<p>calimami, there is nothing wrong with it as long as everyone pays for himself/herself.
Don’t you think it’s selfish to have someone else paying for you to live comfortably and going to college?</p>
<p>I think it will add to the growing gap between the rich and poor. How will the poor ever get out of the lower class? Through education. If every college becomes privatized, there will be a perpetual cycle that will lead to the rich getting richer and poor getting poorer (there already is)</p>
<p>As Justice Holmes once said, “I like paying taxes. They buy me civilization.” Taxes do buy civilization. I can understand the “I don’t want government in my back pocket” sentiment from the millionaire / billionaire plutocracy who can afford private security, private schools, and private living in their Ayn Rand retreat from the rest of the world, but not from everyone else. We are a society, not a collection of anarchic individuals and should be pulling together, not against each other. Taxes are at historical lows, not highs.</p>
<p>Saving tax money on education means that it will be spent on social services, crime, etc. Not all public colleges need to be liberal arts, some should be vocational. People who lose jobs to obsolete industries should be able to go back to publicly funded colleges for retraining at little personal expense (they don’t have jobs after all). </p>
<p>I will cede the point about about government waste, corruption, and frivolity with government money creating a strong incentive for individuals to part with less of their hard earned cash in taxes. However, the solution is not less government, it is better government. We need to hold government more accountable with our votes and make ourselves the masters of our democracy, not “starve the beast” and have a crippled government that serves only the members of it, and the lobbyists who buy the government officials. </p>
<p>Thus, the point of the OP is well taken. Education through graduate or professional school is a service that should be funded by taxes and available to all who qualify, not just those who manage to have parents who are successful enough to send them.</p>
<p>By all means – since the government has done such a great job managing my tax money so far – it should be allowed to manage more:
[Feds:</a> Seattle welfare recipient lives in million dollar home | KING5.com Seattle](<a href=“http://www.king5.com/news/local/Feds--Seattle-welfare-recipient-lived-in-million-dollar-home-134943613.html]Feds:”>http://www.king5.com/news/local/Feds--Seattle-welfare-recipient-lived-in-million-dollar-home-134943613.html)</p>
<p>Let’s see – our brave military men and women have risked their lives and for that sacrifice they are rewarded with the GI bill – but actually we should give the same funding to everyone for no particular reason. Huh?</p>
<p>On the cell phone example, my daughter said it best:
So you’re saying that if I don’t keep up my grades and I fool around and get pregnant, you’ll take my phone away, but THAT"S OKAY because the government will give me a new one for free.<br>
Yup, that sounds about right.</p>
<h1>23 LIKE</h1>
<p>This idea that if it’s broke don’t fix it … don’t like :(</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>This sounds like the community college system, which is heavily taxpayer supported, is widespread throughout populated areas of the country, excels in vocational ed and retraining and has very low tuition.</p>
<p>I think that we’re on the cusp of an educational transformation with online courses and new ways of delivering content. I think that pouring money into maintaining the status quo will merely postpone the inevitable. I’m excited about the ability of online education with live streaming lectures and message boards and blackboard to bring ongoing education to workers no matter where they are. Right now many undergraduate and graduate degree online courses and programs from brick and mortar universities actually cost more than in house tuitions (due to technology fee addons), but this should drop in the future if incentives are not given to maintain the status quo.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Have to agree to a large extent with the general idea, although the implementation could use quite a bit of improvement (as can be seen by the ever rising list prices, the drawing in of marginal schools and students that result in defaulted student loans for non-completed education in what would be low value degrees even if completed, problems with student debt, etc.).</p>
<p>Even the top-1%-ers should realize that widespread education is ultimately good for them – more economic activity that increases the wealth of the economy that is ultimately good for their businesses and investments, less crime and welfare costs, less attraction for actual far left politicians and revolutionaries feeding on the poor and hopeless, etc…</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Excellent point. </p>
<p>It is to our advantage to educate all citizens to a higher level than we do. K-12 really doesn’t cut it anymore, not for the economy now. </p>
<p>It’s not like the 50’s, when a HS diploma got you a union job in a factory where you earned enough to support your family (just one parent working - not both), the money to buy a house and a car, raise a couple of kids, keep the economy going with your discretionary income…</p>
<p>The question is how much value is there in just any college degree? Are they all equal? At what point does the value fall below the cost/effort?</p>
<p>
Agreed. Let’s get the better government first, and then we’ll stop trying to starve the beast.</p>
