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/
Paul
Do they use recycled water?
po – they are the ones that recycle the water and sell it. They use it on their parks and sell the excess.
Olly, The San Diego Zoo Safari Park in Escondido uses reclaimed water. I don’t know about the zoo in town?
Most of our golf courses in SoCal use reclaimed water as do our nature preserves.
Paul
I have inquired about that specific issue and am still waiting to hear. I suspect our local golf courses do not use recycled water. Most of the recycled water we use in the state is used by agriculture.
I wrote an essay in my local paper suggesting an extension of the use of grey water to residences. I am having a hard time recovering from the idea that our toilets are flushed with potable water, that cars are washed with it, that gardens are watered with it, that buildings, even, are washed with potable water.
I suggested changing the building code (yes, more nanny government, I know), to require a cistern in every new building or heavily remodeled building to collect rainwater, which is an incredible resource.
Additionally, the plumbing system should be split into black water (toilet) and grey water (sinks and showers), which is then piped to a water recycling center, which cleans it then sends it back to each residence through a dedicated line. That greywater line should be used for everything but showering, drinking and cooking, including fire sprinkler systems, construction work, which uses a lot of water, and especially for flushing toilets.
After publication, I heard back from many readers who supported that idea, but, obviously, no one tasked of finding solutions was heard from. Meanwhile, we are still forging ahead with trying to build a desalination unit that isn’t guaranteed to work, and if it does, will be inefficient, costly and may cause enormous environmental problems.
po- you might try contacting some of the major communities in Maricopa County, AZ and ask how they work it out. That would give you a base to work from.
Karen and DBQ,
I’m downstream from you and will move north the moment the valve is shutoff. Reasonable water management within this state was erased by the environmental lobby and I don’t expect that will change before the train to know-where finds somewhere else to go.
Karen S
“DBQ – it’s sad how small farms down here have dried up from having their wells shut off by the DWP, and yet I haven’t seen any golf courses or pools go dry.”
Agree with you on that one, Karen.
Along the 101 there are a couple of golf courses, and right next to me there is Pebble Beach and other smaller golf courses. The grass is still green there.
Karen – I do not know about where you are, but here the gold courses and parks use recycled water.
Aridog – I was wondering the same thing.
DBQ – it’s sad how small farms down here have dried up from having their wells shut off by the DWP, and yet I haven’t seen any golf courses or pools go dry.
Hey doc.
California is a really big State, with a very diverse geography, different demographics and are wildly divergent bio-ecological areas.. A whole lot bigger than itty bitty Wisconsin. So yes.. some areas are dry some are not.
If the drought that is harming the rest of the State continues it will be a problem. A big problem. However, having lived through the LAST be all, end all, drought in the 1970’s….I’m not that impressed by the Chicken Little’s , Yes. This is serious. Yes. Many people are being greatly harmed by Mother Nature. You can’t fool Mother Nature.
However, you are certainly correct. People will be at each other’s throats for water. However if you think that people will lie down and be railroaded so that the water can be used for swimming pools and golf courses in southern Ca., you have another think coming. There will be water wars. And in a war…some people die.
We have water here. THIS is where the water comes from.
Molon Labe.
Karen S….there have been multiple alias inversions on this and another thread…my guess is they are all the same petulant individual who can’t, just cannot, no matter what, simply admit they didn’t mean it when they said they were flouncing. The first indicator is whether or not their first newbie post is anywhere near on topic….or is it aimed at an individual or two among this commentariat. As I said earlier (somewhere?)….”Res ipsa loquitur”
PS: The sad part is that said commenter actually has occasional things of interest to say (the best any of us can claim, IMO) and can carry on a topical conversation…right up until he/she/it just has to, just has to I say, make it personal…
Dusty,
So glad there is no problem with the availability of water in California. I’ll readjust my timetable for when you will be at each other throats as to who owns what water.
Bon chance!
SharkDan: thanks.
Looks like yet another new alias has shown up. Doomsday Dolly.
Her complaint was that there isn’t enough water to charge the sprinklers and besides it would slow down new home construction.”
