Germany has long shown far greater foresight than the United States in the investment into science, infrastructure, and alternative energy — investments that are now giving the country huge returns as a leading economic system. With a decision of Lower Saxony, the German have now shown precisely how serious they are about keeping the country as one of the most educated in the world: they have eliminated all college and university tuition. The Germans view education as not just a right, but an essential component for continued growth.
There are critics to educational subsidies who raise some good-faith issues of how such payments can eliminate pressure to make efficient choices and actually drive up costs. I actually see value to students paying some tuition. However, with tuition sky rocking in the United States and falling enrollment numbers, the United States is heading to a reckoning in the future for our lack of investment in our workforce. While we have spent trillions of dollars on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (and just renewed our commitment to the later to keep forces in the country), we have continued to cut environmental, scientific, educational, and infrastructure investments. The inevitable result is that we will continue to drop in our competitiveness in the world market and the future economy. Every other country is investing heavily in education while the United States continues to be distracted by shiny objects with more immediate political benefits for politicians.
What is striking is that it is not just third world countries that are investing heavily education, but economic leaders like Germany.
Notably, tuition was only introduced in Germany in 2006 after the German Constitutional Court ruled that limited fees do not violate the country’s commitment to universal education. However, the tuition rates proved unpopular and the country is now tuition free. Of course, there is no such thing as free tuition. The taxpayers are footing the bill. Moreover, such government subsidies can have a negative impact on not just the choices of students (who feel less pressure to make efficient choices) but on schools which are dependent on the government.
Nevertheless, the contrast could not be greater with the United States in terms of the commitment to education as not just a right (as it is in Germany) but as a real national security priority.
The article below has an interesting discussion of how England rejected the free tuition approach but has lost more money due to the higher student default rate on tuition. Yet, the English students face a maximum debt load of $14,550 per year where U.S. tuition rates and debt are soaring. Student loan debt in our country now stands at $1.2 trillion.
Of course, that is less than a third of the costs for the wars, but no one is making such comparisons.
http://thinkprogress.org/education/2014/10/01/3574551/germany-free-college-tuition/
Po, I hardly ever regret anything I say. I have self discipline which helps me to think before I speak or type. And, as far as “the departed,” I have always worn their scorn as a badge of honor. They have said equally nasty stuff about JT. So, I’m in great company.
OMG, Dredd! That is tooo beautiful!
“Everyone should pay a fair tax, but they do not.”
@ Dredd
I am for that. Everyone should pay a flat percentage of their income. EVERYONE. Right now approximately 40% of the population pays no income taxes. That will never happen because the people on both ends of the bell curve will whine and Congress can’t agree on how to make a ham sandwich much less reform the tax codes. The poor will continue to not pay anything. because they can’t afford it (which in many cases is true)…..the rich because it will take away all of their deductions and they will find other ways to shelter their funds. Overseas looks pretty good Or they will just cease doing business and bring their burden to a comfortable level. SO the middle class continues to be the beast of burden.
There shouldn’t be double taxation of income either. Once items have been taxed there should be no further taxation of that item. The death tax should be eliminated.
I think that benefits received from your employer should be taxed as well. Right now if you are getting health insurance your employer gets a tax deductions and you do not have to pay any taxes on the $20K free money for your insurance.
If this was included in their income, people might begin to consider the true cost of insurance and the costs of over using the insurance.
The same should be true for long term welfare benefits. You should count that as income and pay “some” taxes on that.
From the WSJ. http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2013/08/19/work-or-welfare-what-pays-more/
“The authors found that in 11 states, “welfare pays more than the average pretax first-year wage for a teacher [in those states]. In 39 states, it pays more than the starting wage for a secretary. And, in the three most generous states a person on welfare can take home more money than an entry-level computer programmer.”
Do I take advantage of every possible tax law….you bet. I’m not a suicidal idiot. If those are the laws our vaunted leaders want to make, well, I would be foolish not to obey the laws :-). I like to give to charity, ones that I know where their money is actually going. I pick and choose who gets my charity. The government isn’t a charity, although it wants to act like one.
