Greeks Bearing Gifts....

[KaskadskyjKozak]

..below the belt?

 

A personal attack would be - "...you ugly stupid goon.." which I tend to avoid.

 

which shouldn't be too difficult since no moron follows you around smearing your person at every turn. Insults take various form: for example they can be crude or not. Your not being crude doesn't mean you don't use insults and personal attacks.

 

Now - if I said you posts are full of hyperbole, hand-waving, lack specifics or a thread of logic, include the crisis du minute, and appear to be written while your hair is on fire and/or caught in the car's fan belt. Well, that's a commentary on the the thoughts, or lack thereof, you post. Nothing personal about it.

 

Commenting in this fashion without providing a demonstration of your claims once in a while is acceptable in my book but doing it at what seems every single appearance of yours on this board puts you in the same category as KKK.

 

YOU dispatch more gratuitous insults than anyone else in this thread j-bot.

 

[tvashtarkatena]

Am I the only one that ever learned that you have to be careful to differentiate between causation and correlation?

 

There are two central problems with the literature that evaluates the connections between attending college and life outcomes. The first is selection bias, the second is too much aggregation.

 

The problem with comparing college graduates to non-college graduates is that you are comparing vastly different pools of people. When you compare the most diligent, hard-working, gratification-delaying etc third of the population, who tended to have more involved, responsible parents with middle class or higher incomes and went to better than average schools...of course you find that they tend to smoke less crack, knock-off fewer liquor stores, take better care of themselves, etc. Take a moment and ask yourself what kind of study it would actually take to measure the effect of college on X - all else being equal.

 

so your claim is that ~70% of Americans without a college education engage in "smoking crack, knocking-off liquor stores, not taking care of themselves, etc", which would explain why they never got a 4 year degree?

 

The main area where the over-aggregation problem is most evident is in the income stats. The lifetime income trajectories for different majors are radically different, and profoundly affected by the small subset who go on to careers in very lucrative professions with significant barriers to entry. Ditto for the pool that you are comparing college grads to. When you include high-school dropouts in the pool you get one picture, but when you compare - say- people who got a BA and nothing more to people who chose to go into a skilled trade, or at least one requiring a couple of years of post-secondary training and a certification, the picture looks very different.

 

the key point of what you are saying is they got some education beyond high school. I am not opposed to having other tracks than 4-year college but it doesn't affect the conclusion that education leads to better outcomes.

 

 

 

 

Is JayB actually trying to argue that a college degree doesn't bring in a larger paycheck on average? I know the guy's really into the whole Black is White thing, but really?

 

I would think his glee at the death of unions would lead him to conclude the opposite, but that's just me.

[tvashtarkatena]

 

 

 

The problem with comparing college graduates to non-college graduates is that you are comparing vastly different pools of people.

 

 

Correlation or Causality? No supporting data, so no problem!

[j_b]

Is JayB actually trying to argue that a college degree doesn't bring in a larger paycheck on average? I know the guy's really into the whole Black is White thing, but really?

 

No, I think his claim is they didn't get a four degree because of bad parenting and access counts for nothing.

[tvashtarkatena]

We definitely wouldn't want an enlightened, critically thinking society with a sense of history. No sir.

 

At least half of us wouldn't, anyway. Keep em dumb!

 

Sorry, that's my depression era values showing. I know education is all about training workers to do yesterday's jobs. No innovation, critical thinking, or communication skills required. Skills and curriculum should be strictly compartmentalized, no cross pollination allowed.

 

PS: The biggest hurdle I face in the engineering world is people who can't write or communicate worth a damn - and therefore cannot effectively spread their 'brilliant' ideas. Go figure.

 

I think JayB has a great future in HR...cerca 1980 or so.

Edited June 23, 2011 by tvashtarkatena

[tvashtarkatena]

That typo! LOL!

[tvashtarkatena]

Is JayB actually trying to argue that a college degree doesn't bring in a larger paycheck on average? I know the guy's really into the whole Black is White thing, but really?

 

No, I think his claim is they didn't get a four degree because of bad parenting and access counts for nothing.

 

One thing's for sure. Less access to higher education is definitely better for America. Cuz, you know, college doesn't really make you any smarter - not if you don't deserve it, anyway.

 

No correlation or causality required.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

 

"PS: The biggest hurdle I face in the engineering world is people who can't write or communicate worth a damn "

 

I'm sure they're thrilled to communicate ideas with you.

 

 

[tvashtarkatena]

Still, though, without Art History majors, I might never have gotten laid...

[j_b]

I think JayB has a great future in HR...cerca 1980 or so.

