Comments on: Student Loans: A Disturbing Trend http://blog.robertsalomon.com/2008/07/30/student-loans-a-disturbing-trend/ Sat, 06 Mar 2010 19:47:14 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Mike Barnett http://blog.robertsalomon.com/2008/07/30/student-loans-a-disturbing-trend/comment-page-1/#comment-400 Mike Barnett Wed, 30 Jul 2008 15:11:05 +0000 http://blog.robertsalomon.com/?p=105#comment-400 I hereby volunteer Rob, and all other academics (but not me, since I came up with the idea), to provide their educational services for free for the next three years, until we come through this downturn (hopefully). But seriously folks, this is a problem. I don't see any push in the US to have the government fully finance higher ed. So without ample loans, what could be done? I was having an e-mail conversation with a friend who is an English professor at a public university in the Midwest regarding access to college. I was trying to make the point that the undergrad degree has become the old high school diploma. He saw that as making the case that everyone should have access to college. I saw that as making the case that we should demand more of students before allowing them into college. What's the difference? I think a reasonable chunk of the population should be able to get the skills they need to be successful in the job market while in high school, and not feel obligated to ramble through 4-6 (or more) years of (expensive) undergrad in order to have access to jobs that really don't require what they should be getting in an undergrad. To my friend, that sounded elitist. Is it? I believe in equality of opportunity, and I like to think of myself as what I might call a pragmatic populist -- certainly not an elitist. I think maybe this comes down to what qualifies as college. Should everyone have access to a private university education, like NYU? It's expensive as hell. Should everyone have access to a top state school? What about community college? How do we distinguish who gets access to what? If it's money, that's a problem. If it's intelligence, then that's probably alright with me, but I think my friend would say, we have an obligation to help people rise up to the level that they could go through college . . . But then you get into grad school . . . shouldn't everyone then be provided access to grad school, on the same grounds? PhD? Law degree? Medicine? Anyone have any perspective on this rambling mess I've tried to present? Economics is all about allocation of scarce resources. Higher education is, either by choice or design, a scarce resource. If the current system of allocating it is flawed, what's a better way? What are the tradeoffs in the proposed way? Best, Mike http://www.coba.usf.edu/barnett I hereby volunteer Rob, and all other academics (but not me, since I came up with the idea), to provide their educational services for free for the next three years, until we come through this downturn (hopefully).

But seriously folks, this is a problem. I don’t see any push in the US to have the government fully finance higher ed. So without ample loans, what could be done?

I was having an e-mail conversation with a friend who is an English professor at a public university in the Midwest regarding access to college. I was trying to make the point that the undergrad degree has become the old high school diploma. He saw that as making the case that everyone should have access to college. I saw that as making the case that we should demand more of students before allowing them into college.

What’s the difference? I think a reasonable chunk of the population should be able to get the skills they need to be successful in the job market while in high school, and not feel obligated to ramble through 4-6 (or more) years of (expensive) undergrad in order to have access to jobs that really don’t require what they should be getting in an undergrad.

To my friend, that sounded elitist. Is it? I believe in equality of opportunity, and I like to think of myself as what I might call a pragmatic populist — certainly not an elitist. I think maybe this comes down to what qualifies as college. Should everyone have access to a private university education, like NYU? It’s expensive as hell. Should everyone have access to a top state school? What about community college? How do we distinguish who gets access to what?

If it’s money, that’s a problem. If it’s intelligence, then that’s probably alright with me, but I think my friend would say, we have an obligation to help people rise up to the level that they could go through college . . . But then you get into grad school . . . shouldn’t everyone then be provided access to grad school, on the same grounds? PhD? Law degree? Medicine?

Anyone have any perspective on this rambling mess I’ve tried to present? Economics is all about allocation of scarce resources. Higher education is, either by choice or design, a scarce resource. If the current system of allocating it is flawed, what’s a better way? What are the tradeoffs in the proposed way?

Best,
Mike
http://www.coba.usf.edu/barnett

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