Annie,
Your comment at 5:36 pm violated the Civility Rule and was consequently deleted.
Onesy and Twosy do the list:
po
Paul Ryan has ALWAYS been on the government teat. Besides the support the government provided during his youth, all of his jobs have been government jobs. He is one of those – what do we call them? – oh yes, lazy government workers. And one day, he will be getting one of those awful government pensions that all those lazy, stealing government workers get and have been paid for by the rest of us.
At least that’s what I have heard on this blog.
Dust Bunny Queen
….
Next the reflexive knee jerk argument that we are benefiting by the roads and schools. Well, guess what….we pay taxes for those just like everyone else and probably pay more than many do. We don’t use all the benefits we pay taxes for, but that is a part of a cooperative society.
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All good except some of those with the biggest profits pay no taxes.
Everyone should pay a fair tax, but they do not.
Research that a bit more.
po
Totally clueless.
Assuming that banks are a business.
Dusty
Well done. And thanks for the candid snapshot of your financial stability. Nice to learn that all that evil regulation and heavy tax burden didn’t result in penury.
It is also a curse for business to be under-regulated.
Balance is what is out of reach.
Our system has become dangerously uncoordinated.
Just as we near the cliff.
@ po
DBQ, to claim to have done it on their own.
I was talking about our (my husband’s) business, not my early personal life, where, yes. I was grateful that assistance was briefly available and explained that is why I donate generously now that I am able.
As to the business. Yes. We did it without any government help, any borrowing, any government money and did it in spite of the governmental regulations that make working and doing almost everything difficult.
The government didn’t work for 30 years building our business. My husband and I have done it. If you have never been in business for yourself, you have no basis of comparison.
Next the reflexive knee jerk argument that we are benefiting by the roads and schools. Well, guess what….we pay taxes for those just like everyone else and probably pay more than many do. We don’t use all the benefits we pay taxes for, but that is a part of a cooperative society.
Quoting docmadison who somehow seems to have an uncanny Kreskisn ability to look into my mind and determine what I am thinking and what I though about in the past. Not.
“Dusty had a hard time some time ago. The wicked government helped her during those hard times so she could support her family, work, and get back on her feet. Unfortunately, her story is totally unique. All the other families that have had a need for food stamps are lazy and none have ever worked hard and gotten back on their feet.”
When did I ever say that every one who needed food stamps or still was on food stamps were lazy?. Or that no one has ever worked hard and gotten back on their feet?. You are putting false words into my mouth which is rude and uncivil. I would say you are lying but then that would be uncivil then wouldn’t it.
However if those are YOUR words and thoughts about government aid and people who receive it, you really do need to rethink how you perceive other people.
“Also, Dusty has made it clear what a terrible curse it is to have government regulation. For many years Dusty worked for a bank. Was that bank an FDIC institution? Does Dusty think that FDIC is a good thing for the financial industry?”
You have no idea what I think about bank regulations and FDIC insurance. However since you asked…. If you wish to start another post where we can discuss this and the bank regulations that hinder and the lack of regulations that are directly responsible for the financial melt down…please do. Start with the community reinvestment act and then move on to Glass Steagall and removing the Chinese Wall and we can actually keep on topic. (good luck with that)
“Fellow readers and haters of crippling regulation – do you keep your money in banks that are not FDIC?”
I keep just enough cash to do business and have a cushion for 6-8 months in a personal account. FDIC insurance doesn’t mean anything to me as my other investments and “real” savings are not FDIC insured. By doing that I get a better rate of return and a higher yield on my funds and investments than a bank can offer at this time.
And YES it is a terrible curse for the small business owner and the entire economy to be over regulated by government. Economics 101
Dust Bunny Queen wrote: “When did I ever say that every one who needed food stamps or still was on food stamps were lazy?”
