Posted on 05/09/2007 6:27:07 AM PDT by .cnI redruM
If populists like John Edwards and Pat Buchanan gave a Tinker’s D—n about the poor working people in America, they would condemn our government’s student loan programs from on high. New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has done his home state proud by ripping the lid off of the high-binders and grafters who pocket the taxpayer-funded swag, in manners aberrant to the current legal restrictions. What he doesn’t get after with any skill at all is fundamental dishonesty of government-subsidized overcharging.
Financial aid officers at Columbia University colluded with corporations associated with the university to steal large sums of money, on unethical stock transactions. In return for this, they threw these companies more loans. Cuomo did exactly what he should have done. He threw the book at them with condign prosecutorial malice and will take a well-earned victory lap in front of The House Education Committee.
The bad news consists of what Cuomo won’t throw anyone in jail for. Cuomo cannot lock up a bunch of malefactors who engage in moral turpitude that enjoys legal sanction. There won’t be any investigation of the fact that colleges and universities enhance their tuitions and thereby their bank accounts at a rate far above the underlying rate of inflation faced by producers and consumers in the US economy.
The loans and grants that were intended to give the common man a leg up are paying for the tuitions of the young and very privileged. In fact, almost 1/3 of the students whose parents earn six-figure salaries enjoy the benefits of financial aid. Weren’t those dollars intended for the other America?
The colleges and universities have incentives to behave badly. They receive cash up front, every time the amount of aid gets raised. It follows as no shocker that tuition increases normally follow aid increases. Neal McCluskey, a Cato Institute policy analyst, points out the extent to which these high-minded centers of learning get down and wallow in the political money troughs.
“According to the Center for Responsive Politics, education interests spent over $80 million lobbying federal policymakers last year.”
And how has this investment of political capital paid off? McCluskey elucidates.
“From 1996 to 2006, the College Board reports, the average, inflation-adjusted, per-pupil cost of tuition, fees, room and board rose 28 percent at four-year private schools and 38 percent at four-year public ones. Meanwhile, inflation-adjusted aid provided through federal programs rose 95 percent, from $48.3 billion to $94.4 billion.”
The lobbyists average a return on investment of 5,763%, assuming the $80 million is a constant expenditure, over the last ten years. Thus, it doesn’t come as a surprise that a lot of student aid goes to people who have a moral obligation to give to charity, not partake. Some of the families receiving student aid should be offering the less fortunate a hand up, not bilking the middle class taxpayer for a handout.
Unlike the corruption unearthed by Andrew Cuomo, no one will do a day of time in jail. It will only be encouraged to rage on unabated. Our citizens believe they have voted themselves rich, at someone else’s expense.
A college degree-holder will earn, on average $1 million over the course of their career. A debt-holder leaving Old-Ivy $30,000 in debt, will only need to pay roughly 9% of their annual salary to amortize the loan in twenty years. This assumes a moderately benign interest rate, so that the borrower pays about $60,000 total over the 20 years.
Thus, working class families get taxed to send upper middle class and wealthy families through college on aid packages. With this flagrant example of one America sticking it hard to the other, I can’t help but wonder where Lou Dobbs and Senator Sherrod Brown have been hiding on this one.
But no, our champions of the common man never stand tall on an issue that where they have to climb athwart the sound-bite demagogues. If it can’t be explained in a 20-second blurb, none of our modern Magister Plebes will touch it. We have to save America’s working classes. Who else will we tax when we want someone else to pay our college tuitions?
I’d like to see it stopped althogther, would you agree with that?
Students from all over the world are trained here. Then they go back to their home countries to work.
The debate is how much a gubmint (any gubmint) should dump into educating its population. Some folks believe it’s none of the gubmint’s beeswax, that private industry will take care of it. Others see it as a big deal that keeps America competitive. This is big stuff — a major debate that will determine who gets to lead in the 21st century, if anyone.
Not just that. If we continue to administer the programs as they are, we are not getting any real improvement. Every time the government pumps more into college tuitions, colleges just raise the tuitions and then send their lobbyists to ask for more money so that more kids can attend.
It’s like Charlie Brown running up to kick the daylights out of that football, every time Lucy holds it still.
>>>Some folks believe it’s none of the gubmint’s beeswax, that private industry will take care of it. Others see it as a big deal that keeps America competitive.
The government has a specific obligation to do this much more selectively. The way it works now, Sami Al-Aryan’s jihad classes were properly having their tuition subsidized by Uncle Sugar Daddy. We throw over half of this money after academic disciplines that may have socially redeeming value, but, quite honestly, aren’t going to make us code better or manage more efficiently than Chinese or Indian technicians and business professionals.
If we want to do something along the lines of IGY again, let’s try figuring out what we actually need, let’s not just hand out free money. Let’s also tell these colleges that we are funding to the tuition rate as charged now, and future increases will either come out of their hide, or cause the students to no longer attend. Let’s see how much some of these college administrators who lobby for more aid money *really* care about illuminating young minds.
>>>This is big stuff — a major debate that will determine who gets to lead in the 21st century, if anyone.
Only if the institutions providing this education still have standards. Government subsidized tuitions encourage the colleges to let in anyone with a pulse and a social security card. This dumbs down the educational process and makes the graduates less prepared to keep the US on top of the world.
I’m largely in agreement, but I would say that science and technology is not the end-all-be-all. We also need folks well versed in history, political science, and, yes, even the arts. In short, what we need is a better educated population.
I’m sure there are those that say that it’s none of gubmint’s business how well educated the population is or isn’t, but nothing good can come of an uneducated population that votes for pols the way they choose a soft drink or candy bar.
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