5 minutes ago, Procus said:

I disagree that taxpayers bearing the brunt of loan forgiveness benefits the greater good of society - I do think financially bloated educational institutions bearing the brunt of loan forgiveness would benefit society.  The financial strain is too much - especially given the unsustainable national debt and budget deficits.

Education institutions are also the biggest research engine in the country, in all areas. The private sector takes advantage of this. It is symbiotic. If you reduce higher ed to a bunch of mouthy intellectuals, then it seems foolish but that is a strategic misrepresentation to attack higher ed. Our technological advantage over the rest of the world comes from those bloated educational institutions. U.S. companies got out of the fundamental research biz with the last such entity, Bell Labs closing. Wanna get my vote? Make college tuition entirely tax deductible. 

Just now, Next_Up said:

Education institutions are also the biggest research engine in the country, in all areas. The private sector takes advantage of this. It is symbiotic. If you reduce higher ed to a bunch of mouthy intellectuals, then it seems foolish but that is a strategic misrepresentation to attack higher ed. Our technological advantage over the rest of the world comes from those bloated educational institutions. U.S. companies got out of the fundamental research biz with the last such entity, Bell Labs closing. Wanna get my vote? Make college tuition entirely tax deductible. 

Educational institutions have branched out beyond education.  Go check out the balance sheets of these nonprofits - they are too bloated to the point where the bottom line trumps education.

https://x.com/KaivanShroff/status/1817314276065132685?t=uXBORLMM6HWa6DfIwn5mhQ&s=19

 

17 minutes ago, Procus said:

Educational institutions have branched out beyond education.  Go check out the balance sheets of these nonprofits - they are too bloated to the point where the bottom line trumps education.

I think your research keys in on a particular quartile of "elites.” Most universities are not there and at this time, many are teetering on collapse. Maybe not a bad market correction but you are moving the goal post to a critique of universities. My original point was that government investment in education is beneficial to society. 

15 minutes ago, Next_Up said:

Education institutions are also the biggest research engine in the country, in all areas. The private sector takes advantage of this. It is symbiotic. If you reduce higher ed to a bunch of mouthy intellectuals, then it seems foolish but that is a strategic misrepresentation to attack higher ed. Our technological advantage over the rest of the world comes from those bloated educational institutions. U.S. companies got out of the fundamental research biz with the last such entity, Bell Labs closing. Wanna get my vote? Make college tuition entirely tax deductible. 

That has very little to do with undergraduate tuition. Most research PIs are professors working with postgraduates and paid by grants from public and private institutions. 

Publicly funded research for the most part (outside of some specially handled DOD work) is required to be made public and subject to strict export controls. 

Tuition rates being high are from a combination of factors, but one of the main ones is that we do subsidize college tuition as a nation in various ways, which coupled with high demand for college education means universities can charge a premium. 

As a culture we are generally very suspicious of government regulated price controls for services offered by private institutions (and I personally broadly support this hands-off approach), so between strong domestic demand as well as a strong minority of the study body that comes from Asia and Europe to be college educated in the US tuition prices are set fairly high. 

Frankly too many people choose college in the US when a vocational track for many is the better path based on academic aptitude at 17-18 years old.

Government support for subsidized college loans should at minimum be based on some kind of actuarial table like approach to risk with various factors taken into account. 

If you're a strong student with solid SAT scores who wants to major in Computer Science or Chemical Engineering your available subsidy from the govt should be set higher than if you're a mediocre student who wants to major in history or English. 

That's just reality. 

If you can pay your way to a degree in something that results in fewer marketable skills then by all means go for it. But if you're asking a 3rd party, be it the government or some other patron, to help pay your way then you need to understand that you have an obligation to pay this back and the risk has to be reflected in loan conditions.

2 minutes ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

Government support for subsidized college loans should at minimum be based on some kind of actuarial table like approach to risk with various factors taken into account. 

If you're a strong student with solid SAT scores who wants to major in Computer Science or Chemical Engineering your available subsidy from the govt should be set higher than if you're a mediocre student who wants to major in history or English. 

That's just reality. 

If you can pay your way to a degree in something that results in fewer marketable skills then by all means go for it. But if you're asking a 3rd party, be it the government or some other patron, to help pay your way then you need to understand that you have an obligation to pay this back and the risk has to be reflected in loan conditions.

This is actually a very good idea.

4 minutes ago, BBE said:

This is actually a very good idea.

The other piece of reform in this field that's probably complimentary is what Purdue is doing (or at least was doing, no idea if it stuck): https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2016/04/11/at-purdue-student-aid-based-on-future-earnings-could-revolutionize-college-debt/

 

I think it was a Sam Harris podcast episode where the president of Purdue explained the approach, and it makes a lot of sense. And it's also easy for a student to conceptualize. 

Basically they look at a student and take into account factors that will go to earning potential post graduation, and the loan office will come up with a percentage of earnings and a term length, and that's what you get. So if you go for comp sci or whatever you may have a lower percentage of earnings to owe coupled with a shorter term length, if you have a higher risk major you may have to pay a higher percentage of income for longer.

But either way, the terms of the deal stay the same. So if you get a CS degree and work as a waiter for 10 years the loan guarantor who underwrote the risk takes a bath. 

If you get a CS degree and hit it huge, you might seriously overpay for your degree - but hey you're doing pretty well so whatever.

27 minutes ago, Next_Up said:

I think your research keys in on a particular quartile of "elites.” Most universities are not there and at this time, many are teetering on collapse. Maybe not a bad market correction but you are moving the goal post to a critique of universities. My original point was that government investment in education is beneficial to society. 

