NYCPHP Meetup

[paul at devonianfarm.com]

At 9:24 PM -0400 4/16/08, Christopher R. Merlo wrote:
>So, anyway, I felt compelled to write, because I'm afraid that 
>people trying to choose whether to get a college education or not 
>might be misled into thinking it's something it's not.  The service 
>we provide is not something you can get anywhere else, and for lots 
>of people, it's the difference between promotions or not.
>$0.02,
>-c

    It's a big problem for Generation X and younger people.

    I know a lot of people who are stuck with $100,000+ in college debt but aren't able to get jobs much better than answering the phone at a mutual fund or managing a video store.

    Student loans have created an ecological crisis much like the housing bubble that's currently unwinding.  People were willing to spend more for college from 1980-2008 because financing was available and aggressively marketed.  So the price of college went up.

    Although I think there are some higher values involved in education,  the "market" value of a college education hasn't really increased -- it's certainly a ticket to a certain strata of "top of the low end" jobs in the service sector,  line management in particular,  but it rarely leads up.

    Why?  There's a limited amount of opportunity in the world. People who "blame the victim" and say that people who are stuck should get themselves unstuck and get a better career might be right on an individual basis -- some people certainly can do this -- but if everybody did it,  there wouldn't be anybody to answer the phone at the mutual fund.

    In fact,  I've seen that college and other debt have a destructive effect on people's ambition just as much as welfare.  I'm debt free,  so if I hustle and make an extra $50 or $1000 or $20000,  I can put it in my pocket,  put in the bank,  buy something I like,  roll the money into a new project.  That gives me some motivation.

    I know people who spend half their time at the bankruptcy court and family court...  For them,  any extra $ they make is just going to go to their creditors,  so why bother?

    I know a lot of 20-somethings who need to make a huge payment every month on their student loans...  They're under a lot of pressure to get the first job that's "good enough"...  Taking the risk to find "something better" could land them in default.
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