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/
Riesling – the majority of people in America don’t want a huge tax rate.
There’s a reason why it’s called “The American Dream” and not “The German Dream.”
Giving away more than half of what you earn is not much of a dream. I recall a Persian French surgeon I met once who moved away from France because of the burdensome taxes. He said he worked himself to the bone in med school, internship, long hours, and was living in a tiny apartment, with the government taking most of what he made. What was the point? So he moved to the US.
KarenS: I am well aware of Germany´s high taxes. Believe me. The thing is, we actually get something in return. And so do the parents of the 7 kids who live a block away from me. I would never begrudge them the free tuition their children are getting/will get at university.Those kids will grow up and get jobs and pay taxes and keep the whole ball rolling.
Riesling
WE had Senegalese teachers with the occasional French one. The system was lenient enough but surely not as lenient as this current US system, which is all multiple choices and second chances to raise one’s grade.
WE were required to memorize everything, every subject, especially history and geography. WE knew much about the US and Europe, but knew little about Senegal.
Paul, I suspect you are right. There was not much room for creativity in our system, and not much room for jokesters either.
When I was in high school there was also a tier system but it was informal. NYS has a regents diploma for those who pass regents tests in required subjects and school diploma for those who didn’t take the regents classes/tests. Students intending to go to college took the regents courses. Those not intending to go to college could choose regents courses or not. Those with school diplomas can enroll in a community college, and many do.
Things may have changed with regard to the regents courses and exams. My time in high school was barely out of horse and buggy days. And, yes, I had to walk 5 miles in snow that was over my head except for the narrow path if someone was ahead of me.
“highest”
Karen – what the hell to they do for the 1m a year. Geez, how do I get that job?
Forbes:
There is no such thing as a “free” education. Germany is already the 2nd highs taxed nation, and will surely rise, leading to a brain drain as professionals leave the country to try to keep more of what they earn.
People will always seek a better life, and high taxes are one of those obstacles that drive people away.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ccap/2014/10/03/there-is-not-such-thing-as-a-free-college-education/
Paul:
There has been hot discussion here in CA lately on the enormous salaries of university regents. Many are paid close to $1 million/year. The problem is that the universities say they want to keep their salaries in line with other universities. So, when one raises salaries, they all raise salaries. This year alone saw an increase of 20%, and there is a 3 year plan for even more increases.
Greed, indeed.
http://www.startribune.com/nation/275801081.html
Riesling, Your name reminds me of some great wine that I drank while I was there. I drank a lot of beer at Octoberfest, and I don’t like beer but that beer was good. Don’t know why I didn’t get drunk. A group of us tried to take the bus back to the hotel but ended up at the bus barn. Don’t remember how we got back. hmmm, maybe I was drunk. Anyway. thanks for sharing information about the German education. 2 foreign languages totaling 13 years! I’m impressed. Mine were English for 12 years and Spanish for 3 years. 🙂
Re-read my comments and am cringing at the misspellings and punctuation mistakes. Sorry!
Riesling – WordPress NEEDS an edit key.
What Annie said betimes.
This blog is an example of what too many college professors do for education in our current dumbing down of society (e.g. Why Ben Affleck Is Right, Bill Maher Is Wrong, And Sam Harris Is Jaded About Islam).
We are falling into ignorance in the form of ill informed opinion under the trance of belief that opinion is better than knowledge.
What Noam said too:
Annie, you spelled that right. Kudos to your architect cousins. I read somewhere that German architects have the longest, most demanding course of study of any architects in the world.
Po: here the teacher “suggests” which school you attend after elementary. You can then flunk out and have to go to a different, easier school or have to repeat the year at any time. In fact, the principal at my daughter´s school said he had had to repeat the 7th grade. The man went on the get a doctorate! Did you feel a lot of pressure as a child to get good grades? I think the French teachers are very strict. Were they strict in Senegal?
Riesling, I have four cousins that live in the Nordrhein-Westfalen area. Two cousins are architects, one is an engineer, one is an attorney. My relatives that went to Germany after WW2 and the ones who went to Canada, Australia and the US ( my family), were Donauschwaben who were refugees from Yugoslavia, Die Vertriebene, I believe that is how it’s spelled. My German relatives fared quite well, despite the early privations. Among my American cousins, only half of us attended university. Same with my Australian and Canadian relatives.
