Yeah, but did you ever bother to look at why the GDP is high or just latch onto the single statistic that fit your preconceptions?
not all education is training to get paid. There is great societal value to the arts, to philosophy, to literature, to history, to education. Now I will agree that those who go deeply into debt to study these are still responsible for their debts. Some can pay back in kind - taking jobs that benefit society - teachers of the poor, peace corp, social work.
But to say there is no societal gain from these types of disciplines is myopic.
About 15 years ago, when my kids were in high school, I had an interesting conversation with an American coworker of mine.
He had married an Argentinian and spent some years in Buenos Aires, and had recently moved back. He summarized the experience as fantastic people and city. Lousy government and economy. But great schools. High schoolers in Buenos Aires took school seriously.
The high school my friend had attended in the States, he said, which he had considered top notch, was lackadaisical in comparison to an Argentinian high school.
At the same time my kids were spending a little time in a Japanese high school and had quite a shock. Japanese high school, compared to American high school, was a fusion of military boot camp run by NASA astronauts who had been in cheer squad themselves, and who all trained in watercolor at the Sorbonne. Intelligence from a different planet. Light-years more rigor in scholastics. And with way better food.
Here’s where the conundrum came in…
Argentina’s economy was in a shambles. As always. There was widespread sectarian hatred, politely hiding in plain sight, ready to explode.
Japan’s economy had for 20 years been shrinking. 1970 to 1990 the U.S. had been increasingly terrified by the Japanese economy. By 2010 it was a footnote.
But the U.S. education system had run unchanged during all that time. It had been inferior all that time, according to all the talk heads.
I’ve only heard bad things about the U.S. education system all my life. What is being said about it now could be taken verbatim from a 1970 editorial, only replacing ‘woke’ with ‘hippy’. The profs are all commies. The students are all faggots.
And yet the USA remained the dominant economy in the world to this day, and spearheaded the Digital Revolution. A very expensive endeavor in terms of research investment.
So, my friend posed to me this conundrum: we are the most innovative and in some aspects wealthiest nation in the world, and yet our education system is what it is. Is that in spite of it, or because of it?
Concur. Universities centuries ago were places of learning for learning’s sake. They were places that collected, stored and organised knowledge and those attending were the elite and probably wealthy.
Again I concur absolutely. No argument from me.
The argument here is who pays. Societal good doesn’t necessarily have to be funded by taxes extracted by force especially because those it is extracted from don’t agree with the society’s definition of societal good. They can see and agree that issues such as defence, law and order, international relations etc aught to be funded from taxes but after those and a few more the connection disappears into the fog.
Commenters here may perceive me as extreme, lunatic far, far right, or even further - not my self assessment but I’m no bleeding heart Lefty - but I do believe governments should be much, much smaller and that private sectors will fill the gaps.
This also solves another endemic problem - corruption. If your government was properly restricted to the authority delegated to it in your constitution, it would automatically reduce greatly in size, funding, power and meddlesome interference in the proper exercise of my actual political persuasion, individual responsibility.
Therein lies my solution to the funding of universities. Individuals pay or they convince others to do so on their personal behalf. Simply looking to government for hand outs is easy when governments have lots to hand out and votes to buy, but remove that power totally and better solutions emerge. Add a university with an incentive to produce valuable products and no recourse to slush funds from taxes and you have the start of a thriving sector focussed on quality rather than a kindergarten for kidults experimenting with parent-shocking personal appearance disfigurements, disgusting habits and a piece of paper of little or no value to society.
Not a complete philosophy, you must note, but a basis for one.
Concur. Isn’t it lovely how we agree!
Very well said. The biggest shortfall with the US education system I have seen is the state’s lack of funding for technical education beyond high school and the lack of promotion of the value of such as education. There has never been a national promotion of this type of training, sadly.The state I grew up in had a top notch state funded technical degree program that was supported by designated taxes on the industry in the area. They churned out some excellent electronic and mechanical technicians in two years that the US is severely lacking in now. Unfortunately they switched over to medical training and some computer programming as their emphasis. The shortage of highly skilled workers is getting worse and will become severe as AI and robotics take over most mundane and assembly work in the next 5-10 years. Skilled machinists that can fabricate the latest equipment, technicians that can repair them can now demand top wages.
