Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[froot loops]

I entered Michigan as an 18yo, in-state Freshman in 1966. While student loans were available, it cost around $425/quarter for 18 credit hours. My parents, probably in the middle to upper portion of the annual income Bell curve could afford it. If I remember correctly, room and board in East Quad was around $900 for a full year - September through May. By the time I graduated the cost per quarter had doubled. Don't remember R&B. By the time my son, who considered Michigan as an undergraduate option (about 28y later), was ready to go to college, out of state tuition was approaching $30K for four quarters. Now, it's around $45K.

The cost curve of a college education isn't linear. It's logarithmic with the largest increases coming in the last 15-20y. But, clearly, costs have risen out of proportion to what actual expenses should be for a college education and part of the blame goes to the availability of easy money from loans with all risks for the banks to issue them covered by the government.

I'm sure there's some data out there that demonstrates the logarithmic character of college tuition costs but, there is no question it's been accelerating for a long period of time and it's likely that one of the main contributors to the astronomical cost of attendance today is increasing amounts of easy money for the schools and for the banks that are issuing loans.

I sort-of agree with Hannibal. If free college tuition for all becomes policy and precipitates the collapse of the present financial aid programs, I'd have to say I'm for it.

Yeah I don't really care how its done, but lets make sure that people recognize that state funding to public schools was slashed since the crash of 2008 and that has contributed a lot to tuition increases. And also recognize that the people sitting in their ivory towers criticizing the sitting advising the youngsters of today to pull up their bootstraps had it much cheaper back in the day, to your credit you have recognized that.

When I went to college it started at 69 dollars a credit hour and now it is 482, that almost an apples to oranges comparison because of the semester switch. It is more like 110 to 482, so that's about a 400 percent increase over 25 years. But if you look since the crash it has increased from 257 dollars a credit hour to 482 dollars a credit hour a staggering 87 percent increase over a ten year period. That's for MSU, I can't find a great page on U of M but in looking around it is similar. Oakland went from 268 to 414, not as much but still 54 percent.

I mean sure if you take away the government backstop from the banks, maybe it makes lenders more cautious and it works it's way through the system to change tuition. But maybe it just means less people go to college. And I'd rather not go through something like 2008 without the US government as the lender of last resort.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Here's something to consider ........ messaging from the two sides, China and the US, on the Trump/Xi sidebar at the G20 Sumitt on Saturday.

I reported yesterday that the Chinese press had noted that the US had agreed to a XI demand that if there was to be a meeting at the G20 Summit to move trade negotiations forward, the US would have to abandon their plan to add an additional $300bn in tariffs. Those weren't the exact words but they are similar the point being that as far as the consumption of the news for the Chinese people, the message was Xi got something from Trump.

Next, and following the reports from China, Larry Kudlow, Trumps Chief Economic Adviser, said "Trump agrees to no-preconditions for meeting with China's Xi. The messaging from the Trump side is tha the US got China to sit down at the trade negotiating table "without pre-conditions."

So what is it? No pre-conditions or pre-conditions. It really doesn't matter. What matters is the humiliation thing China wants to avoid in this trade dispute I spoke about in my post. I wonder what Munchin and his team think about the Kudlow declaration? Trump and Xi will either green-light lower level officials to proceed or they won't based on the words that pass between the two of them. That is a scary situation if you ask me. First, you have the subtleties of language and cultural differences that I don't think Donald Trump is sensitive to. I think Munchin and maybe some on his team are but they're not going to be in the room. Both leaders are going to go in with their chests pumped out. No question. One or the other of these two or maybe both is going to misunderstand the other in some way that has the potential of tanking the continuation of trade negotiations.

I'll say this. If the Saturday soiree between these two, and given Trump's volatility, produces a continuation of trade negotiations between the two countries, I will be surprised.

