I don’t view a college degree as an “asset” for which
by kormal (2024-02-22 18:00:27)

In reply to: Ironically, too many people attending college is a problem.  posted by EricCartman

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ROI is a good metric. And I don’t think the gains are privatized. Everyone benefits from a college-educated populace!

I’m also a fan of the EITC. And I 100% agree with your last paragraph. We’re all just whistling Dixie around the real issues.

A degree most certainly is an asset.
by EricCartman  (2024-02-23 09:08:04)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

Let's say that you took out a loan to build a factory. Construction takes four years, and at the end of four years the factory will generate $X in income. You would certainly consider this an asset, right?

A college degree is no different, it is just human capital as opposed to physical capital.

If society pays off the loans used to obtain this human capital, and you get to keep your degree, how can you view this as anything other than privatizing the gains and socializing the losses?

You seem to place a lot of value on society graduating from college. Again, High School should be enough formal education for most of society. Do you have any data to support this assertion? I'm seeing the opposite, which is highlighted in the WSJ article below:

Roughly half of college graduates end up in jobs where their degrees aren’t needed, and that underemployment has lasting implications for workers’ earnings and career paths.

That is the key finding of a new study tracking the career paths of more than 10 million people who entered the job market over the past decade. It suggests that the number of graduates in jobs that don’t make use of their skills or credentials—52%—is greater than previously thought, and underscores the lasting importance of that first job after graduation.

Of the graduates in non-college-level jobs a year after leaving college, the vast majority remained underemployed a decade later, according to researchers at labor analytics firm Burning Glass Institute and nonprofit Strada Education Foundation, which analyzed the résumés of workers who graduated between 2012 and 2021.

More than any other factor analyzed—including race, gender and choice of university—what a person studies determines their odds of getting on a college-level career track. Internships are also critical.

The findings add fuel to the debate over the value of a college education as its cost has soared—and whether universities are producing the kind of knowledge workers that employers say they need.

“You’re told your entire life, ‘Go to college, get a bachelor’s degree and your life is gonna be gravy after that,’” said Alexander Wolfe, 29 years old, a 2018 graduate from Northern Kentucky University who currently works security at a corporate facility in the Cincinnati area. “In reality, it hasn’t really helped me that much.”
I think the point is that it's not solely an asset
by FL_Irish  (2024-02-23 09:25:45)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

I would assume most would say that they got quite a bit more out of attending Notre Dame than the resultant income differential. Seems like multiple things can all be true here.

1. There is a potential benefit to going to college beyond the economic ROI.

2. That said, there does need to be a certain level of economic ROI given the costs involved, and for many students that economic ROI is not achieved.

3. College is not the only place that the economic and non-economic benefits often associated with higher education can be obtained, and for many students it is not the right place for those benefits to be obtained.

4. Thus, instead of encouraging everyone to go to college, we should do more to promote the availability of both these economic and non-economic benefits in contexts outside of traditional four-year colleges.