Renzatic on 24/8/2018 at 07:08
Quote Posted by Abysmal
That just means other ecosystems run out of room. If only everyone would stop chasing a higher standard of living. The proper way of a colony is inequality, as nature intended. Gotta keep most people low or the whole thing breaks. I didn't say I wanted it that way.
You're not entirely wrong, but good luck trying to convince people of that greater good.
Pyrian on 24/8/2018 at 07:27
Quote Posted by Abysmal
If only everyone would stop chasing a higher standard of living.
Higher standards of living correspond very well with lower birth rates. Mostly it seems to come down to the availability of contraceptives. Make sure that everyone who wants birth control, gets birth control, and we'd solve our population growth problem overnight. 'Course, evolution would eventually have something to say about that...
Pyrian on 24/8/2018 at 08:06
Quote Posted by Abysmal
After we automate them away, what's the plan?
I actually think that's a
lot further away than people like to think. The U.S. automated and off-shored the vast majority of its prior economy, and has never shown the slightest sign of a
fundamental labor excess (obviously we've had plenty of recessions and depressions where demand for labor temporarily dropped, but those were all fiscal fiascos). The jobs just changed. If we really reach a point where we need people to not work, some sort of UBI is the obvious plan of attack.
SD on 24/8/2018 at 15:55
Quote Posted by nickie
I've never managed to reach the threshold and it's too late now. Interestingly, I thought, it used to be the only debt that wasn't wiped out by bankruptcy although I don't know if that's still the case.
I've not quite reached the threshold either, although the threshold is much smaller for newer graduates, albeit their repayments are lower and more fairly structured (if I breach the threshold even by £1, I am obligated to pay my entire debt off over five years).
Tuition was free for me, at least; ironically, the only reason I took out two years of student loans was because I needed to guarantee I had a certain quantity of money in the bank in order to attend university in the USA.
Yes, they changed the law in 2004 to exclude student debt from consideration in bankruptcy. Otherwise, I suppose, every graduate would be tempted to go bankrupt.
heywood on 24/8/2018 at 17:03
Re: free tuition
The rising cost of post-secondary education is largely due to the growth in demand exceeding the growth of supply. There's a limited number of reputable institutions and degree programs, and stiff competition among students for admission to schools that will give them marketable degrees. I don't see how that would change if public universities were free. Private institutions would still attract paying students, and the good public universities would still be highly selective. There would be fewer people going deep into debt for a worthless degree, but there would be even more people getting worthless degrees.
In my opinion, it would be better to put more public money into improving primary and secondary education as well as trades and skills. We still have a ton of under-funded and under-performing primary and secondary schools. Also, it seems to me that shortages of skilled workers in certain regions is more of a factor in limiting economic growth than shortages of degrees. I'd rather we spend to improve basic education and reduce structural unemployment and skills gaps than produce more history and psychology degrees.
Re: automation
Our standard of living is largely a function of our productivity. We've always been finding more efficient ways to do things that require less labor. Whenever we take a step forward in productivity, we temporarily displace some workers. But over the long term, every advance in efficiency has resulted in an increase in the standard of living and no net loss of demand for labor.
Trying to protect workers from being displaced by automation is counter-productive. If you don't take advantage of automation to increase efficiency, somebody else will, and they will out compete you and your workers will lose their jobs anyway.
If you try to close off your economy to prevent competition, you will cause a drop in your standard of living, devaluation of your currency, inflation, and economic contraction. If you're able to live through that and reach a stable condition, you can be like Cuba and stand pat for four decades or so while the world passes you by.
Pyrian on 24/8/2018 at 17:36
Quote Posted by heywood
In my opinion, it would be better to put more public money into improving primary and secondary education as well as trades and skills.
I find these sorts of strategic quibbles disingenuous. Let's be clear: The same people who want to better fund higher education, also want to better fund lower education, and the same people that are actively defunding lower education are opposed to better funding higher education. We can debate exact tactics all we like, that's all well and good, but first we have to establish that education
IS an important priority that should be given more consideration and funding instead of less.
heywood on 24/8/2018 at 17:44
That's a different argument.