 

unfortunately his regurgitation of neolib think tanks talking points about education not being necessary is indicative of the types of jobs they expect will be made available.

[tvashtarkatena]

"PS: The biggest hurdle I face in the engineering world is people who can't write or communicate worth a damn "

 

I'm sure they're thrilled to communicate ideas with you.

 

 

Thrilled enough to pay me for doing the writing for them, anyway. I'm good with that level of thrill, personally.

Edited June 23, 2011 by tvashtarkatena

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Is JayB actually trying to argue that a college degree doesn't bring in a larger paycheck on average? I know the guy's really into the whole Black is White thing, but really?

 

No, I think his claim is they didn't get a four degree because of bad parenting and access counts for nothing.

 

One thing's for sure. Less access to higher education is definitely better for America. Cuz, you know, college doesn't really make you any smarter - not if you don't deserve it, anyway.

 

No correlation or causality required.

 

Hell yeah. Drop all admissions standards and just pay for tuition 100% with taxes. One size fits all for everyone!

 

[tvashtarkatena]

Is JayB actually trying to argue that a college degree doesn't bring in a larger paycheck on average? I know the guy's really into the whole Black is White thing, but really?

 

No, I think his claim is they didn't get a four degree because of bad parenting and access counts for nothing.

 

One thing's for sure. Less access to higher education is definitely better for America. Cuz, you know, college doesn't really make you any smarter - not if you don't deserve it, anyway.

 

No correlation or causality required.

 

Hell yeah. Drop all admissions standards and just pay for tuition 100% with taxes. One size fits all for everyone!

 

Exactly what I was about to suggest before you trumped me with this one size fits all response.

[prole]

The problem with comparing college graduates to non-college graduates is that you are comparing vastly different pools of people.

 

Correlation or Causality? No supporting data, so no problem!

 

Typical Jay: muddy the waters, obfuscate the obvious, paralyze with pseudo-science and selective relativism. "Is education good, really? Have you considered the chicken and the egg? How can we ever really know anything, really?"

 

They're creepy and

they're kooky,

Mysterious and spooky...

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Exactly what I was about to suggest before you trumped me with this one size fits all response.

 

Of course all of Americas ills would be fixed if only everyone could go to college irrespective of aptitude or will. The result will be an enlightened populace of intellectuals who all can read, write, think critically, and, of course, vote dumbocrat! And everyone will make more money, live healthier, and not work at Walmart or McDonalds!

[JayB]

The problem with comparing college graduates to non-college graduates is that you are comparing vastly different pools of people.

 

Correlation or Causality? No supporting data, so no problem!

 

Typical Jay: muddy the waters, obfuscate the obvious, paralyze with pseudo-science and selective relativism. "Is education good, really? Have you considered the chicken and the egg? How can we ever really know anything, really?"

 

They're creepy and

they're kooky,

Mysterious and spooky...

 

It's nothing more than basic critical thinking.

 

Causation. Correlation. Different.

 

There are plenty of other examples - such as the fact that people on Medicaid tend to be in worse health and die younger than those with no coverage at all.

 

One way to think about that would be that Medicaid coverage itself causes ill health and excess mortality relative to having no insurance. Another would be to consider the possibility that there are larger, more profound differences between the cohort enrolled in Medicaid and those who lack insurance that manifest themselves in the health metrics.

 

Etc, etc, etc, etc.

 

I find this quite amusing in the context of someone making claims about how attending college automatically increases one's capacity to engage in critical thinking. Clearly it does for some people in some courses of study - but the effect is far from universal.

 

See below:

 

"In spite of soaring tuition costs, more and more students go to college every year. A bachelor’s degree is now required for entry into a growing number of professions. And some parents begin planning for the expense of sending their kids to college when they’re born. Almost everyone strives to go, but almost no one asks the fundamental question posed by Academically Adrift: are undergraduates really learning anything once they get there?

 

For a large proportion of students, Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa’s answer to that question is a definitive no. Their extensive research draws on survey responses, transcript data, and, for the first time, the state-of-the-art Collegiate Learning Assessment, a standardized test administered to students in their first semester and then again at the end of their second year. According to their analysis of more than 2,300 undergraduates at twenty-four institutions, 45 percent of these students demonstrate no significant improvement in a range of skills—including critical thinking, complex reasoning, and writing—during their first two years of college. As troubling as their findings are, Arum and Roksa argue that for many faculty and administrators they will come as no surprise—instead, they are the expected result of a student body distracted by socializing or working and an institutional culture that puts undergraduate learning close to the bottom of the priority list."

 

http://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/A/bo10327226.html

[tvashtarkatena]

Just so you know for the future, I'm not j_b. End of stupid tit for tat.

