College up 100% since 2000 VS healthcare of 55%

Discussion in 'Economics' started by noob_trad3r, Feb 7, 2013.

  1. piezoe

    piezoe

    Traditionally economists have used comparisons between lifetime earnings for high school versus college graduates as a way of evaluating the "value of [a] college education." Do you have something, other than anecdotes, that might be better?
     
    #21     Feb 8, 2013
  2. yeah as a matter of fact I do

    two kids with advanced degrees, one still quailyfiying for food stamps (she gave me two cans of black beans and some rice for the Holidays)

    50k in debt in student loans

    I only paid 16k for my first down payment for a house

    and one kid with only a bachelors degree, and it took her like 9 years to get it

    and she has always been in business for herself (if you call counting cards at the blackjack table in Las Veges a business.)

    so the advanced degrees are not really paying off financially, especially when they fall in love and get pregnant

    but yes, I know how you democrats like to look down on the people

    I read that book Das Kapital

    he knows what to do with money once somebody has made it

    But he doesn't know how to make it

    I've got no problem with helping the poor

    That's all I do anymore

    But I don't like looking at them and declaring, "All you are good for is being an employee." And the only reason your party says that is because you need them.
     
    #22     Feb 8, 2013
  3. piezoe

    piezoe

    Those are nice stories, but I was wondering if you had something other than anecdotes. [as a personal note that may be of some interest to you, I'm not registered with any political party-- I consider myself rather apolitical.]

    There is a very tasty Brazilian dish you can make with those black beans and the rice https://www.google.com/search?q=fei...s=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

    Feijoada is a variation of the New Orleans specialty, red beans and rice. I think I prefer feijoada. Obviously both versions are of African origin.

    When I first moved from the educated North to the Deep South and discovered that folks were actually eating kidney beans and white rice, I naturally thought wtf, might as well be eating potatoes and corn starch. But later I discovered that the particular combination of beans and rice provides a complete compliment of the essential amino acids, which you otherwise don't get if you eat only beans, or only rice.

    And to my amazement the dish is very tasty, especially with a little Tobasco.
     
    #23     Feb 8, 2013
  4. From what I have been reading it seems so. Way too many dollars chasing the same goods. Pricing seems out of proportion to the cost increases of other goods and services.

    So are you saying the price is correct because there are more people wanting to go to college than actual spots?

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/steveodland/2012/03/24/college-costs-are-soaring/

    Since 1985, the overall consumer price index has risen 115% while the college education inflation rate has risen nearly 500%. According to Gordon Wadsworth, author of The College Trap, “…if the cost of college tuition was $10,000 in 1986, it would now cost the same student over $21,500 if education had increased as much as the average inflation rate but instead education is $59,800 or over 2 ½ times the inflation rate.” Blunting these increases is a rise in federal student aid including tax credits and deductions. And nearly two thirds of undergraduates now receive some sort of grant aid and student loan borrowing is on the upswing. But loans must be paid back so the pain of payment is only delayed
     
    #24     Feb 8, 2013
  5. +2
     
    #25     Feb 8, 2013

  6. Treat college loans like any other unsecured loan, and remove the government backstop.

    Risk will be priced in accordingly in regards to earnings and loan payment potential and college prices would have to correct as well.
     
    #26     Feb 8, 2013
  7. Bob111

    Bob111

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chili_con_carne

    wifey making it all the time with rice as a side dish..
     
    #27     Feb 8, 2013
  8. piezoe

    piezoe

    It seems all of your numbers are essentially correct if you use the government inflation rate. What I'm saying is that the calculation of how much tuition has increased relative to consumer inflation is very sensitive to the rate you use for consumer inflation. If you use a rate calculated from the method used by the government prior to 1987 for example, and that was before the really heavy use of hedonics came in, then you get a mean increase for public institution tuition very close to the inflation rate. You can see the rate, as calculated by the method used up until 1987, at shadowstats.com -- that's John Williams web site. The mean rate is somewhere between 5 and 6%. He also shows the official government rate calculated using hedonics, which is lower. In my personal opinion the shadowstats rate is a better reflection of the actual rate of inflation experienced by consumers, and therefore of colleges and universities as well.

    I'm not saying the government numbers are wrong. They are not by definition. They are useful for some purposes, but in my opinion the inflation rate computed as it used to be is a better reflection of the actual inflation experienced by the typical consumer.

    I can't take any credit for discovering the sensitivity of these numbers to the inflation rate. A number of months ago I was listening to a story about college tuition on NPR and the speaker, who was some kind of an expert in the area, was saying that tuition had just barely kept up with inflation. I thought wtf, that's totally different from what I've been reading in the media. So I went to the Dept of Ed. statistics and did my own calculations using both the government official consumer inflation number and the www.shadowstats number, and immediately the discrepancy became clear.

    I posted the details of these calculations somewhere on ET, but damned if I can find them now. I don't recall what thread they were in, but it was likely in the Economics forum. I can look some more if there is enough interest expressed.
     
    #28     Feb 8, 2013
  9. there's lies, damn lies, and anecdotes
     
    #29     Feb 8, 2013
  10. agreed.. the prospect of taking exams and writing essays and going through great efforts just to make somone else rich is something that is difficult for me to comprehend these days. I will admit I am somewhat of a hypocrite since I did go through the process myself. But I was dumb back then and had no one to tell me any better.

     
    #30     Feb 8, 2013