America’s Middle Class is being priced out of colleges for their kids; and many parents are questioning whether college is worth it, and whether they can afford it.[3] This is true to an even greater extent when it comes to graduate schools, such as law schools.[4] As more and more Americans face economic problems during the balance of this decade, which will be true of their counterparts abroad as well[5], many will find that undergraduate college educations and graduate schools are luxuries that they cannot afford. Many families will be doing whatever they can just to survive.
Lots of parents of those Americans who grew up during and after World War II never went to college. To these parents, colleges were a gateway to great jobs and wonderful futures and the “American dream” for their children. Today, like the issue of “home ownership” that was sold as part of that dream too, Americans are reassessing their goals and their capabilities; and their conclusions may not augur well for colleges, universities and graduate schools in the United States and abroad. Certainly in the case of State-supported schools, where budgetary pressures are dictating that their expenditures be slashed, the twin pincers of parents who cannot afford to send their kids to these schools, and declining budgets, may break the backs of such schools.
Another old friend of mine, who covered Washington for many years as a talented and insightful political and economic reporter and editor, told me recently that colleges are effectively dinosaurs and relics of the past, like newspapers and newsweeklies in this Internet age. The educational institutions of the future will be online—or so my friend believes—which cost a fraction of what “bricks-and-mortar” educational institutions cost today. The kids now are computer literate like no generation of the past; and the idea of learning online is second nature to them.
Why spend money on college tuitions and campus living expenses, and professors’ salaries and the infrastructure of college campuses, when everything can be done online for a fraction of the cost? Why have professors repeating essentially the same lectures year after year, when such lectures can be taped once and shown again and again on YouTube? Why not eliminate “redundancy” and have the best professors teaching students online nationwide, and eliminate the costs of multiple professors? Why allow “teaching assistants” (or “TAs”) to educate our kids, when the professors are paid to do this? Why not eliminate colleges and graduates schools in wholesale numbers—just like libraries and book stores are closing or becoming “bookless” because everything is online?
The bottom line with respect to whether education shifts to the Internet might not be a function of conscious decisions by educators or parents: pure economics in America and globally will determine the results. Falling governmental tax revenues will dictate drastic cuts like never before; and declining personal incomes and home values and foreclosures, and other family sacrifices, will result in changes to personal life styles that will affect the way educational programs are perceived and delivered worldwide. It is not surprising that the Washington Post‘s parent sold Newsweek magazine for $1, and kept the Kaplan online schools that have become increasingly “cash cows” for the company.[6]
© 2011, Timothy D. Naegele
[1] Timothy D. Naegele was counsel to the United States Senate’s Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, and chief of staff to Presidential Medal of Freedom and Congressional Gold Medal recipient and former U.S. Senator Edward W. Brooke (R-Mass). He practices law in Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles with his firm, Timothy D. Naegele & Associates, which specializes in Banking and Financial Institutions Law, Internet Law, Litigation and other matters (see www.naegele.com and http://www.naegele.com/naegele_resume.html). He has an undergraduate degree in economics from UCLA, as well as two law degrees from the School of Law (Boalt Hall), University of California, Berkeley, and from Georgetown University. He is a member of the District of Columbia and California bars. He served as a Captain in the U.S. Army, assigned to the Defense Intelligence Agency at the Pentagon, where he received the Joint Service Commendation Medal. Mr. Naegele is an Independent politically; and he is listed in Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in American Law, and Who’s Who in Finance and Business. He has written extensively over the years (see, e.g.,www.naegele.com/whats_new.html#articles), and can be contacted directly at tdnaegele.associates@gmail.com; see also Google search:Timothy D. Naegele
[2] I served on the Board of Directors of the University of California, Santa Barbara Alumni Association, and as a Trustee of the UCSB Foundation, for a combined total of approximately ten years, overlapping the time that both of my kids and their spouses attended UCSB. See http://www.naegele.com/naegele_resume.html
Tuition hikes were coming then, and I argued vehemently that they would price the Middle Class out of a University of California education. I am a product of the University of California system, having attended UCSB, UCLA and Berkeley for law school; and the Middle Class has been the backbone of the university. Needless to say, the cost hikes since I served on the UCSB boards have been even worse.
Also, the same thing has been happening with the law schools, yet law school graduates cannot find jobs today. What they do is load themselves up with massive student loans, and then are unemployed or forced to take menial jobs, and they default on the loans. It is “fraud” on the part of the law schools, because they keep touting the “value” of their education. See infra n.4.
I had a “spirited discussion” about these issues with a very nice female UCSB professor, who was the “faculty adviser” to one of the boards on which I served; and I asserted that UCSB (and other UC schools) were not preparing undergrads for jobs, and that the job market for them would get even tighter. Her response was that if students want to be prepared for jobs, they would need to go to graduate schools. I essentially told her that was absurd because neither the students nor their parents could afford it, but this fact of life did not faze her one iota.