 

Anecdotal, of course, but in 30 years of working life most of the leaders I've encountered didn't have educational backgrounds that even remotely predicted the positions they would eventually attain. Most were, go figure, liberal arts majors, in fact.

 

The most important predictors of executive success, according to the WSJ anyway, involve attributes like open mindedness, critical thinking, ability to assess, summarize, and communicate complex issues, social intelligence, and personal passion; not how you did on your thermo 105 exam. Crackhead parents (an anti-black myth, given the comparatively nonexistent public health threat that crack represents compared to...booze, but that's the Rfuck drug of choice, isn't it?) produce hard working geniuses, WASPY parents produce duds. So it goes. The question is, do kids with some desire get a 'crack' at college or not? Society is best served if they do...regardless of their choice of majors.

 

This particularly true nowadays. If I want to become a fluid dynamics genius, a day or two on the web will do the trick. How many software engineers have liberal arts backgrounds? If I want to learn how to write, persuade, negotiate, get the best out of team of people, or navigate through a crisis...yeah, you get the idea.

 

Then there's the good ole bidness degree...the Rfuck wet dream. Pretty much a joke...and I should know. Still, looks good on the resume and gets me some extra bucks. I'll take it!

 

Don't get me wrong, if you're gonna be an engineer, an engineering degree is a good start. If you're going to be a leader, however, you can start pretty much start anywhere. Unless you're Bill Gates, however, that somewhere had better include a college degree.

 

Finally, I suppose there are a lot of college students who wander around aimlessly, not knowing what they're gonna do with their lives...myself included. It's called BEING 20 YEARS OLD. I realize that JayB was drawn to janitorial services while his fellows were partying their asses off, and that early certainty of mission must have produced some resentment. I had high paying engineering internships during college, myself...never had to push a mop for money - that's some real loser shit...but losers are part of our society too, I guess.

 

 

 

Edited June 23, 2011 by tvashtarkatena

[KaskadskyjKozak]

I realize that JayB was drawn to janitorial services while his fellows were partying their asses off, and that early certainty of mission must have produced some resentment.

 

Interesting. How did you "realize" that? I mean, did you know JayB when he was 20. I did. He lived one room over.

 

 

 

[KaskadskyjKozak]

 

BTW, I agree with you on the utility of General Ed. requirements beyond pure-tech. That's kind of why I chose to go here: linky rather than take the easy way out elsewhere on the same university campus.

[tvashtarkatena]

JayB - the great aggregator

 

All statistics, massaged, non existent, questionably sourced, or not aside - here's a simple thought experiment:

 

What is the cost to society of sending a chowderhead to college who will wind up in a lackluster career, pay his taxes, and pay back his student loans (as most do), as compared to the cost of not sending a genius to college, but to the service industry instead?

 

Or...what's the cost of having an increasingly ignorant voting public? That answer should be readily apparent by now.

 

College doesn't benefit everyone - no program or system does. But it benefits most in some way - even if its pure socialization - and the free market recognizes and rewards that with fatter paychecks.

 

The Rfuck mentality is this: Catch one 'welfare cheat' (usually invented for PR purposes) - end welfare. Fuck all those who benefit from it...and who will use less social services in the future because of it.

 

This libertarian mentality is driven by an obsessive drive NOT TO GET SCREWED! The watch word is WHERE'S THE MOOCH? It certainly isn't WHO NEEDS HELP, AND I'M GRATEFUL ENOUGH TO BE ABLE TO PITCH IN.

 

It's kind of fucked up and frankly, low rent. Guess it must be differences in upbringing. Mine was values based, if kind of the hard ass version. Petty mooches here and there never bothered me...giant corporate mooches kind of do, though.

 

Could crack be a factor in the proliferation of these crackers?

[rob]

I used to be quite poor. My son's birth was paid for entirely by medicaid. Social services really helped me and my family get on my feet until I didn't need help anymore.

 

I can't imagine why anybody would think these services don't genuinely help people. I suspect they are heavy on opinion, and light on fact.

[j_b]

It's nothing more than basic critical thinking.

 

Causation. Correlation. Different.

 

wow! I am impressed with your demonstration. Should critical thinking suggest to you that the economic conditions that lead to poor child development are the same that lead to decreased access to higher education?

[j_b]

I find this quite amusing in the context of someone making claims about how attending college automatically increases one's capacity to engage in critical thinking. Clearly it does for some people in some courses of study - but the effect is far from universal.

