Joe Biden should pass executive order to cancel student debt, Schumer says

[laylalex 7,293]

2 minutes ago, Ban Hammer said:

but who calls a movie producer, lawyer, or investment banker on the weekend and is willing to pay through the nose to get things fixed?

Movie producer: People who are working on a film and need any one of the many fixes only the producer can do (usually involving getting more money or buttering someone up)

Lawyer: The list is long -- anyone who has a dispute that needs legal help

Investment banker: Don't call them on the weekend, call them on Monday, unless they're very junior

[Steeleballz 7,550]

8 minutes ago, laylalex said:

I don't know, I know people who majored in semiotics who are now movie producers and lawyers and investment bankers. An excellent liberal arts degree can set you up for all sorts of different roles in life, some of them highly lucrative and highly fulfilling. Not everyone is cut out to be an electrician or a plumber, you know.

 

  Specific degrees are not the problem so much as people not having an idea about what they want to do with their degree. I know a lot of people who were undecided about what they wanted to do and thought taking college courses would be a good way to fill the time while they decided. Four years later some of them still didn't know, but they did spend a lot of money getting from point A to point B. 

 

  

[laylalex 7,293]

The semiotician I know who ended up as an investment banker had no intention of being an investment banker -- it kind of fell in his lap after several years of drifting, including a MA in cultural studies at another second-tier Ivy. He ran an antiques store for a few years and thought about law school but ended up getting a temp job for a small fund as a personal assistant. Someone spotted him, like: what are YOU doing here as a PA? And then he kept getting bumped up and up because whatever they threw at him, he was pretty brilliant.

 

Really depends on the people, I admit.

[Dashinka 24,635]

18 minutes ago, laylalex said:

I don't know, I know people who majored in semiotics who are now movie producers and lawyers and investment bankers. An excellent liberal arts degree can set you up for all sorts of different roles in life, some of them highly lucrative and highly fulfilling. Not everyone is cut out to be an electrician or a plumber, you know.

Makes one wonder if a person would be a good movie producer or investment banker, why waste the time and money with a college degree? 

[yuna628 9,687]

There is value in all sorts of education. Life doesn't always land you in the job for the degree you have though. I remember growing up, I wanted to follow in my uncle's footsteps and attend a prestigious art college and be a fashion designer or photographer. My uncle of course went to that school in an age long before it now costs... something around 80k+ for a masters I think these days. Did he become some kind of famous artist for his degree? Nope. Absolutely not. He was a great painter, even better photographer and sketch artist and those skills back in the day meant he was in high demand from all sorts of people. Ultimately he ended up with a job in a completely different career field, but he used the skills he honed every day. As a poor gal going to that college was really a pipe dream and as I got older other things took higher priority in my life. Still, I think had there been greater accessibility and affordability I'd have been very happy there.

 

There are many kids that know what it is they want to do, but they can only dream about doing it. There are also many kids that were never given the tools they needed to figure out what it is they might be good at, interested in, or wanted to do with their lives.

 

My husband always knew what it was he wanted to do, and was the first in his family to graduate. His degree has given him valuable skills, but the truth is what he does now has nothing to do with his degree. He needed a job, any job. He took that job and has moved through the ranks. Now they want him to be a teacher with no experience in teaching because they're desperate! That being said we're still paying the loan, and will be for years. I don't think anyone else should pay for it either.

[Burnt Reynolds 5,058]

32 minutes ago, Dashinka said:

Makes one wonder if a person would be a good movie producer or investment banker, why waste the time and money with a college degree? 

I've yet to see the positive outcome of this warped meritocratic idea where people force a non intellectual populace into university with an oddball degree and tens of thousands in student debt for and no/little relevant skills. It seems to me we'd have been better off just keeping our unskilled working class and not adding pointless complexity to their lives, as it is often associated with psychological issues... stress, depression, anxiety, hopelessness..

 

I've never seen more degree holders bagging groceries at grocery stores. What a god awful waste. I think people really need to understand for much of the populace, just keeping busy is fulfilling enough. They don't need the pointless complexities of the problem solving industry. We see what lockdowns are like on the psyche of people, you see the same despair in the eyes of these people in question.

Edited November 18, 2020 by Burnt Reynolds

[laylalex 7,293]

My dad was working class and benefitted from an excellent public education K-12 here in California. He went east for college (to my second tier Ivy as it so happens) for a sociology degree, but tuition was manageable with grants and working during term time and on vacations, and a modest loan. Then he came back to SoCal to go to law school in the UC system. It cost him almost nothing and it allowed him to start at a small firm and take interesting cases when he struck out on his own because he had no debt to service. It gave him a ton of flexibility that has paid dividends throughout his life -- with little debt, he could accumulate wealth faster and help my mom pay off her med school loans. 

 

The problem isn't "these people don't need formal education" -- most people can benefit from thinking in ways that are out of their comfort zone. That doesn't mean college for everyone, but the answer isn't "unless it pays for itself, quickly, it's useless." The problem is tuition, room and board. My dad could get a degree in a "nothing" subject and move from working to upper middle class because he didn't have to pay a huge chunk of his pay to service his debt. 

[Boiler 45,731]

My Dad did has Accountancy Qualifications at night school. My Brother at LSE but then it was free and a grant towards living costs.

 

Interesting how things have changed and effectively it has become a major Corporate activity. Feels like Health care, they did it because they could and nobody stopped them.

 

 

[laylalex 7,293]

A lot of it is I think improvements to the physical plant that just aren't necessary, like deluxe student centers and indoor climbing gyms and... and... and... No student needs these things. I remember reading about some public university in the midwest that had a water park put in. What?? Crazy. Student lounges with TVs and cable/wifi/comfy chairs yes; cheap late night coffee shop yes; decent student gyms with a pool/basketball court/squash court/etc. yes; water park no. 

[Prizm123 1,086]

our building at work has foosball tables in every breakroom.

WHY?

no one EVER uses them.

they would be better off just giving people raises than to put useless things everywhere in some sad attempt to look like they care or to try to show how fun it is to work there.

 

sorry got into a rant there when i saw the stuff about gyms and tvs lol

[laylalex 7,293]

1 minute ago, Prizm123 said:

our building at work has foosball tables in every breakroom.

WHY?

no one EVER uses them.

they would be better off just giving people raises than to put useless things everywhere in some sad attempt to look like they care or to try to show how fun it is to work there.

 

sorry got into a rant there when i saw the stuff about gyms and tvs lol

Yeah, my husband's office has a full kitchen with cereal dispensers and every single kind of milk (cow, oat, soy, goat, rice, etc.), sodas and energy drinks, fruit, Rx Bars, a beer fridge in the boss's office, etc. You name it. Plus the foosball table AND a darts thingum and a chillout room with a TV and a PlayStation... The food gets eaten and the PlayStation is played with and the beer gets opened but nobody touches the foosball or darts.

 

I think gyms and TVs are reasonable indulgences for college kids. A gym isn't even an indulgence -- it's good to keep a student healthy in mind and body.

[Boiler 45,731]

Nobody has mentioned the Student Union Bar.

[laylalex 7,293]

Not something you see in the US -- our drinking age is 21, of course. Which is why when I arrived in the UK age 20 I promptly got legally legless on my first night.

[Boiler 45,731]

Why am I not surprised.

[laylalex 7,293]

I told you about my flatmate who kept scrumpy in a teapot. It's her fault! I had no idea what the ABV was on that stuff until it was too late.