David: she´s about 4 hours away. Couldn´t get a dorm room. Lives with a great (studious) bunch of kids in a huge apartment. Obviously, I like the free system. They have changed the system so that job experience/qualifications can qualify a person for university. You can also go to night school to get your Abitur. I tutored a Turkish girl in English who was working as an assistant in a Pharmacy and wanted to study to be a Pharmacist. It wasn´t easy, but she made it!
Interesting details, Riesling. Thanks for sharing.
In what part of Germany do you live? I am making plans to visit south Germany.
What is missing from the German University experience? Sports teams, huge stadiums, cheerleaders etc. and the involvement of banks in the payment process. What´s the same as in the States? They can party! I´ve heard that the law school´s parties are the most legendary…..
Riesling – the best parties are thrown by the theatre dept after a show closes. They are invitation only. Here in the United States we rates schools by the quality of their parties. I was a Creighton University and about to go to Arizona State University when I found out they had been rated in the top five party schools in the United States. In all my years at ASU I never went to a decent party at ASU. Not sure who was doing the rating but not me. 🙂 Right now the University of Arizona has moved up into the Top Ten Party Schools on the Playboy Poll. For the life of me I do not know why anyone would want to party with any of them down in Tucson. Wilbur and Wilma the Cat are their mascots. How can you get beyond that? How can you take pride in that?
Poor people can get financial aid (Bafög) and if you´re really smart you can get a scholarship, which would help pay for living expenses, since their is no tuition. We pay about $100 a semester for a student ID, which includes free bus and train fare and free admission to the local public indoor and outdoor pools. Her books cost about $400 dollars last semester, which I think is a good deal for a Biology/English major with 9 classes and 2 labs. It isn´t easy to get a dorm room, so most students live off-campus in shared houses/apartments. There is no meal plan. You can eat in the cafeteria or not. It is subsidized and most students do eat lunch there on weekdays. The students can play ball sports, take dance classes and yoga etc. in a very modern sports center for free on campus.
That was the way it was for me too, Riesling, in Senegal, which uses the French system.
We had to take an exam to from elementary to middle school, then from middle to high school, where you picked a track, A-Literature, B- Economics, C- Math, D- Science. One had to pass a comprehensive exam in order to graduate high school and go to university, where one follows the same track.
However, in high school, if one’s track is not working out, one may switch tracks.
Passing the exams decides whether one remains in school and goes on or one finds a job as a trades apprentice and becomes a carpenter, a mason, a tailor and an auto mechanic…among others.
po – the problem with these systems is that it is a system that sees all students as being the same. Under your system I would probably be a failed auto mechanic somewhere in Senegal because when I went to school no one recognized and understood ADHD. We were just trouble-maker. I spent as much time in the vice principal’s office as I did in the classroom. If fact, I told him one time I spent so much time there they should name a chair after me. He didn’t see the humor. Actually, the reason I was in his office was some other teacher did not appreciate my sense of humor.
Anyway, your system does not allow for people like me who do not find their way until later in life.
Hi! Riesling here in Germany. My daughter is going to Uni here. She did have to meet requirements like having had 8 years of one foreign language and 5 of another. Then came real grades in gym class, RELIGION – yes – RELIGION in a public school (can be replaced with Ethics), and Music (not choir, music theory) and then all the other stuff you learn in school except sex ed was taught in Biology. Health was also covered in Biology. Anyway, then the last year of highschool they take a big written and oral test. You´ve got to do well on it if you want to get into a good Uni for your intended major. Your grade on this test is averaged in some complicated way with your class grades and the result is called Abitur grade. You send the Uni you want to go to this number. That is it. They do not care if you are male or female, what color your skin is, if you did charity work or not. You are accepted or not on usually based on this grade alone.
Riesling, thank you for the information from Germany. What do you think of the free university concept? Does your daughter live on campus? If so, how far away from you?
If you owned a business who would you hire?
Kid 1: Free college education from Ivy League School.
Kid 2: Worked through college to pay his own way at State school.
Hey Jim, I’ll stick to my, “happy and fulfilled life b.s.” just for the sake of argument. Still think “greed” infers harming others, and I don’t see it that way.
I wouldn’t use a Beatle as an example of liberal warm-heartedness. Everything I have read pretty much says the opposite about them. Yeah, yeah… fun, happy guys–just don’t touch the money!