I don't buy the fact that easy money is the root cause.

The root cause is the fact that administrators have obfuscated their duty. Instead of using money to expand opportunities for kids and put more through college they have simply treated it like an endless gravy train.

They pay themselves like CEOs and use kids to debt finance growth so they can justify higher salaries and more construction.

Easy money makes it possible but it isn't easy money that abuses itself.

(12-30-2015 07:54 PM)HeartOfDixie Wrote:  I don't buy the fact that easy money is the root cause.

The root cause is the fact that administrators have obfuscated their duty. Instead of using money to expand opportunities for kids and put more through college they have simply treated it like an endless gravy train.

They pay themselves like CEOs and use kids to debt finance growth so they can justify higher salaries and more construction.

Easy money makes it possible but it isn't easy money that abuses itself.

I agree on the construction part. I was on UAB's campus yesterday and it is a totally different place from when I graduated 10 years ago, and still vastly different from when I stopped working there only 3 1/2 years ago.

(12-30-2015 07:54 PM)HeartOfDixie Wrote:  I don't buy the fact that easy money is the root cause.

As opposed to every other Bubble cheap money has produced?

Quote:The root cause is the fact that administrators have obfuscated their duty. Instead of using money to expand opportunities for kids and put more through college they have simply treated it like an endless gravy train.

** BECAUSE IT IS AN ENDLESS GRAVY TRAIN **

if Kid A wants to go to college for a useless degree is puppetry. A gets a loan for 20K to cover a year. He hands that to the school..

Now if he fails out or even graduates and can't get a job it's on kid a to pay the bill. The College has long spent the money and has no responsibility to pay it back.

Quote:They pay themselves like CEOs and use kids to debt finance growth so they can justify higher salaries and more construction.

This will happen in *any* industry where there is easy cash.

Quote:Easy money makes it possible but it isn't easy money that abuses itself.

Fair point but in any large industry if you pump it full of cash you're going to see this.

(12-30-2015 08:39 PM)Bull_In_Exile Wrote:  

(12-30-2015 07:54 PM)HeartOfDixie Wrote:  I don't buy the fact that easy money is the root cause.

As opposed to every other Bubble cheap money has produced?

Quote:The root cause is the fact that administrators have obfuscated their duty. Instead of using money to expand opportunities for kids and put more through college they have simply treated it like an endless gravy train.

** BECAUSE IT IS AN ENDLESS GRAVY TRAIN **

if Kid A wants to go to college for a useless degree is puppetry. A gets a loan for 20K to cover a year. He hands that to the school..

Now if he fails out or even graduates and can't get a job it's on kid a to pay the bill. The College has long spent the money and has no responsibility to pay it back.

Quote:They pay themselves like CEOs and use kids to debt finance growth so they can justify higher salaries and more construction.

This will happen in *any* industry where there is easy cash.

Quote:Easy money makes it possible but it isn't easy money that abuses itself.

Fair point but in any large industry if you pump it full of cash you're going to see this.

1. We have to break this up into the non-profit and for-profit sectors of all of this.

When we talk non-profit, University of, type schools we were all duped because these are not supposed to be entities out to rip people off. That change is why a lot of people are disgruntled. However, that is exactly what they have done. But, again, it isn't cheap money that is at fault, it is the administrators who abused their positions.

All bets are off when we talk for profits, they are programs designed to rip off the taxpayer, end of story. So, you are dead on when you talk pumping money into those situations.

2. The choice in degree argument is more perception than reality. Liberal Arts majors are not the source of the problem, even though they are the most often cited. There simply aren't enough women's studies majors out there to be driving the problem. The truth is that the marketing, general business, etc degrees are where the glut is.

3. We go back to the non-profit versus for-profit sectors.

Administrators at public schools, where most American kids go to school, have a responsibility which they have thrown out the window over the last 10 years.

(12-29-2015 10:40 AM)TheDancinMonarch Wrote:  

(12-28-2015 12:11 PM)HeartOfDixie Wrote:  I think the best answer would be the arms race between schools.

Isn't that called college football and basketball?

That and fancy dorms, cafeterias, etc.

(12-29-2015 10:40 AM)TheDancinMonarch Wrote:  

(12-28-2015 12:11 PM)HeartOfDixie Wrote:  I think the best answer would be the arms race between schools.

Isn't that called college football and basketball?

No. Perhaps it's the title 9 statues which push schools to funs 85 female athletes that produce no revenue so they can have 85 football players who do produce revenue.