It really should be a challenge. The saying at my kids college/university was "A 'C' gets a degree". And while "haha that's funny" there were many in that group that took that literally and put in the least effort possible.

For work, my team and I work with engineer types, and its been a 10 years span of helping them. The newer graduates are a mixed bag: some are bright and innovative, and some are coasters.

We've had young guys asking for help on a problem, and as you help they start replying to text messages on social media, missing the entire "help" session you provide.

We've had grads struggle with simple counting / talling.

We have done step by step troubleshooting documentation. Then field a call from somebody saying the steps don't work. OK let's see your system and go through the steps. Let's check Step 1.
Them: oh I didn't do step one, because it said I didn't have system permission. So I just did step 2 onward.

I could go on, but I should end this rant LOL.

Which also means there should be rigorous standards to continue; similar accountability to any other job.

You shouldn't be able to collect a hefty check and be like my college friend. He who failed out of our college 4 times because he was just there to go to bars do his own thing (which was not going to class or doing homework or really anything else).

There would have to be limitations on how many people could get paid for some degree types. It doesn't do society much good to foot the bill for degrees that don't have actual related job opportunities. It could maybe work where just heavily needed jobs get wages paid, while other degrees are only offered under the current system.

Another thing here is that this would be another form of taxes used to directly benefit businesses. If taxes pay to educate a lot more employees for a job market, the companies in that market would directly benefit by being able to pay lower wages. I wonder if we could do a different system where companies could offer sponsorships for specific degrees in exchange for employment, similar to how ROTC works.

It’s one of the things I’m most grateful about living in Sweden. I wouldn’t be able to pursue higher education otherwise.

Social infrastructure FTW, a far more respectable way to run the ship. I'll keep with the boat analogy to use another idiom; "a rising tide lifts all boats" society shows wisdom in encouraging the kinds of conditions where their citizens can succeed without significant barriers, and improve the whole of it afterward (instead of the banking institutions which extend predatory high-interest loans) with their success. Hats off to Sweden.

I believe New Zealand does this as well?

Here in Sweden education is free

Free at point of service. But it's 7% of Swedish GDP, with all of that coming from public coffers.

Compare it to the US, which spends only 5.5% of GDP on education, with the majority on the heavily privatized university level.

The math gets worse when you look at student/teacher ratios, administration overhead, building construction, and spending on extracurriculars like sports.

Americans spend less overall than their swedish counterparts, but far more on amenities that have nothing to do with the actual mechanics of education.

According to my American economics education, this proves the American system is actually more efficient. Swedes would do better to adopt our model, if they want to be A#1 Liberty Whiskey Sexy, like we are.

I got beat for refusing to work in a mall hanging clothing while the "school" took my pay for my education at sped ed. Sweden should think about running things here instead..

may start voting to the wrong politicians

also competing with the rich for high paying jobs too. thats why its gatekept. like AMA, AND MANY graduate level jobs.

This about a thousand times.

I can only guess he is asking why it is expensive to get the degrees, and that's a fair point.

I'm old enough now to know I could be a Dr. Something with my knowledge and experience but would just have to put in massive time to get it recognized. Since I can't gain much* with that, screw it.

*aside from social bragging rights and rl title which is about worth as much as in games (I am against titles how did you guess? - not against diplomas and certificates, mind.)

Oh and before I forget: learning - depending on field - can be done by hands on and experiencing or simply pondering yourself, that's free too. Too few people do that and only rely on preprocessed knowledge.

Or in some cases, like FOSS, the knowledge is freely available, but you pay for a detailed course or tutorial to receive that information in a simpler, more streamlined way.

Exactly. Smarter doesn't equate well educated.

Yuuuup. Piece of paper literally to get a higher paying job. Only says you attended school, doesn't mean you learned anything or built skills there.

Here in Aus it was free up until the 90's. When one of my coworkers told me that I actually nearly started the revolution then and there lmao. All this talk about how hecs is a good system from all these privileged ass old people when they didn't have to pay a dollar >:(

So that's why the USA is the primary source of monetised knowledge. Fwiw I fully support pirating educational media, because if many countries of the world can access a significant amount of education for free, everyone should have the same chance, regardless of how the government of the locale wants to rule and restrict it.

I support fair wages for those who deliver publicly available services at material cost only or lower, so I support taxation that finances it and minimum wage regulation. Even though I believe the current minimum wage in the West isn't sufficiently regulated. It needs to triple in order to catch up to the 'inflation', or the perceived monetary value of everything.

It was free until some time in the 1960s when black people started getting involved

Black students, Jewish students, East Asian students... Anyone who wasn't a WASP with wealthy parents.

George Bush Jr famously had to make Yale his safety school because he couldn't qualify for UTexas.

Can you elaborate? I've never heard this before, and for most of the 1960s it was the Democrats who were the racist pieces of shit (to the extent it was even partisan).

Not saying you're wrong; I have a vague notion that Reagan mostly was the one who ruined higher education but I don't actually know that much about it. Is there something I can read about this though?

I would also add that damn near all of human information is free to be had on the internet for the low, low price of a monthly broadband bill. The real expense comes when you want a piece of paper that says you know all this that other people will take seriously.

Access to books is not the same as access to a structured course with experts explaining the topics. YouTube classes can be very good to learn something specific, but do not achieve the organization of a university program.

In my country, university classes are public a d anyone can attend for free. You pay for the degree only. If it is formation you want, you can attend classes.

same in US, most of them seek out international rich students, and you can see how much of these from the middle east and asian coming in with thier expensive cars to campus everyday. at the same time they neglect the rest of the students, so they dont prepare them for thier career track as there is very little resources directing to the departments, just enough to get by so the Professors and staff dont "revolt", they also abuse the adjunct positions to avoid paying them full time, or more benefits, if they can replace all the instructors with masters or BS level educations they would instead of getting PHDs. it all goes to wooeing international students, and sports. stem needs lab work as experience, but its so limited and small most graduating dont even know about it, or its extremely hard to get into. you can tell the university is being cheap if they use overworked professors to do advising.