[Dr. Strangelove]

[Hannibal]

Out of control college tuition skyrocketing dates back at least to the mid 1980s. "They slashed the funding" has been one of the excuses for it since at least that time. It's as bullshit now as it was then. It's possible that there is some small portion of the overall increase that has happened because we were already funding some college through tax dollars, but there hasn't been 30-40 years, year after year, of steadily progressing college funding cuts by government. The basic fundamental reason that college costs so much is "because they can". They can because kids will go to college at any cost, and they will get the money to do it. The kids will do it at any price for both psychological reasons and practical ones. As a result, there is no corrective mechanism for inefficiency and misuse of funds. That is how the University of Michigan has a staggering 100 employees in the "Diversity" department with a budget of $11 Million per year. By my math, that's the tuition of 762 in-state kids that goes towards absolutely nothing but giving make work jobs to worthless, ideological seat warmers.

There's probably nobody here who sympathizes more with the "pulling yourself up by the bootstraps" arguments than me, but there is only so much you should be asking people to do if you want society to prosper.

"Hey, kid, listen here. I know that it looks tough, but just work full time at Wal-mart while going to classes for five or so years. Granted, you'll be completely sacrificing five years of your youth and you'll be taking years off your life by burning the candle at both ends. But just think of the rewards down the road. If you're lucky, you'll make enough money with your college degree to pay off what's left of your student loans by the time that you are 35. Play your cards right, and you can break even on your net worth by the time that you are 45."

Yeah, I don't blame young kids for not enthusiastically embracing that message.

College is a terrible value proposition to most people who aren't going into something like medicine, engineering, law, or finance. College costs need to be low enough so that it makes financial sense for social workers, graphic designers, and schoolteachers to go there too. And it should be achievable by people whose parents are social workers, graphic designers, and schoolteachers. This isn't a pipe dream. It used to be that way. Kind of like how you used to pay your doctor bill instead of having your employer-sponsored insurance cover everything.

[froot loops]

I gave you examples of tuition rate since the crash in the state of Michigan. The funding for state schools was slashed, its undeniable. The slashing of state college funding is fact. It certainly isn't a bullshit excuse. If you think it is, show your work.

[Cody_Russell]

College is a terrible value proposition to most people who aren't going into something like medicine, engineering, law, or finance. College costs need to be low enough so that it makes financial sense for social workers, graphic designers, and schoolteachers to go there too. And it should be achievable by people whose parents are social workers, graphic designers, and schoolteachers. This isn't a pipe dream. It used to be that way. Kind of like how you used to pay your doctor bill instead of having your employer-sponsored insurance cover everything.

[AlabamAlum]

I actually find value in the electives. If done correctly, it makes the graduate a more well-rounded person. A BS/BA is not a trade diploma, but maybe that's an option for traditional schools. Giving an AD without many of the electives that you would get in a BS/BA.

[Ghengis Jon]

Electives have value, but like everything else it requires making the right choices. Electives are essential for having a well rounded education. Classes in ancient history spurred me to collecting ancient Greek and Roman coins. German, what started as an elective but became my minor, worked out just fine as I've been employed by a German company for 30 years now. Over my career, many trips to the Fatherland where that came in handy. Those English electives develop good communication skills, an essential skill in middle and upper management. If one chooses underwater tractor seat upholstery, well, you wind up like Wiz. What you choose today will have an impact on tomorrow.

[froot loops]

Haha, those damn liberal arts majors!

[iam416]

"They slashed the funding" has been one of the excuses for it since at least that time. It's as bullshit now as it was then. It's possible that there is some small portion of the overall increase that has happened because we were already funding some college through tax dollars, but there hasn't been 30-40 years, year after year, of steadily progressing college funding cuts by government. The basic fundamental reason that college costs so much is "because they can". They can because kids will go to college at any cost, and they will get the money to do it. The kids will do it at any price for both psychological reasons and practical ones. As a result, there is no corrective mechanism for inefficiency and misuse of funds. That is how the University of Michigan has a staggering 100 employees in the "Diversity" department with a budget of $11 Million per year. By my math, that's the tuition of 762 in-state kids that goes towards absolutely nothing but giving make work jobs to worthless, ideological seat warmers.

Correct.