I expect before the end of this decade that one or more of the California State University campuses will close because of budgetary problems. Whether it happens with one of the UC campuses remains to be seen. This pattern will be repeated elsewhere in the United States, and in other countries.
[3] See, e.g., http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/07/28/african-american-middle-class-eroding-as-unemployment-rate-soars/?test=latestnews (“It’s quite a sign of the times that people are questioning whether their education was worth all the time, effort and expense”)
[4] See, e.g., http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2011/01/03/the-american-legal-system-is-broken-can-it-be-fixed/#comment-1274 (“Is Law School A Losing Game?”) and http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2011/01/03/the-american-legal-system-is-broken-can-it-be-fixed/#comment-1583 (“The Law: A Less Gilded Future”) (see also the article itself, as well as the footnotes and other comments beneath it)
[5] See, e.g., http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2010/09/27/the-economic-tsunami-continues-its-relentless-and-unforgiving-advance-globally/ (“The Economic Tsunami Continues Its Relentless And Unforgiving Advance Globally”) (see also the footnotes and comments beneath the article)
[6] See, e.g., http://www.businessinsider.com/its-official-newsweek-will-be-sold-to-former-stereo-equipment-mogul-sidney-harman-who-reportedly-bid-1-in-excha-2010-8 (“Newsweek Sells For $1 To Stereo Equipment Mogul Sidney Harman”) and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Post_Company
A College Education Is The Largest Scam In U.S. History!
This is the assertion made beneath a YouTube video entitled, “College Conspiracy,” which is worth watching even though it is long.
See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpZtX32sKVE
Also, this assertion is consistent with the views of law students about the costs and value of their legal educations, and the chances of getting jobs after law school—which is discussed at the links cited in footnote 4 of the article above.
See also http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/story/2011-10-25/public-college-costs-increase/50919598/1?loc=interstitialskip (“Tuition and fees rise more than 8% at U.S. public colleges”)
[Note: What appears below are comments that were posted beneath another article on March 17, 2011 (see http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2010/09/27/the-economic-tsunami-continues-its-relentless-and-unforgiving-advance-globally/#comment-1516), which are sobering and worth repeating here with respect to those who default on their student and related loans]
Debtors’ Prisons
The Wall Street Journal’s article entitled, “Welcome to Debtors’ Prison, 2011 Edition,” is worth reading. It states in pertinent part:
See http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704396504576204553811636610.html?mod=WSJ_hps_editorsPicks_1
As the American and other global economies decline during the balance of this decade, such draconian measures may be used more and more to collect debts and harass debtors.
See, e.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debtors'_prison
In the United States, it is unconstitutional to incarcerate someone solely for failing to pay a debt. For example, it violates (1) the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, (2) the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause of the Eighth Amendment (as applied to the States through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment), and (3) the Eighth Amendment contains the Excessive Fines and Excessive Bail Clauses.
See http://topics.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxiv (Section 1: “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws”) and http://topics.law.cornell.edu/constitution/billofrights#amendmentviii (Amendment VIII: “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted”)
In Florida, for example, the St. Petersburg Times stated in an editorial entitled, “Debtors’ prison—again”:
See, e.g., http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/editorials/article991963.ece
Will Colleges Adapt, Or Be Cannibalized?
While it might be important which college someone attended when he or she applies for their first job, several years later it is essentially irrelevant. An online education may be just as valuable, at least in the future. Indeed, many fine universities worldwide would be wise to offer degrees online.
Also, the present generation of kids includes large numbers of video game “addicts.” Surely, some smart video producers can be hired by colleges and universities to make purely educational courses “fun” too. Or perhaps some will be hired by existing online schools such as Kaplan and the University of Phoenix . . . or maybe they will even start online schools of their own.
At some point, the online schools may hire the best and brightest professors from traditional “bricks-and-mortar” colleges, universities and graduate schools to help them with their educational programs, and to enhance their credibility.
I believe there is and will continue to be a place for brick and mortar places of higher learning, but these places will face real competition and eventually the cost bubble financed by the easy availability of student loans will meet its bust. Before that happens though a great many graduates will experience a prolonged underemployment in a suppressed job market leaving them unable to ever pay off the loans.
The bubble has been enabled by the easy financing which has allowed the universities to indulge whims without any normal market accountability. Easy financing plus the internationalization of the student pool has channeled competition into higher salaries for a few tenured professors and an ever expanding very well paid bureaucracy managing this and facilitating that. Much of the teaching load is carried by low paid untenured graduate students and professors.
