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Universities in Europe are generally high quality and low cost. It does have it's problems but it is not one or the other. You do not need a degree 30 years ag

Universities in Europe are generally high quality and low cost. It does have it's problems but it is not one or the other. You do not need a degree 30 years ago to do lots of jobs that now require one. Higher education for a lot of organizations is just an easy way to cut the application stack down

ChuckNorris89 6y ago
>Universities in Europe are generally high quality and low cost. The cost is low for the student but it's pretty high for the taxpayers. Not US high but still, it's not free, there's lots of bloat in the system that thrives on volume of students not on quality so they try to push forward legislation and programs to increase the number of students, especially from abroad and build more faculties/universities with more staff to hire regardless if the jobs market has need for more students or not. It's not super expensive for the taxpayers but because it's mostly free for the students, lots of them treat it like Highschool 2.0, bouncing in and out, not bothering to finish it or prolonging it till their thirties, etc. which turns into of a waste of public resources at some point.
- silvestrov 6y ago
  No, the cost to tax payers in Europe is less than what people in USA have to pay the college. This is because my University (in Europe) had no sport facilities whatsoever, not even a soccer field. It also had no dormitories, canteens, no fancy library, sport teams etc. It did teaching + research, and nothing else.
  - SilasX 6y ago
    Right -- in the context of Europe, high quality means high education quality; it may not be high quality in the sense of all the frills Americans usually expect out of the college experience.
  - user5994461 6y ago
    For reference, cost in France is about 11kE per year for undergraduate and 22kE per year for master in computer science engineering. That's what it costs the university per student, not what the student pays (up to 1k a year). This doesn't cover accommodation or canteen since that's not part of the university. I don't know what's the cost in the US but I don't imagine it's orders more. The worst number I heard from coworkers was 60k$ a year in NYC (that's easily triple income and taxes compared to France so not a straight comparison).
    - pb7 6y ago
      That's roughly how much public in-state universities cost in the United States on average[0]. Some states are significantly cheaper. [0] https://www.valuepenguin.com/student-loans/average-cost-of-college https://www.valuepenguin.com/student-loans/average-cost-of-c...
      - sudosysgen 6y ago
        Wait. You're comparing total cost in France, to cost at the point of use excluding taxes in the US. Education in public in-state universities is also highly subsidized.
        ericmay 6y ago
        Is it highly subsidized? Any reason to think that is the case?
        sudosysgen 6y ago
        It is indeed highly subsidized, to the tune of billions a year. You can read the Financials online.
        ericmay 6y ago
        Do you mean subsidized in the sense of student loans backed by the government?
  - ericmay 6y ago
    Idk. People say this but are sports the real cost driver here? Many sports programs in the US pay for themselves and more or might be close to break even. We also have Title IX (1) which in some cases will lead to increased costs. Not to mention we have, you guessed it, a Title IX coordinator at every university that has to comply with Title IX who probably makes $50,000 - $100,000. If you think about other programs at universities, you’ll see quite the glut of administrators. https://www.womenssportsfoundation.org/advocacy/what-is-title-ix/ https://www.womenssportsfoundation.org/advocacy/what-is-titl... (1) The US education system is really just screwed up by free, guaranteed government loans. If we just made loans dischargeable then most of our issues would go away overnight. The issue you have here though is that we are concerned about access to affording college for those who have to take out loans, but this route we have just makes college increasingly unaffordable. It’s a viscous cycle. I think stopping it is the way forward. Most likely sports are going away at US universities. Big football programs will stick around though because the make a killing and people generally love them. Men’s basketball too because it’s relatively affordable. For reference, as I’m watching Bloomberg there was a report that came out suggesting star quarterbacks at major Us football programs at the collegiate level should be compensated at around $2.4 million dollars. We won’t have a men’s rowing team, or women’s volleyball anymore though. Kind of sad since these are also used as Olympic training programs. But maybe we will change how we do things. I think the US will start losing a lot of sports talent though because the infrastructure isn’t there outside of the university system.
    - watwut 6y ago
      Afaik, only few super winning sports programs are earning. The rest of them costs money.
      - ericmay 6y ago
        Probably 20-30 I’d say safely make money. For the others, it depends on how much it costs. Like if they are in the whole $100,000/year they could instead fire an administrator, or ask alumni for donations. I have to think most universities aren’t losing too much money or they’d cancel the sport already, but I think with COVID-19 this is going to happen across sports in college anyway,
  - nemothekid 6y ago
    >had no sport facilities whatsoever, not even a soccer field. It also had no dormitories, canteens, no fancy library, sport teams etc. Sports teams and dorms are no where near the top of the ticket of University expenses. Many of the Ivies hardly invest in sports and still come with a 60k ticket. American private universities are more expensive because American universities hire more administrative faculty and pay them more. That’s largely where the money is going.
