The St James Ethics Centre is partnering with the National Centre for Vocational Education Research in an IQ2 debate on this topic in Adelaide in July. This subject is also being debated in the UK after research showed that the majority of people surveyed thought that a degree was no longer worth investing in.

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/252 ... z1PEAW05PH

Is it important for the majority of people to invest in university education?

University Education can be viewed like any other investment for the future. What is the ROI (Return on Investment)?

If you pursue a degree, that has limited demand with regard to post graduation employment. How long will it take you to recover the cost of getting the degree. This is especially critical if borrowed money is used to pay for the degree. Will the job you get following graduation enable you to earn a living and live in a manner you'd like and still pay off any student loans in order to be out from under the debt burden in a short period of time.

Would it make a difference if tertiary education were still free (paid for by taxes)? Should it be seen as an investment by society rather than individuals?

It's an investment for the individual, not society. Your rationale can be used to justify almost anything be government subsidised. Society as we know it would collapse without cars - should everyone get a free car? We all need electricity, do we get it for free? I need a roof over my head, where is my free house? What about free food? Ultimately, almost the entire benefit of a university degree goes to the bearer of the degree. They get the knowledge, they get the higher wages, thus they should have to pay for it. This is especially pertinant in an era of an increasing amount of joke degrees that simply cost money without offering anything even remotely tangible to the graduate, let alone society.

If it reallly was 'for society', then why shouldn't a doctor or engineer be on a fixed low wage with the remainder paid to everyone else to 'even things out'?

Some tertiary education is still paid for by taxes. But i don't use the word free, as few things in life are free. And the taxpayer funded tertiary education that I am aware of isn't free to the individual.

As there seems to be chronic shortages of STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Math) perhaps more scholarships or societal support for these areas of study should be considered. At the same time if someone wants to pursue stidies ion other areas, they need to do it out of their own pocket.

Is the discussion so far a bit narrow? It seems to focus on a university education as an economic investment, to be considered in purely material terms - the cost of going to college being balanced against the expectation of enhanced earnings, and the question of who bears the cost, and who gets the additional earnings, being considered in that light.

But surely there is more to human flourishing than an increased earning capacity? Is their really no benefit, individual or social, to education beyond its implications for employment and productivity?

A separate forum on this disussion board is devoted to the ethics course being offered in NSW primary schools as an alternative to Special Religious Education. I don’t have access to the forum because it’s for participants in the ethics course project, but I’d be very surprised if the value and significance of that project was discussed purely in terms of its implications for the future earning capacity of the children concerned.

If we don’t evaluate that education in purely economic, materialistic terms, why would we value any education in those terms? I don’t think many people who have actually been to college sees the value which accrued to them purely in terms of earning capacity.

Nor, for that matter, is it right to see the cost of going to college purely in terms of the fees or subsidies involved. People who go to college make other sacrifices for the longer terms benefits they hope will accrue - e.g. they defer entering the workforce, and so attaining economic independence and even a degree of economic security, which in turn many means deferring things like marriage and childbearing.

In short, there’s undoubtedly a financial aspect to this, but discussing the question purely in financial terms seems to me absurdly reductionist; if we see any ethical value in human growth and human flourishing (on both the individual and collective levels) then we must surely consider education in that light.

Peregrinus

As the question was about investing in a university education it is about investment. So i view it in economic terms

You describe education as a hobby. if people want to indulge in their hobbies, they should feel free to but they shouldn't expect to have their hobbies subsidized by someone else.

While I have a number of hobbies, for the most part i don't expect to make money from them.

I collect coins as a hobby, but can't be considered an investor as I have a hard time parting with something I've collected. but I engage in my hobby with my disposable income.

Again, I think you’re being reductionist here. “Investment” doesn’t have to mean just money. You can invest time and effort in things. You can make an emotional investment in a relationship. You can invest things with symbolism and significance. And so forth.

I think if we just look at education in terms of its implications for earning capacity, we’re missing a lot of what education is about. And you’re not saying anything to make me change my mind.



No, I don’t.

Problem is, how do you measure 'human growth' or 'human flourishing'? These are far too ambiguous terms to use as a justification for what amounts to a huge, involuntary wealth transfer. I have no problem with someone signing up to a basket weaving course or 4 years of eco-feminism, it's when these endeavours are charged to the taxpayer when the actual recipient doesn't think they are even worth the cost, that it begins to raise my eyebrows.

If ambiguous 'human growth' is a good reason for spending taxpayers money, can I get the government to pay for a picnic? You know, so I can get an appreciation of nature and understand the scope of humankind's destruction of the ecosystem? Can the government pay for me to attend a rap concert, so I can get an appreciation of ethnic minority perspectives on inequality in the justice system? Where is my free computer and internet, so I can become 'more informed' about social justice issues and the plight of whales/trees/refugees/etc?

If a student is offered a loan to cover 100% of the cost of a university degree, and the loan is charged interest at artificially low rates, and the student still doesn't think it is worth doing....why should anyone else pay for the degree for them when it is clearly going to be worth even less to an uninterested 3rd party? I will admit that it does rile me up to know that there are cleaners and factory workers paying taxes so that unappreciative, largely wealthy, people can enjoy farting around at university doing rubbish degrees they wouldn't touch if they had to pay for it themselves.

Remember, if those university students were paying for their own degrees (even if through loans) there would be a lot fewer complaints from people about the university system in the first place. I think the real issue here is that there are a lot of academics and students who fear that one day, the public might tire of their shenanigans and cut off the welfare so they will no longer be able to spend their days navel-gazing and might have t, get a job that contributes something more than, uhh what was it...'human flourishing'?

People really fight it out hard to be able to get a degree though when talking about how important they really are, that would actually depend on what you do and how you do it.

It is no guarantee, unfortunately because even if you finish a degree, that would not automatically work to your advantage, let alone with how you are going to be viewed by the economy.

Perfect! That's why I joined this forum. I have graduated from high school 3 years back and started working after that. Now, I was at the point where I was thinking to go back to school get me degree. However, this post has clearead up a lot of my doubts and am going forward on this journey. Thanks a lot guys:)

all depends on what your major is, having a degree in 14th century arabic poetry probaly wont get ya to far. now finish medical school on the other hand and you are pretty much set. Tradeschool is really the way to go for most people. simple, logical, afforadable and lets face it, without someone to build the hospitals and 14th century poetry studying facility, you need people like me.

Hi.

While I don't have a uni degree we cant underestimation the TAFE system as being quite good!