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Australian tertiary education system is a bit of a mess. Rather than saying 'the government provides subsidies / loans' -- it's preferable to think of this as

by Jedd 6y ago

Australian tertiary education system is a bit of a mess. Rather than saying 'the government provides subsidies / loans' -- it's preferable to think of this as the population does this, with the government merely administrating. In theory the government should reflect the will and interests of the population, but in Australia that's not the case on most important issues (climate change, fossil fuel usage, renewables, health, etc) and there's no evidence to suggest they've got it right with this decision. Trying to guess what the job market will look like in 10-30 years from now, and fiddling with deferred monetary incentives today, sounds like hubris. HECS - university fees - came (back) in around 1990, initially a flat rate of A$1800 per student per degree. Naturally this number has risen steeply over the last three decades. Interestingly many of our politicians obtained their qualifications when tertiary education was effectively free (1974-1990). This, along with considering breakdown of what subjects our politicians actually studied at university [1], should be considered as they blithely toy with the long term social and economic effects of coaxing people into career pigeon holes. [1] https://www.torrens.edu.au/blog/business/what-degrees-do-ministers-in-australia-have-and-why-it-matters-guess-the-top-3 https://www.torrens.edu.au/blog/business/what-degrees-do-min...

austinl 6y ago
> "Rather than saying 'the government provides subsidies / loans' -- it's preferable to think of this as the population does this, with the government merely administrating." I think this is true of all public spending in some sense. Governments don't have money. Rather, the population does, and via taxation, the government is able to administer it how it chooses, for better or worse. Hopefully for the better, of course.
- Jedd 6y ago
  Yes, absolutely. In some cases the distinction's less compelling, say defence, where individually I'm unlikely to notice the budget allocation, let alone how that expenditure is sliced up. It's still fair to say that it's the collective's money, but government budgeting for it is just not scrutinised in the same way. Also, with education it's fundamentally different as almost everyone goes through some part of the education sector at some point in their lives. In Straya we have about 1.5 million people in tertiary (university, colleges, etc) education today. This is a large chunk out of of the 25m population. Consider also that we have 13.5m tax payers, and about 17m eligible voters (and voting is compulsory here). I feel that 'the government spends this money' distracts us from the provenance and accountability for these crucial and significant social decisions.

by Jedd 6y ago

austinl 6y ago

> "Rather than saying 'the government provides subsidies / loans' -- it's preferable to think of this as the population does this, with the government merely administrating." I think this is true of all public spending in some sense. Governments don't have money. Rather, the population does, and via taxation, the government is able to administer it how it chooses, for better or worse. Hopefully for the better, of course.

Jedd 6y ago
Yes, absolutely. In some cases the distinction's less compelling, say defence, where individually I'm unlikely to notice the budget allocation, let alone how that expenditure is sliced up. It's still fair to say that it's the collective's money, but government budgeting for it is just not scrutinised in the same way. Also, with education it's fundamentally different as almost everyone goes through some part of the education sector at some point in their lives. In Straya we have about 1.5 million people in tertiary (university, colleges, etc) education today. This is a large chunk out of of the 25m population. Consider also that we have 13.5m tax payers, and about 17m eligible voters (and voting is compulsory here). I feel that 'the government spends this money' distracts us from the provenance and accountability for these crucial and significant social decisions.