One employee that I paid $30,000 a year was getting food stamps. She asked me to please not give her a raise because it would disqualify her from receiving food stamps and medicaid. Until my business could make the jump to pay her $60,000 a year, giving her enough to replace the government subsidies she was enjoying, she did not want any kind of raise. She also limited the hours she worked so that she would not exceed the threshold established by government. This is a weird way in which government hurts the productivity of the economy and makes establishing a business difficult. The way I worked around the problem was giving her a spreadsheet with certain business goals. When she accomplishes the goals, then the business can afford to double her pay. It would be so much easier if her pay could just be steadily increased.
Nick, I regret having to say this but I must, low hanging fruit…and no, not Mango! You, my friend, to some, the departed, are exactly the troll you rave against!
Good point, Doc. That is akin to Paul Ryan bitching about the lazy takers while when he was young and his mother was in need of help, the government took care of them, but that was different.
Not unlike those masses railing against Obamacare on the urging of Rush Limbaugh when they are the ones most likely to benefit from it. Better yet, they support that corporations are people when those corporations grow fat off their dead bodies, taking away their rights to unionize, taking away their rights for a living wage, and yet, and yet…
Those who claim to have done it by themselves are either dishonest or totally clueless about what they are talking about.
The fact that we can even speak of American dream is the proof that there is a structure that enables the dream and the pursuit of it. Whether jobs, or shelters, or food stamps or emergency rooms…all of those are part of the structure that makes it impossible to claim that one, whether Mitt Romney or DBQ, to claim to have done it on their own.
po wrote: “Those who claim to have done it by themselves are either dishonest or totally clueless about what they are talking about.”
My experience has been the same as Dust Bunny. The federal government has been the single greatest hindrance to me living the American Dream. I succeed in spite of government, not because of government. My single largest monetary obligation has been to the government. My biggest check every month goes to government. And as she has opined, I see very little return from it.
Government has had some positive contributions. We can talk about public school teachers, professors, roads and highways, that have benefitted me. However, if I left it up to government, then I would never even have sight of the American Dream. I would be meagerly earning minimum wage somewhere still waiting for government to build my business for me. There are a few people like our President who has had everything handed to him from government, and has lived off government all his life, and lives the American Dream thanks to government, but government does not work that way for people like me. I have to pay government first, then my family, and lastly I have a little left over to help others.
Focus on the theme song (Do some transcontinental medication):
Someone is CWI.
Everyone here raise your hand if you are a narcissist, psychopath, or sadist. Nick is making a list.
Mango
Dredd,
I think maybe I should rejoice, but I am unsure as to why. Did I do something special?
How do you go about getting people’s comments deleted? I saw someone early ask for comments to be deleted, how is that possible?
Isn’t Nick in charge somehow that he can order that done?
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I don’t have much more time to spend on this.
You said knickers should be a guest blogger.
It gets excited.
You retract.
It gets unexcited and you are called a tropical fruit to be ignored by spinny.
I said rejoice, ignorance is bliss with that couple (PC the S and Spinny Knickers) and you really do want ignorance from them.
It is their brand, their way of throwing a tantrum.
You now ask if those in that weblock can delete stuff cause it seems like they are in control.
PI (3.17) is in charge, but knickers, spinny, and PC the S alter his ego to the point of hissy fits and, “quoth the raven, nothing more.”
Spend more time figuring out what is going on, so you know for yourself.
Spoken like a true Libertarian!
That Canadian study conducted about internet trolls and reported by Forbes shows trolls are very high on the narcissists, psychopaths, and sadists scales. Social media is learning the best way to deal w/ trolls is to excise them quickly and decisively.
Dusty had a hard time some time ago. The wicked government helped her during those hard times so she could support her family, work, and get back on her feet. Unfortunately, her story is totally unique. All the other families that have had a need for food stamps are lazy and none have ever worked hard and gotten back on their feet.
Also, Dusty has made it clear what a terrible curse it is to have government regulation. For many years Dusty worked for a bank. Was that bank an FDIC institution? Does Dusty think that FDIC is a good thing for the financial industry?
Fellow readers and haters of crippling regulation – do you keep your money in banks that are not FDIC?