    - srtjstjsj 6y ago
      Ticket price has nothing to do with budget. The schools have endowments and scholarship for rich students to pay more while poor students pay less.
    - zamfi 6y ago
      > Many of the Ivies hardly invest in sports and still come with a 60k ticket Believe it or not, at some of those Ivies, the cost per student exceeds $70k/yr, and is covered by overhead on grants, endowment, and other donations.
  - Terr_ 6y ago
    One theory goes that the whole "College ranking" apparatus has created a "race to the most affluent" situation, since high tuition costs have no negative effect on a College's ranking, and if you don't spend on facilities and things to up your ranking, then you'll lose customers to the competitor who does.
    - chmod775 6y ago
      Aren't college rankings mostly using the bullshit "citation" metric, for which researchers optimize by forming citation rings? [1] [1] not to mention self-citations, which is probably half of all citations in the US vs roughly 1/4th of them in most other places: https://www.scimagojr.com/countryrank.php?order=au&ord=desc* https://www.scimagojr.com/countryrank.php?order=au&ord=desc*
- Hokusai 6y ago
  > The cost is low for the student but it's pretty high for the taxpayers. That is a supposition that proves to be false. The same happens for health care. To have a centralized state sponsored education or health care system allows it to be more efficient that smaller for profit institutions that have incentives to increase cost to the students as their profit depends on that. Also, I would like to notice, that for European tax-payers it is an investment. That money spend in education brings back way more money that what the original cost was. So, to just talk about "cost" misses the point. > bouncing in and out, not bothering to finish it or prolonging it till their thirties, etc. Not true. I have never been in a classroom where anyone was above thirty, probably no one was over their 25 anniversary. But, that is my personal experience. Can you provide some data about that? I have not been able to find any statistics to confirm your statement.
  - twic 6y ago
    Americans are absolutely, utterly, unable to imagine that the way they do things is not the best. It's incredible to watch from outside.
    - seibelj 6y ago
      Europeans are utterly unable to create new global enterprises at the rate of America and China, apart from a few odd balls like Spotify. Different places optimize for different things, for better and worse.
      - plafl 6y ago
        Europe is a collection of small countries. It's not coincidence that the economic powerhouse of Europe, Germany, is the most populated country. And since this is going quite off topic here is some wild idea: let's keep just a fraction of the current universities, like say 5 or 10%, force talent in Europe to concentrate in a few places, force mixing across nations. Actually this is already encouraged somehow but let's be more brutal. Just thinking out loud maybe an stupid idea.
        6y ago
- watwut 6y ago
  > bouncing in and out, not bothering to finish it or prolonging it till their thirties Very rare. Mostly because school is not paying you unless your results are super great. Meaning, if you want to eat and live inside, you need money.
  - ChuckNorris89 6y ago
    Not exactly true. When parents pay your rent and food and University is free some have little incentive to take it seriously.
    - watwut 6y ago
      The parents who do that till yoir 30ties who simtaneously insist on you being formally student at university are rare. Either they cut you off or are fine paying you even if you dont study. And frankly, my impression is not that American students take school more seriously in average. They dont seem to, the paying money effect seems to be primary demanding more support and stufd from school. Not working more. If nothing else, the college experience where massive focus is on fun, parties, extracurricular acrivities, fraternities, sorrorities, networking, fun again and sport tend to be American focus.
- kakwa_ 6y ago
  > The cost is low for the student but it's pretty high for the taxpayers. Well, not really. In France for example, the cost per student per year looks like the following: * Classe preparatoire (math & physic 2 years course to prepare ranked for Engineering schools): ~15K euros per student per year * Engineering Schools: 10 to 25K depending on the specialty, with a few prestigious schools (Centrale Paris, Polytechnique, Mines de Paris, etc) in the 30 to 60K bracket. * Literacy student in university: 5 to 7K * Math or Physic student in university: 10 to 15K * Business School: 15 to 20K However, keep in mind this figures don't include housing. Apart from Business schools and less prestigious engineering schools, most of these are public schools with low tuition fees for students (even if these are slowly increasing, Centrale Paris raised them to 3.5K recently for example). Also, cost apart, having public schools with low/no tuition fees helps keeping open opportunities for everybody, and mitigate social and economic aspects. It reduces the "my parents don't have the money to allow me to go through university" or "do I really want I 200K lawn from the start of my professional life?" aspects. It's just better at giving more equal opportunities to every students, minimizing somewhat factors that are outside of their control like the socioeconomic background of their parents. Don't get me wrong, it's far from perfect and these factors still play an important role, but at least it's an effort in the right direction.