What’s ironic is that the higher education system is more in control of people with left leaning ideological assumptions than any other part of our society. When allowed the freedom to craft their own world what did they do?
Thank you for your thoughtful comments.
With all due respect, for many years the prevailing wisdom was that newspapers and newsweeklies had a bright future too, and that book stores were irreplaceable. However, many newspapers and book stores are gone now, without so much as ripples in the water—with much more of the same yet to come.
In California alone, with increasing budgetary pressures during the balance of this decade, can the University of California and the California State University systems continue to support all of their campuses, much less at anything approaching their present levels? My guess is no, and that the consequences will be just as “startling” as when favorite newspapers closed or became mere shells of their former selves, and book stores closed forever.
They had become obsolete, like the horse and buggy; and colleges and graduate schools are heading in the same direction. As stated in the article above, the cost of online education is a fraction of the cost of “bricks-and mortar” facilities and the bloated faculties that fill them. Something has to give, bigtime, and it will. Higher tuition costs and college living expenses cannot be borne by families who are suffering already, and who will suffer even more during the balance of this decade.
I agree that many graduates will be unable to pay off their loans, and some will be facing the prospect of spending time in “debtors’ prisons.”
See http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2011/07/29/are-colleges-dinosaurs/#comment-1755
I agree with your last paragraph as well.
Steve Jobs’ Legacy
When I first started using the Web, and put up a Web site, the Internet was being referred to as a “dirt road,” and not an information superhighway. Since then, it has grown geometrically and become much more sophisticated; and the current estimates are that out of the 6.9 billion people globally, approximately 2 billion use the Internet today.
See http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm
Wow . . . all of us may say or think. How far we have come in a relatively short period of time. We bank with it; we meet our spouses (or significant others) using it; we buy most things via it; information is exchanged, and teaching is conducted like never before; revolutions are begun and continued because people connect through the Web; and elections are won or lost based on the Internet. Yet, few users realize how vulnerable it is to an EMP or other attack, which might bring it crashing down.
See http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/emp-attack-only-30-million-americans-survive/ and http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/10/virus-hits-drone-fleet/ (“Exclusive: Computer Virus Hits U.S. Drone Fleet”) and http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2046660/U-S-drones-killed-American-Al-Qaeda-boss-infected-virus-amid-fears-terrorists-logging-move.html (“U.S. drones that killed American Al Qaeda boss ‘infected by virus’ amid fears terrorists are logging their every move”); see also http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2011/07/29/are-colleges-dinosaurs/
What Steve Jobs accomplished, as great as it has been, would not have been possible without the Internet. I am using my fifth-generation Apple laptop; and over the years, I have purchased lots of other Apple products, beginning with a PowerBook 160 almost 20 years ago. Like many other Apple users, I swear by them. Some of us have even communicated in the past with Steve, who has been receptive to many new ideas.
While the future is exceedingly bright, it is also fraught with enormous problems and challenges. China, Russia and other countries try to hack into the Pentagon’s computers on a regular basis; and they must be treated in substantially the same manner as if an enemy launched missiles against our cities. Fraudsters bilk Americans and others out of billions of dollars; and this will only get far worse with the passage of time. Law enforcement seems paralyzed when trying to address such problems, because they cross jurisdictional lines; and the necessary resources are not there, owing principally to declining budgets.
See, e.g., http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2010/01/31/lawyers-and-internet-scams/
Steve was a hero to so many people, yet his final verdict may become available shortly, when an authorized biography is released; and in the future when true “insiders,” such as John Lasseter of Pixar/Disney, share their views of Steve and having worked with him and contributed mightily to many of his enormous successes.
See http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2011/10/05/pixars-john-lasseter-on-the-death-of-steve-jobs/?KEYWORDS=Lasseter
With tributes pouring in from around the world, an article in the UK’s Economist may have said it best about Steve:
See http://www.economist.com/node/21531529
Indeed, as much as Bill Gates and Microsoft undoubtedly have been very successful, this may be Steve’s lasting legacy, and not that of his competitors. He made computing fun, for lots of us who are not geeks and never will be; and we will always thank him and honor him for that gift.
Where did you go? I would love to learn from you regarding the situation in the EU.
Thank you, Katherine, for your comments as always.
I went to four colleges (i.e., UC, Santa Barbara, UCLA, Berkeley, Georgetown), which were excellent.
See http://www.naegele.com/naegele_resume.html
However, like great newspapers—and builders of fine buggies when automobiles came on the scene—this will not save them. We live in a computerized world, as this blog, e-mail messages, and YouTube attest.