I see your point re government investment in education being beneficial.  I would say that the devil is in the details, and that the student loan system is not being used to finance education per se as it is to finance non-profit institutions whose purpose has in large part gone astray.  These universities are in dire need of very thorough audits.

6 minutes ago, Procus said:

I see your point re government investment in education being beneficial.  I would say that the devil is in the details, and that the student loan system is not being used to finance education per se as it is to finance non-profit institutions whose purpose has in large part gone astray.  These universities are in dire need of very thorough audits.

You're suggesting government needs to more tightly regulate entities you see as potential bad actors?

3 minutes ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

You're suggesting government needs to more tightly regulate entities you see as potential bad actors?

There is just SOO much money involved here - money in which the federal government stands to be on the hook for - and its become such a big part of our economy, that it's worth examining.

4 minutes ago, Procus said:

There is just SOO much money involved here - money in which the federal government stands to be on the hook for - and its become such a big part of our economy, that it's worth examining.

That's a lot of words to say "yes we need more regulation" 

2 hours ago, Mike030270 said:

Scary thought

This shouldn't be surprisng. The gestapo needs to be free to persecute enemies of the state. 

1 hour ago, Next_Up said:

Education institutions are also the biggest research engine in the country, in all areas. The private sector takes advantage of this. It is symbiotic. If you reduce higher ed to a bunch of mouthy intellectuals, then it seems foolish but that is a strategic misrepresentation to attack higher ed. Our technological advantage over the rest of the world comes from those bloated educational institutions. U.S. companies got out of the fundamental research biz with the last such entity, Bell Labs closing. Wanna get my vote? Make college tuition entirely tax deductible. 

Yay welfare state

US companies are far from out on fundamental research

The higher ed system is bloated and we need to let it fail in order to save any of it. Its an unpopular opinion but its the truth. 

 

6 minutes ago, ToastJenkins said:

Yay welfare state

US companies are far from out on fundamental research

Universities are typically taking on higher risk research that may not be funded by private equity but is nonetheless important sometimes bleeding edge research from which the seeds of the next generation of research monetization can happen. 

Doesn't always happen that way, but the point is there is important research worth doing that doesn't necessarily have an obvious market application. 

29 minutes ago, Procus said:

I see your point re government investment in education being beneficial.  I would say that the devil is in the details, and that the student loan system is not being used to finance education per se as it is to finance non-profit institutions whose purpose has in large part gone astray.  These universities are in dire need of very thorough audits.

basic agreement. Thank you for engaging in reasonable discourse

Just now, JohnSnowsHair said:

Universities are typically taking on higher risk research that may not be funded by private equity but is nonetheless important sometimes bleeding edge research from which the seeds of the next generation of research monetization can happen. 

Doesn't always happen that way, but the point is there is important research worth doing that doesn't necessarily have an obvious market application. 

They are more a training ground than they are the engine of research. When you write frants half the work is typically already done and largely redundant of other work.

in that process you get some molecular biology that industry will apply. But the roi is in the training. Ive paid many multiples in taxes what my training grants cost

Just now, ToastJenkins said:

They are more a training ground than they are the engine of research. When you write frants half the work is typically already done and largely redundant of other work.

in that process you get some molecular biology that industry will apply. But the roi is in the training. Ive paid many multiples in taxes what my training grants cost

Fair, but also seems to support strong investment in research at the University level. 

16 minutes ago, ToastJenkins said:

Yay welfare state

US companies are far from out on fundamental research

You need to research the history of corporate research. State with ATT Bell Labs, Howard Hughes Corporation and Kodak. In the late 80s when corporations realized they could get similar returns from a person and a computer as from a research lab and shift the research emphasis to universities, subsidized by the federal gov, it happened. It would be silly to say that no companies do fundamental research but most is now funded by the SBIR program and as such these are small companies. The main corporate area that still does fundamental research is biomedical, however, they often use patents from university fundamental research to do their work in developing products. Either you don't know what fundamental research is, science for the sake of advancing science, or you know some companies that I do not. Can you name a list of companies doing fundamental research? One caveat, I would say that all the companies creating LLMs are doing fundamental research, as they try to understand what they have created and advance it.

39 minutes ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

That's a lot of words to say "yes we need more regulation" 

Actually, the opposite - it's paring down federal involvement in the educational process

26 minutes ago, Next_Up said:

basic agreement. Thank you for engaging in reasonable discourse

a rarity in CVON 😂

26 minutes ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

Fair, but also seems to support strong investment in research at the University level. 

For science? Surely. For gender sfudies?? Negative ghost rider.

the best way to view research funding is through the training lens. Industry doesnt have the time horizon for that kind of roi

28 minutes ago, Next_Up said:

You need to research the history of corporate research. State with ATT Bell Labs, Howard Hughes Corporation and Kodak. In the late 80s when corporations realized they could get similar returns from a person and a computer as from a research lab and shift the research emphasis to universities, subsidized by the federal gov, it happened. It would be silly to say that no companies do fundamental research but most is now funded by the SBIR program and as such these are small companies. The main corporate area that still does fundamental research is biomedical, however, they often use patents from university fundamental research to do their work in developing products. Either you don't know what fundamental research is, science for the sake of advancing science, or you know some companies that I do not. Can you name a list of companies doing fundamental research? One caveat, I would say that all the companies creating LLMs are doing fundamental research, as they try to understand what they have created and advance it.

Yes after my phd i didnt understand what fundamental research is…funded by NIH grants…

i can give you endless companies doing fundamental research. From gene therapy to small molecule to large molecule to immune oncology to nuclear medicine