 

See below:

 

"In spite of soaring tuition costs, more and more students go to college every year. A bachelor’s degree is now required for entry into a growing number of professions. And some parents begin planning for the expense of sending their kids to college when they’re born. Almost everyone strives to go, but almost no one asks the fundamental question posed by Academically Adrift: are undergraduates really learning anything once they get there?

 

For a large proportion of students, Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa’s answer to that question is a definitive no. Their extensive research draws on survey responses, transcript data, and, for the first time, the state-of-the-art Collegiate Learning Assessment, a standardized test administered to students in their first semester and then again at the end of their second year. According to their analysis of more than 2,300 undergraduates at twenty-four institutions, 45 percent of these students demonstrate no significant improvement in a range of skills—including critical thinking, complex reasoning, and writing—during their first two years of college. As troubling as their findings are, Arum and Roksa argue that for many faculty and administrators they will come as no surprise—instead, they are the expected result of a student body distracted by socializing or working and an institutional culture that puts undergraduate learning close to the bottom of the priority list."

 

http://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/A/bo10327226.html

 

No worries folks. Eventually, JayB will be done with listing all the problems in our educational system in order to dismiss the wild idea that socio-economic condition is a strong determinant of access and success in education.

[tvashtarkatena]

I used to be quite poor. My son's birth was paid for entirely by medicaid. Social services really helped me and my family get on my feet until I didn't need help anymore.

 

I can't imagine why anybody would think these services don't genuinely help people. I suspect they are heavy on opinion, and light on fact.

 

The GI bill put my dad through college/law school, which in turn enabled him to pay for part of our college educations - all 7 of us.

 

This ripple effect, or you might call it a trickle down effect, can go a long way with the right government program.

 

A private corporation would NEVER have done this. The idea that the trickle down effect works in such a targeted way in in the free market is, and always has been, moronic. Try explaining such a program to a Wall Street stock analyst come quarterly reporting time.

 

JayB's never sat in on one of the calls, I'd wager - never listened to some 32 year old in a sharkskin suit 3000 miles away no one's actually met berate a CEO who built his company from scratch for falling 20 cents a share short because he understood the impact too many layoffs would have on the community and the long term future of his company.

 

I have. The free market simply doesn't give one fuck about anyone who needs a leg up to get back on their feet...or on their feet for the first time. The idea is fucking ridiculous. Always has been.

[JayB]

JayB - the great aggregator

 

All statistics, massaged, non existent, questionably sourced, or not aside - here's a simple thought experiment:

 

What is the cost to society of sending a chowderhead to college who will wind up in a lackluster career, pay his taxes, and pay back his student loans (as most do), as compared to the cost of not sending a genius to college, but to the service industry instead?

 

Or...what's the cost of having an increasingly ignorant voting public? That answer should be readily apparent by now.

 

College doesn't benefit everyone - no program or system does. But it benefits most in some way - even if its pure socialization - and the free market recognizes and rewards that with fatter paychecks.

 

The Rfuck mentality is this: Catch one 'welfare cheat' (usually invented for PR purposes) - end welfare. Fuck all those who benefit from it...and who will use less social services in the future because of it.

 

This libertarian mentality is driven by an obsessive drive NOT TO GET SCREWED! The watch word is WHERE'S THE MOOCH? It certainly isn't WHO NEEDS HELP, AND I'M GRATEFUL ENOUGH TO BE ABLE TO PITCH IN.

 

It's kind of fucked up and frankly, low rent. Guess it must be differences in upbringing. Mine was values based, if kind of the hard ass version. Petty mooches here and there never bothered me...giant corporate mooches kind of do, though.

 

Could crack be a factor in the proliferation of these crackers?

 

-The idea that people who haven't gone to college are collectively inferior citizens in some essential way, and their existence in the voting pool somehow jeopardizes democracy is a strange one for any "progressive" to adopt.

 

It also seems strangely at odds with the historical record. Somehow - entire suites of legislation that I suspect that you find quite appealing - from the enfranchisement of women, to the repeal of prohibition, to the New Deal, to the Civil Rights Act, the Great Society, etc were all passed when the number of college graduates was several times lower than it is today. How is society becoming "progressively more ignorant" while the percentage of people with degrees has been progressively increasing for decades?

 

-The "reward" that the market confers upon college graduates is highly variable, and may not be sufficient to repay the cost of acquiring it. There are other options that may be much better for people who's primary objective for going to is to earn a living that they can acquire at a much lower cost than a four-year degree.

 

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/college_bound/2011/05/new_study_tracks_lifetime_income_based_on_college_major.html

 

http://cew.georgetown.edu/whatsitworth/

 

This doesn't matter much for people who come from families that can afford to put them through college, but it matters a great deal for people who will only be able to finance college by borrowing the money.