CRAIGforCONGRESS

Missouri's 7th District, U.S. House of Representatives

  
 

 

 

Congressional Issues 2012
MORALITY AND CULTURE
Higher Education



Congress should:

  • eliminate all programs of aid for higher education
  • eliminate all federal regulations of content and administration of higher education

Universities are dramatically biased against the principles of a free economy and the moral values of the Founding Fathers. Parents should not feel pressured to spend tens of thousands of dollars for children's diplomas, when such money might be better invested in apprenticeships, small business capital, or a first home. Congress should amend government hiring policies to de-emphasize university education, and abolish student loan programs.

Statistically speaking, enrolling in a traditional "secular" university will be the worst decision of your entire life. Here's why:

  • You will waste an extraordinary amount of money
  • You will waste some of the best years of your life
  • You will not make the world a better place; you will be part of the problem, not part of the solution.

Can you answer this simple math problem?

Find the % of students who enroll in college who are successful and happy with the work they do.

1. In the box below are all the students who who enroll in college, hoping for happiness and success. A couple of million each year. We'll call them "Group A"

 
Group A
 

2. 50% of Group A will not graduate, so enrolling in college was a waste. Google something like "what percent of college students graduate?" Some years it's 51%, some years it's 47%, but it's about half on average. In the box below, Group B = 50% who enrolled but did not graduate, Group A = 50% still hoping for happiness and success from college:

 
Group A
 

Group B

3. Of the graduates in Group A, 50% will get a job they could have gotten without attending a single college class, so enrolling in college was a waste of time and money. Group C ["underemployed"], joining Group B [enrolling in college was a waste].

 
 Group A
 

Group C

Group B

4. 50% of those remaining in Group A graduate, but do not get a job in the field they majored in. They thought they loved the field of X, but they end up with a job in the field of Y. We'll call them Group D ["misemployed"], joining Groups C ["underemployed"] and B [enrolling in college was a waste]

 
 Group A
 

Group D

Group C

Group B

[It is an unfortunate fact that many employers have been brainwashed by the University-Industrial Complex and require employees to graduate from college even though what they study in college has no relationship to the work they'll be doing on the job.]

5. 50% of those remaining in Group A, who got their degree and actually get a job in their major field of study, don't believe the work they do makes the world a better place. We'll call them Group E, joining Groups D, C, and B [enrolling in college was a waste]

 
Group A
 

Group E

Group D

Group C

Group B

The more questions you ask, the smaller "Group A -- People who found success and happiness by enrolling in college" becomes.

Before you spend four years and tens of thousands of dollars (for which you may end up paying an equal amount in interest) you should be sure you can answer this question:

What percent of people who

  • enrolled in college and
  • got a job they could not have gotten without graduating from college and
  • got a job in the field they majored in

believe the work they do makes the world a better place?

What percent of those who enroll in college end up successful and happy in the work they do?

Pursuing a traditional path of classroom schooling could land you a traditional job.

Pursuing an alternate path of education could land you an alternate kind of job: one that makes you happy and benefits humanity.

College may not train you or equip you to benefit humanity, but it qualifies you to hold certain jobs. You can't get these jobs without that piece of paper called a "degree." Often these jobs are government jobs or government-approved jobs. That is, a job approved by a government that has

  • killed, crippled, or made homeless tens of millions of innocent non-combatant non-white civilians around the world during the lifetime of those who graduated from college from 1975-1985
  • increased the number of Americans in poverty or in prison.
  • increased the number of people who feel their lives are meaningless.

Have you really thought through the kind of life you want to lead, and whether an over-priced college degree is the best way to help you serve the planet?

Q.1: What percent of students who didn't know what they wanted to do with their lives by the time they graduated from high school are happy because they got a college degree?

Q.2: What percent of students who never enrolled in college and are doing the work they wanted to do when they graduated from high school are happy?

The answer to Question 2 is much larger than the answer to Question 1.

Your K-12 public school education did not equip you to answer these questions.

Working and Investing vs. Attending College Classes

See this chart [source]. It proves that people who work and invest the earnings instead of going to college and don't invest any more for the rest of their lives earn more from these years of investing than people who go to college and then start investing after college when (it is hoped) they get "a good job," and continue to invest every year for the rest of their working life.

Unfortunately, college graduates in positions of government power are destabilizing the economy and making investment impossible.


As a matter of public policy we should consider these issues:

  • Funding: Is it Constitutional for the Federal Government to be involved in university education?
  • Value: Is a university education worth it, even if it's Constitutional for government to fund it?
  • "Academic Freedom": What rights do students and teachers enjoy?
In light of the staggering cost of college education today, it may seem unbelievable that my father in the early 1950s was able to finance his own education with a summer job waiting tables. Like most in his generation, eight weeks of work per year allowed him to graduate debt free. In contrast, the debt burden now heaped on today's college graduates is so oppressive that the financial challenges are becoming a palpable psychological strain on an entire generation.

The irony is that without easy access to student loans, which have been touted as a means to ease college affordability, tuitions never could have risen so high in the first place. Sadly, it is not students who have benefited, but the educational establishment that receives the proceeds. Colleges collect huge sums of money up front while students get saddled with staggering balances.

Peter Schiff
"
Why Not Let Markets Set Prices?"


College is the Ultimate Scam | James Altucher - blog


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Funding

Value



The average state university costs over $11,000 a year: room, board, tuition, and books. The average private college costs over $27,000 a year. The Ivy League universities cost $150,000 and more, with costs rising faster than the rate of inflation.

It gets worse. Most students take at least five years to earn a bachelor's degree. Some take six years. And over half never graduate.

None of this is necessary. A self-disciplined student who knows about the seven loopholes of the collegiate system can earn a degree in three years or less, for $15,000 or less. [more]

Charles Murray is a Harvard grad to went on to earn his PhD in Political Science from MIT. He is in every sense a scholar, working at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research in Washington D.C. He thinks a Bachelor's Degree is a waste of time and money. He predicts the Market will find a replacement for the college degree. Others agree:



When C's Became A's

From C's to A's


Academic Freedom

From CATO.org:

book coverFeds In The Classroom: How Big Government Corrupts, Cripples, and Compromises American Education

Challenges the constitutionality of how deeply entrenched the feds have become in the classroom, which was, until recently, the function of state and local governments.


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