statistics at the population level, again, it’s easy to show that you don’t need to graduate from an elite college to earn a better than average wage. As a note to the career prospects, how much you make in 10 years is not such an optimal measure. 10 years is a long time, and you do benefit more early on. The opportunities and overall quality of life is more impacted. This is also provably incorrect. There are plenty of statistics about where the peak earnings years are for most Americans. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_earning_years https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_earning_years

glofish 7y ago
Let me ask this, is your underlying argument that the $1.5 trillion student debt in the US is merely a result of ill-made choices? All these people chose not to enroll in that super-affordable yet on-par-with-the-best-over-long-term local educational institution, instead, they chose to pay a lot more for marginal benefits at best.
- scarface74 7y ago
  I am saying from a pure ROI standpoint, it is simple to determine whether the cost of the education was worth it. By using a few criteria. 1. On average, was the cost of the education worth the difference between not going to college at all vs going to college. We know the answer to that question: https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/research-summaries/education-earnings.html https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/research-summaries/education... 2. Once you determine whether going to college vs not going to college is worth it, is the cost of going to an expensive college versus a cheaper college beneficial based on the difference between the discounted future cash flows of your lifetime earning potential? You can figure that out on average by looking at the median ten year earnings after graduating from college. It doesn’t make any sense to spend more than the minimum to get a degree in certain fields - like teachers, social workers, and even pharmacists. Yes I’m saying that most people don’t choose colleges strictly based on the ROI. I think that is either a mistake or a luxury depending on your viewpoint.
  - glofish 7y ago
    as luck would have it here is plot I saw on reddit https://www.payscale.com/college-roi https://www.payscale.com/college-roi