The universities can churn out excellent engineers who can design but it takes the techs on the ground to keep it running. The EU develops these skills thru education and trade unions but the US is falling behind.
The Chinese are way ahead on this and will soon eat our lunch. Especially if this defunding of basic research keeps up.
I worked a couple of months with a very smart young man from Malaysia who described his education very similarly. Except he said his instructors at his maritime university would hit him & his fellow cadets for all sorts of silly reasons. This guys was more than well educated & sharp as a whip. Unfortunately, he was extremely petty which hampered his abilities at being a good watch stander & leader. I worked with dozens of smart maritime officers from different Asian countries whose pettiness prevented them from excelling at their jobs. I might be wrong but I assume they learned the pettiness that stifles good problem solving abilities from their schools & upbringing? Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to work with a dumb, sloppy cowboy American either but I won’t tolerate an assistant engineer who grinds his teeth when the stapler is out of place or raises their voice because they think an unlicensed made a mistake either.
darn - was about to send in my CV - oh well
What if the sectors which benefit from the education of our society subsidize a percentage of these students. Use a portion of fines from civil cases brought by the government to fund scholarships for legal studies. Settlements from healthcare and pharmaceutical suits fund scholarships for these studies. Same with finance, environmental, infrastructure… incentivize businesses for sponsorship for students with preferable status of grants, permitting or contracts. This could be applied to donations for the education of the arts as well. If universities are awarded grants and research funding, attach a condition that they need to give a free ride to “X” amount of low income students. This doesn’t have to be mandatory, either they contribute or they have lower preferential status.
banking is only 11% of its gdp if thats what you were getting at, using 5% of the workforce according the wiki
Asia is learn by rote, no room to think as that could effect politics and control of the population.
The other problem ( really bad in Singapore) is they convince them they have had the best education in the world. They start work and cant understand why they are not the boss and dont want to learn anything as they have just finished learning everything there is to know except thinking.
From an essay, Copernicus and Bologna by Carlo Rovelli.
That is why education frightens the MAGA morons and ignorant “conservatives”.
I think you have the wrong way around, the loonie left is pushing the woke agenda ignoring the old school education.
The left wants more uneducated illegals into the USA as they assume they will vote left.
Sad indictment as they are saying only the uneducated vote left.
Same in many countries.
What is your definition of the “woke agenda”? Give examples because it seems to me ‘woke’ is anything one doesn’t agree with.
When feeling overruled facts
https://www.nas.org/academic-questions/34/4/woke-madness-and-the-university
“To be called ‘woke’ in a world that sleeps through suffering is no insult — it is Gospel. Woke means awakened by compassion. Guided by truth. Humbled by grace. Committed to justice — not just for some, but for all. So let them mock. Let them sneer. We will still build the Kingdom — not with walls, but with love. Be awake. Be loving. Be woke.” - Pope Leo
Doing some of my own research on the cliche of woke I found out it was originally used and coined by African Americans. In later years it came to indicate an awareness that injustices exist still with different races, sexes and national origin. I can understand why using a term with African American origins would annoy a certain class of people I don’t have any issue with treating people equally and calling attention to when they are not. So I reckon i have been ‘woke’ for many years. 
Are you saying that’s what you think too? I hope not.
CCP or US taxpayer funded for your own destruction
Public Universities are going to be fine.
In many places Community Colleges are struggling.
Many small private colleges without big endowments are in financial trouble. Some have already failed. Many more will. Demographics (a smaller college age population) is against them. These schools will suffer even more without foreign students.
The big name, well endowed Universities, like Harvard, Yale, MIT, Stanford and Caltech will be just fine, with or without government research support, or foreign students.
There are many good non-financial arguments for encouraging foreign students to attend US universities.
However, there is something to be said for reserving more seats at America’s top universities for American students.