You completely missed the point. The issue is that “some wells do not provide the required GPM to give the sustained sprinkler time required. Not that there isn’t water. There just isn’t that much of it at one time from “some” wells. To get around that water must be pumped and stored in holding tanks and have booster pumps to provide the required PSI to operate the sprinklers.
“Does anybody suspect that the fire sprinkler regulation for new homes was an attempt to reduce the danger of wildfire?”
Only an idiot with no concept of the causes wild fires would suspect such a thing. Wild fires are caused, generally, by lightening strikes (over which we have no control) and also by careless campers. Houses starting wildfires is something that almost never ever happens. The fire sprinkler ruling was instituted to keep houses in cities and subdivisions from burning down the neighborhoods. Places that already have public water systems.
Another way to prevent or minimize wildfires is to have a good program of clearing underbrush, thinning the forests and select logging.
Rules made for the urban areas that are a good idea but which make no sense for rural citizens.
po
I don’t think there is much chance he is reading The Guardian, either.
Paul (Doc, good point) not the daily mail though
po and docmadison – I do get the DM but it is my palate cleanser for the day. I delight in the spelling and grammar errors. And that every photo is hilarious. Actually the letter to the paper are worth the read. They can be scathing. 🙂
Democracy Now, I meant.
Yeah, NPR is liberal in their programming, but when it comes to news, they do a good job just reporting the facts. The british newspapers and websites are good.
Paul,
By any chance, could one of those British papers be the Daily Mail?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5eBT6OSr1TI
Regarding your question to po— he is referring to Democracy Now. Very liberal. Very Progressive.
A very important point was missed last night when Dusty was discussing the regulation that required the installation of fire sprinklers in new homes. Her complaint was that there isn’t enough water to charge the sprinklers and besides it would slow down new home construction.
Dusty wins the prize!
When there is not enough water it is may be a good idea to discourage increasing the population (new home construction)
California has been plagued by wildfires. Do we all agree that wildfires cause billions of dollars of damage each year and some loss of life? Does anybody suspect that the fire sprinkler regulation for new homes was an attempt to reduce the danger of wildfire?
Or do I just underestimate the preference of westerners to practice self-reliance and freedom and liberty and to protect their property and find enough water their ‘ownselves’.
docmadison – my house not only has the required sprinklers inside, but has a fire bell on the outside. All required by town code. All of that was added to the cost of my house. It was not an option.
Ausgezeichnet, SharkDan!
I second the sentiment, Realist.
SharkDan: “To some commenters desperately insisting on the “work hard and you’ll get ahead” platitudes of the American Dream: Americans actually are working harder than ever before, with record productivity in 2014, and yet inflation-adjusted wages have actually gone down in the past two decades even as the cost of living has gone way up. This is why most Americans according to all the surveys still feel we’re in a recession and have had no recovery at all. It’s useless to respond to this with even emptier platitudes like “the American Dream means opportunity, not a guarantee”– that’s a nonsense statement that can be said about every country in the world. There’s some degree of “opportunity” even in Somalia or the poorest parts of Bangladesh. What’s been distinctive about the American Dream is the social-contract element– that working hard, following the laws, mastering a skill historically have been associated with a reasonable expectation of success and material comfort, yet over the past few decades, despite working harder and being ever more productive, Americans’ standard of living has actually gone down even as Europeans’ standard of living has gone way up, with much better infrastructure and higher social mobility.”
Dan, I think that entry belongs in the Turley blog hall of fame, if there was one.
Paul C. Schulte
po – since the right does not control the MSm and they are rarely reported on by the liberals at MSM how is it that you know they are losing their minds?
Paul, by MSM do you mean MSNBC? My source for news is neither fox nor msnbc and certainly not CNN. I do watch Chris Hayes, but democracy now is my number one, then npr and public radio, and other alternative newsfeeds. ALso twitter, facebooks, various blogs… the daily show… Between all of those, i tend to avoid being propagandized while finding things out as they are.
po – if you have not seen the initials before it means Main Stream Media. NPR is very liberal as is any public radio show. Personally, except for some breaking local news, I get all of my news from the internet. I subscribe to newspapers from all over so I get a variety of views. Actually, my best source for news in the United States are the British papers.
You say that democracy is number one? Not sure what you are referring to. Could you explain, please.