<p>This is a huge problem and I understand the frustration and the sentiment. However, starving the beast brings the entire society down except for those milking the beast from the top (it is an odd shaped beast). I read an interesting book recently called, “The Price of Civilization” that addresses how to salvage government with a third party that is not bought by big oil (republicans) or Wall Street (democrats) that will actually do what the majority of people really want - reduce expenses and raise revenue by increasing the tax burden on the extremely wealthy and on economic transactions, among other things, to get the deficit under control.</p>
<p>Starving the beast will harm education, leave infrastructure crumbling, and lead to further deterioration of what we actually need the government to do. No question it is not doing what it needs to, and Obama did not bring “change.” Education is one thing that the government needs to do for the benefit of society as a whole.</p>
<p>Different debate about what sort of education and education reform generally.</p>
<p>Keynesian economics:</p>
<p>More government spending → Consumer spending + Business investments → Higher GDP…</p>
<p>Anyways, look at Europe, is education worth being subsidized by the government? I believe so. I will pull that PhD card again. 45% of ALL doctorate recipients in the US are foreign born and 55% of all engineering PhDs are foreign born. What does that mean? Are we going to let China and India take over the world dominance? The way we are headed, it certainly seems like it. The question is: where is the money coming from? Of course it comes from the people, but in times of slow growth, there needs to be a stimulus. Education had long term benefits. Is higher education necessary? Of course it is. Unless you are willing to rebuild the K-12 education from the ground up. Do you honestly believe we are doing a good job educating kids these days? No, far from it.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Maybe we should be concentrating on rebuilding K-12 education from the ground up, before giving the government a larger role in higher education. After all, K-12 is the foundation, and a weakening in that foundation has caused a lowering of readiness for college and thus a lowering in college standards and level of rigor in courses. </p>
<p>As for Keynesian economics, the way that theory has been applied in this latest recession has led to a deeper and longer recession than any previous ones I have lived through. Many recent economists have also been reevaluating its so-called savior role in the Great Depression.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>yes, let’s look at Europe. Open a newspaper.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>It means the US has the best university system (a mix of public and private) in the world.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Investing in education is not a stimulus. As you said, it is long term.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Do you realize that spending more money does not guarantee better results? We have tripled (in real terms) the per student spending on K-12 education since 1970, and the achievement results show zero improvement. <a href=“http://reason.com/assets/mc/dpowell/2011_01/derugy-column-chart2.jpg[/url]”>http://reason.com/assets/mc/dpowell/2011_01/derugy-column-chart2.jpg</a></p>
![http://reason.com/assets/mc/dpowell/2011_01/derugy-column-chart2.jpg[/url]](http://reason.com/assets/mc/dpowell/2011_01/derugy-column-chart2.jpg%5B/url%5D){kind=link}
<p>
</p>
<p>do you think everyone in Greece lives comfortably?</p>
<p>Everyone does have access to college education. There are already government loans to facilitate this (taxpayer subsidized, obviously). There are also private loans. Let me know when you can get a car loan or a house mortgage at 0% interest for the first 4/5 years.</p>
<p>“Having access to a college education” and “everyone’s education should be paid for by the taxpayers” are not the same thing.</p>
<p>Take ownership of your life. If college is a worthy investment for you, then you should be willing to make that investment in yourself.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Actually, the inappropriate application of Keynesian economics (cutting taxes and increasing spending, turning a short-lived surplus into deficit) during better times helped inflate the bubbles that led to the deeper and longer recession now than typical. The problems in the financial system are likely the reason it is deeper and longer; one can argue that the Keynesian economics applied in the recession made it slightly less deep and long. Of course, the government’s room to maneuver in this area is severely restricted by past reckless spending during good times, such as the addition of the unfunded entitlement to the socialized medical insurance program (Medicare Part D).</p>
<p>From above…</p>
<p>" I will pull that PhD card again. 45% of ALL doctorate recipients in the US are foreign born and 55% of all engineering PhDs are foreign born."</p>
<p>As a percentage of their native populations,i’ll bet we have more PHd’s …to use India and China as examples is laughable,talk about great divides between almost haves and have nothings…We in this country have a significantly better education system then India and China.</p>
<p>college degree holders pay $885,000 more in taxes than they receive.</p>
<p>And yet those are college degree holders who earned their college degrees under the current system. Who is to say that those numbes would continue to be so impressive if the degrees were earned under a new system that required less effort on the student’s part? These kids need to have some skin in the game!</p>
<p>Rich kids have no skin in the game, yet they tend to have disproportionate representation in elite schools producing Wall Street employees.</p>