Conservatives want to cause a massive recession in higher education

I think they are more open to other adults than children on this, simply because they don't have to do daycare for their kid lol. None of these people have any real principles other than oppositional defiance and personal convenience

 

You think the government decides how many people to admit to the school? How many professors to hire, etc? You are so close to understanding the nature of capitalism here, but you attribute it to the government (no wonder this country is so cooked) ... artificial scarcity is how capitalism functions! Making schools even more market-driven than they already are will incentivize scarcity ... just like in housing, medicine, and everything else that costs way more here than in places that socialize or reduce market effects! We dont build public housing anymore, and builders arent out there making cheap homes to satisfy demand. Why sell 10 cheap houses when you can get more return with 1 very expensive house?

 

no, professions and colleges do to artificially limit the number of practitioners, overwhelmingly in the medical field.

survey is another big problem. educators decided surveyors in florida needed a bachelor degree, and the years in the field actually learning the trade. the ven diagram for the guy willing to do the schooling and the field time is so small that florida has a massive shortage of surveyors. two schools in the state (UF and FAU) offering programs and graduating a dozen or so a year with all the old surveyors retiring. big shortages, survey office looking like a retirement home these days

OT and PT - now a doctorate - wife is OT with 20+ years and masters, couldn't get licensed today. PT - same, need a doctorate in US, masters in Europe. Daughter got masters in UK, got licensed in UK, sat and got licensed in US with masters. Artificially contrived constraint for no good reason.

 

The basic point is why does that number go up if it all becomes self funded? Like that number is probably higher than what the market would bear! What incentive do Medical/Veterinary/Dental associations have to not gatekeep? Then you need the government to de-credential and essentially let Dr. Nick Riviera operate with his degree from Hollywood Upstairs Medical College.

 

Well, what's the case there would be higher numbers without government support? Either the government is colluding with those professions, or they are bargaining with them to get numbers higher while keeping them happy to some degree by not increasing the supply of labor dramatically. So, unless they decide to stop colluding and break the power of medical associations to gatekeep, how is the number going up instead of down?

 

A voucher school could be anything the market wanted.

As for online education, kids could be helped with discussion boards if they're having trouble. Some kids could go to traditional schools. You could give kids financial incentives to learn. Given gov't spends well over $10k/year in many places for K-12 ed there is a lot of room for kids to make money and for gov't to save money.

Regarding medical care, ending licensure lowers costs and would incentive many to go to a doctor iinstead of worrying about costs. If you wanted a ",board certified" doctor you could still see one. If you were comfortable seeing someone with a lower amount of education who operated with the help of an Ipad/AI you could do that. In places where it's hardest to get an electrician's license, electricians charge more and you have more accidental electrocutions. More cases of accidental blindness where it's harder to become an optometrist. Etc per Mary T. Ruwart, Ph.D.

I'd be very comfortable having something like hypertension treated by an unlicensed individual. A smaller percentage of 3rd worlders compared to whites or Asians are smart enough to get licensed in many fields where whites and Asians dominate. Third worlders make less money as well. I say get rid of licensure and wealth would be distributed more evenly throughout society. And poor people could get services at lower prices. Everyone would know that certain facilities had the elite doctors/etc and if you wanted the best care you could go there.

No reason for an MRI to cost $3000 in America and $200 in Vietnam.

Also, healthcare costs overall could decline by 50%-70% if we had a Singapore/Milton Friedman-style healthcare system that utilized health savings accounts where everybody has health insurance. The richest fund their own accounts, the gov't 100,% funds the poorest people. Sliding scale in between. When 3rd parties pay for medical procedures costs explode. Same with education

 

FFS!

 

If you allow more people to practice medicine, the cost drops. Simple supply and demand. The govt and universities are keeping it low, even though in a free market for things that high price/profit, it's in there best interest to gain more market share. They don't obviously, now you can point to lobbying to keep it that way from outside sources, but ultimately the govt and universities make that decision. That is the source of corruption. Govt ultimately can say no to the lobbyists, they have no power unless your govt/universities are corrupt,.which they are.

 

The issue with this analysis around licensing is that the medical profession has already divised the work around: nurse practitioners and PAs.

 

Sorry, but I want my doctors and dentist to be licensed.
Also, how exactly would an electrician demonstrate that he is an "above average" electrician?

 

Of course, more labor supply means labor costs less to hire - but lobbying and corruption is a thing that is legal (and encouraged) in this country and the lobbying power of rich medical associations is greater than would-be medical students. So we just cut funding and hope it all works out and gatekeeping ends? Maybe we suddenly become a democracy that represents people and not the monied and powerful? People sure love breaking things in this country and hoping magic will fix it in the aftermath. Probably the result of decades of propaganda about the amazing powers of the free market.

 

But think of how cheap it would be if your buddy Steve could give you a root canal and you arent allowed to sue him if he screws up!

 

I don't know that he's putting all the blame on Universities, but clearly the solution will have to start at the University level. I think it's like a lot of cities in that administrators value things (new buildings, expansion, etc.) that the students (citizens) don't want and never asked for. I'm sure most if not all students would trade the shiney new building for a major reduction in the cost of classes. But then the admins wouldn't have anything to brag about. It's like the new building here in St. Pete. "Largest on the West Coast". Only people who care - or wanted it - are Miami/NY developers and the politicians.

Also, enough with the DEI prerequisites. If someone wants to choose that course of study, fine. But nobody should be forced to pay for it, especially given the current cost of credit hours and the plague of student debt.

 

I mean state universities are not independent of the state government ... the people that control universities or that are in oversight positions are often political appointees themselves.

 

Maybe a list of projects he's worked on and supervisors who have worked with him?

 

The question is, where is all this money (from this obvious bubble) going? And why should students have to bare the cost?

 

Its a capitalist country, where do you think the money is going? Who bears the costs of literally any commodity that is for sale? If education is a commodity, people are going to want to sell it for as much as possible. The easy fix is give people money to pay for it. Which is what we have done. Its not the best path, but it probably is the best mix of people getting to profit and also access it relatively easily if we are intent on subjecting education to market forces.

 

Throwing more money at it is "the answer"? To what is clearly a bubble anyway?

I don't get that line of reasoning at all. Unless we're talking about something like Europe where college is fully funded by taxes and available to anyone. IDK, but I don't see throwing money into an existing bubble as the solution.