At least two of the colleges that I attended are desperately seeking money now, from whatever sources they can tap (e.g., alums, foundations). This is especially true of the State-funded colleges, which are seeing California’s budgetary problems impact them significantly.
With respect to the euro zone and its problems, here are my latest blog comments.
See http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2010/09/27/the-economic-tsunami-continues-its-relentless-and-unforgiving-advance-globally/#comment-1902
The worst is yet to come, during the balance of this decade; government efforts will prove futile; and it will get very ugly.
I can see that Higher Education will have short on-line courses for absorbing basic knowledge. When these have been passed, the student would be allowed to attend a campus course for more interesting and challenging work including discussions, workshops and, for scientists and engineers, lab work. It would mean attendees would know at least know the basics and should lead to better discussions. There could also be remedial courses, on an ad hoc basis, BEFORE the online modules ended so that slower students could keep up. This would help with keeping fixed costs down and success up. There could also be guidance on how wise it would be to pursue the subject to a higher level. This extra tailored tuition could be done using internal staff or approved freelance tutors.
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Failure at the first stage would cost time more than money, and there would be an opportunity to remix the courses to be taken. You could still pocket a pass and not pursue that subject to a higher level. For example, this would be useful for those needing basic Maths but not wanting to do any more than needed!
This should also be done at 16 – 18 years old (in England, the Sixth Form) for part of the year, if only for practice! It could be done at the second half of the summer term, so school vacations could cover a longer period (and reduce the prices of holidays at peak times of the year!
It would also reflect the changes in work patterns, with many companies allowing working from home for one or two days a week.
In England, The Open University has been doing much of this, without the Internet, for over 30 years!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_University
http://www.open-university.co.uk
Thank you, Robert, for your comments.
First, inasmuch as children are learning to use computers at a very young age now, query whether traditional classroom education will be relevant—or necessary—at all in the future? Why spend money on “bricks-and-mortar” educational facilities?
Second, governments will not be able to support them. For example, in California with which I am very familiar, the State is effectively bankrupt, and so is the City of Los Angeles and other governmental organs. State funding may decline and then become nonexistent.
Third, as I have discussed in the article and comments above, with the use of YouTube and online conferencing, why is a college campus needed in the future? Indeed, I have felt for many years that offices are anachronisms. Companies, and certainly small companies, can have “virtual” existences online, and do today.
Fourth, the idea of paying professors to give the same lectures year after year is absurd. Give the lectures once, and record them, period. In the area of rapidly-changing subjects, again YouTube and online conferencing will suffice.
Fifth, newspapers and horses and buggies are testaments to bygone eras. College campuses may become relics of the past as well. Among other things, why waste scarce energy resources getting to them. Today, they are a waste of money; and this will be true to an even greater extent in the future.
Sixth, I have been online for about 20 years, since I bought my first Apple laptop, which is probably a museum piece now. I have three degrees, two of which are law degrees from Berkeley and Georgetown in the United States. I do not need to go to a college campus today for anything. Everything is online, at one’s fingertips.
Lastly, thanks for the links to the Open University. It seems interesting.
Large parts of some courses might be done on line, but in many disciplines, such as Science, Engineering and Medicine, there is a need for people to be in the same room for discussions, work groups and lab work; and where better than a campus to do it! Video streaming may be possible in some circumstances but, for example, participating in a Low Temperature Physics experiment using a video link would not be feasible.
A half way house, as I suggested, would not be so futuristic and it would reduce costs because the foundation courses would be help students decide which of the more expensive campus courses would be appropriate to take. There would also be an opportunity to check out how things where going: the exam results and the views of the students, tutors and employers of the graduands would need to be assessed before the college campuses were knocked down or converted to something else!
Thank you for your additional comments, Robert.
Again, pure economics will decide this, just as it did in the case of the demise of the horse and buggy, and now newspapers. If college campuses have any utility, they will be maintained, albeit in a much-scaled-back form. Otherwise, economics will dictate their elimination.
Walking Away From Student Loans
An article in the Wall Street Journal entitled, “Trying to Shed Student Debt”—and subtitled, “Lawmakers Rethink Bankruptcy-Law Ban on Walking Away From Education Loans”—is worth reading:
See http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303978104577364120264435092.html?mod=WSJ_hps_sections_careerjournal; see also http://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2011/07/29/are-colleges-dinosaurs/#comment-1755 (“Debtors’ Prisons”)
Online Education Is The Future, Period
Education Will Change Radically
In response to my comments that online education is the future, one well-meaning but naïve commenter wrote:
In turn, I responded:
If anything, this may be an understatement.
See also http://blogs.smartmoney.com/advice/2012/07/18/student-loans-sink-mom-and-dad/?link=SM_hp_ls4e (“Student Loans Sink Mom and Dad”)