I thought we're talking about the merits of Ocasio-Cortez's proposal to make post-secondary education free?
In my opinion, there are higher priority uses for public spending.
Starker on 24/8/2018 at 18:19
Free tuition doesn't have to mean that a lot more people who want a "worthless degree" will be suddenly be able to get it. Also, not only would there be fewer people to go into debt over a "worthless degree", there would be much less people going into debt in general. Which to me seems like a good thing. Also, it would allow for more social mobility in a situation where (
http://www.nccp.org/publications/pub_1194.html) 1 in 5 children in the US live in poverty and 2 in 5 live in low income families. And yes, primary and secondary education are important too, of course.
And yes, automation does increase productivity. Which is why social programs are needed to distribute that increase in productivity. As the last three Republican presidents have demonstrated, it doesn't just trickle down to those in need. Dealing with the effects of automation doesn't mean you have to abandon automation to protect workers, it just means you don't have to let the displaced workers become destitute as a result.
Quote Posted by heywood
That's a different argument.
I thought we're talking about the merits of Ocasio-Cortez's proposal to make post-secondary education free?
In my opinion, there are higher priority uses for public spending.
Well, the argument was that Ocasio-Cortez's proposals are not radical far left ideas, but pretty mainstream and ordinary.
Also, investing in higher education seems a better priority to me than massive tax cuts for the rich and budget increases for the military that they didn't even ask for.
nickie on 24/8/2018 at 19:21
Quote Posted by SD
. . . the only reason I took out two years of student loans was because I needed to guarantee I had a certain quantity of money in the bank in order to attend university in the USA.
Yes, they changed the law in 2004 to exclude student debt from consideration in bankruptcy. Otherwise, I suppose, every graduate would be tempted to go bankrupt.
And I took loans out because I became a single person a year in. It wasn't more than about £5000 though (long time ago now).
Going bankrupt is not a good thing unless you're immoral or have family money to set you up again. It does affect your future prospects. But Inland Revenue debt is written off and student loans is government money (or used to be) so it seemed illogical.
Apologies to icemann for wandering off topic so to salve my conscience, like Starker, I think, I've not noticed a rise in far left, only in far right. That may well be because I am only afraid of the far right.
heywood on 24/8/2018 at 19:53
There's no free lunch. A student might not be taking on debt under her proposal, but the federal government will be taking on the debt and we'll all have to pay it sooner or later with interest via taxation. So let's make sure it's well spent.
Under the current US system, the costs may be covered in part by direct payments by the student or their family, academic or athletic or other scholarships funded from various sources, need-based financial aid funded from various sources, and student loans. It's a messy hodgepodge for sure, but it does accomplish a few things. First, students with high family incomes pay more and students with low family incomes get more subsidy. Second, it ensures that students have some skin in the game, so there is incentive to pursue studies that have a positive ROI.
We're already wasteful in that a great many students obtain degrees that have little or no economic value. A lot of people were raised to think that Bachelor's degree = career with a middle class or better income. That's not the case and there are plenty of people out there who wasted time and money obtaining an unmarketable degree who are now tending bars, waiting tables, working in retail, doing administrative work, etc. There will be less incentive for students to get their money's worth out of an education if they're not paying for it.
As I said in my previous post, there's already fierce competition for admission to colleges and universities with a good reputation, because the education they get and the degrees they earn have more value. Many of those are private, and students will still pay to attend. The better public universities are already highly selective, so making them free isn't going to increase their enrollment.
Also, most of the good schools (public and private) are already progressive with financial aid, to make opportunities for poor students who can get admitted on merit. The bigger problem that poor students have is that their primary and secondary education usually isn't very good, so they have a hard time getting admitted to a reputable degree program based on merit. And when they do, they are less likely to succeed because they weren't as well prepared. So the single biggest thing you can do, by far, to improve economic mobility is to improve the quality of primary and secondary education where poor people live.
If you take a kid who graduates high school with the equivalent of a 9th grade education and expect him or her to attend a public college or university for free, they're going to end up at a bottom tier school earning a worthless degree. Better to put the money into ensuring they get a real high school education and/or sending them to a vocational school to learn a trade or marketable job skills.