[THE_WIZARD_]

wiz should have been a mod at that debate last night

EFZ

[Jeff Buchanan]

I spent some time yesterday trying to study the economics of trade. Specifically I wanted to know if tariffs produce a net positive effect on a single country's standard of living by imposing tariff's on others to extract more unburdened trade with them. The answer to that question is not a simple yes or not. It depends.

Some background. I read a lot of Adam Smith in college and with a little jogging remembered some of it - the important stuff anyway. He had his blind spots as an economist mostly involving the industrial revolution and accumulation of capital for the sole purpose of individual consumption without the production of the products consumed benefiting society as a whole. But there is plenty of what he wrote about that still applies:

(Adam Smith )recognizes that retaliatory trade restraints may be useful if they can be quickly effective in opening foreign markets. This difficult calculation must be left "to the skill of that insidious and crafty animal, vulgarly called a statesman or politician." However, they otherwise (if left in place too long) are self defeating since their great cost punishes the domestic market more than the foreign market.

Moreover, if they are left in place too long, the affected economic sector may get so addicted to them that any rapid removal might prove very disruptive. This disruptive impact is no more a reason for continuing either an individual restraint or a trade war than is the momentary unemployment of soldiers and war industries a reason for continuing a military war.

So, tariff's in the short term according to Adam Smith have their place. I have no clue if those advising Trump are actually working from this basis. I am certain Trump has no understanding of Adam Smith's economics or what Smith said about tariffs. Others? Maybe but still, not a lot of folks are applying principals articulated by Smith in "The Wealth of Nations" to their global economic figuring.

The global market place has made dramatic changes to trade and how it is conducted from Smith's time. To try to narrow the scope of my point, the global supply chain beomes central to it. Tariff's disrupt it and by extension the products that are produced as an end point of it. A car ends up in the dealer showroom. It wasn't completely assembled in a plant where all the parts of it, engine transmission, body and interior parts, etc. arrived at a single location and they ended up being put together by a particular set of laborers and managers to produce the final product. Parts of the car, for example the engine or transmission, the frame, tires, wheels, etc. can be assembled at different locations as in a global assembly line with the actual car being spit out somewhere on the planet. The ship and aircraft building process are another good example of the global supply chain.

Tariffs in this setting are terribly disruptive to production and that is where most of the criticism, and it is correct, directed against the Trump administration' trade policy comes from. What I'd argue is that global trade among the major players has disadvantaged the US on a number of levels and for any number of reasons that anyone can read about. There is no disputing that. There is reasonable debate on how to address what the US perceives as unfair trade practices. Using the WTO for trade dispute resolution instead of acting unilaterally to apply retaliatory tariffs is one of those debates.

Frankly, I can't completely defend the Trump administration's trade policy but I get it and if seen as a short term measure to extract trade concessions from trading nations and open more free markets, it makes sense. Long term, it is stupid. What happens with China trade between them and the US in the short term is still undecided but I think both parties want an end to tariff escalation and therefore are motivated to settle. The problem here is the character of the two deciders who may or may not be taking the good advice of their advisers. On one hand you have hardened Communists with the knowledge that productive, if not somewhat controlled and constrained, capital markets will preserve their power on the other, advisers who, if you listen to press accounts, are Trump's yes men. Pick your poison.

Because I'm a glass half full kind of guy, I think this will all work out. We'll know a lot more after Saturday's meeting between Xi and Trump takes place and official statements are released.

[iam416]

I would pay top dollar to see some geriatric blowhard fake hipped motherfucker scream STOP THE RUN!!!! at Kamala Harris non-stop for 5 minutes. And then move on to Bernie and repeat.

[froot loops]

It's possible that there is some small portion of the overall increase that has happened because we were already funding some college through tax dollars, but there hasn't been 30-40 years, year after year, of steadily progressing college funding cuts by government.

In fact that is what has happened over the last 40 years in the state of Michigan as a matter of fact.

[AlabamAlum]

Where tf is Kapture?

He missed commenting on both dem debates?