georgeecollins 6y ago
Are Universities in Europe really that high quality? Certainly some are, but as a parent researching schools I have been really surprised by how many European colleges are a bit mediocre by the criteria I was evaluating. For example, Spain and Italy have some of the oldest colleges in the world. But in many ways there are four or five colleges in California that are better, four or five colleges in Texas, and across the US many many colleges than any college in those countries. I know a lot of people will disagree because there are so many ways to compare colleges. But what I look for is the strength of the top faculty (not necessarily the teachers but who you might work with as you get more advanced), the facilities, the quality of the research that comes out of that University. The US really has an impressive number of schools that attract top faculty from around the world and produce world class research in many fields. A lot of European colleges seem to give you a good education. But if you really wanted to be an expert in something, or just get the experience of working with top people, it is amazing how relatively strong US colleges are. I know I am making a lot of generalizations, perhaps unfairly. So if you disagree or see it a different way please correct me. This is something I am really trying to learn about.
- alexpotato 6y ago
  Speaking as a dual US/Italian citizen there are some things I would add to your picture (which surprised me when I first learned them). I should also add, my picture is a bit dated since I last looked at this in the early 2000's but a lot of this is still true: US vs Italian "high school" - Finishing Italian secondary education is most equivalent to US high school + at least the first year of most US universities - I believe this is true for most major European countries and boils down to the expectations for students being higher in Europe than in the US US vs Italian universities - It's true that Italian university is free - It's also true that "anyone" can attend - However, there is a mandatory "advancement" exam at the end of the first year that MOST (~70% in the early 2000's) students fail which bars them from continuing - The above is what sometimes skews comparisons between US and Italian colleges - To complete university, you are required to do a "thesis" and then defend it. Historically, this was done orally in front of a panel - There is also the effect that because university is free and housing is usually paid for by parents, taking 5+ years to finish is both normal and somewhat socially acceptable (this is more of an interesting side bar) Long story short, this means the Italian university is really Sophomore year of an American university plus some graduate level work. A good example of this is how there is(was?) no separate law school in Italy since you are essentially doing advanced level courses in "undergrad". Another comparison: at the time (early 2000s) multiple people in senior level positions in European companies mentioned to me that in their opinion, having an MBA from a top US school was equivalent to a degree from a top Italian economics school like Bocconi University. Since most US companies thought of the MBA as the "advanced" degree, they weighed it more heavily so it did "matter" in that sense but not from an education only perspective.
indymike 6y ago
" Higher education for a lot of organizations is just an easy way to cut the application stack down" This is an easy way to ensure you do not have a diverse workforce, or even the best people for the job
graeme 6y ago
You completely missed the point. The author said pick two out of three. High quality, low cost, universality. As you say, you can have high quality, and low cost. But European university isn’t as universal as north american universities are.
BurningFrog 6y ago
> You do not need a degree 30 years ago to do lots of jobs that now require one This is part of the problem. Stop demanding a formal degree for jobs, allow anyone who can do the job to do it, and much/some of these problems will go away.
- srtjstjsj 6y ago
  The majority of people don't go to expensive private college for the degree , as that is available cheaper elsewhere. They go for the feeling of elitism. Some of the worst money wasting colleges are the scam trade schools like University of "Phoenix".
  - hpkuarg 6y ago
    University of Phoenix was founded and is based in Phoenix, Arizona, so if you want to put scare quotes on a part of it, maybe "University" of Phoenix is the better way. ;-)
    - dodobirdlord 6y ago
      I think their point is that most of the University of Phoenix's programs are online.
      - jessaustin 6y ago
        The time is past, when one could disparage online learning merely for being online.
        donw 6y ago
        I don't think that UoP is being disparaged -- it just sounds a bit odd to tie a virtual university to a physical place. On the other hand, "University of 4Chan" doesn't have the same ring to it.
  - chii 6y ago
    > They go for the feeling of elitism it's not a feeling - it's real. Connections with other highly connected (and rich) people will give you more opportunities that merit alone won't give you.
TempLogsForOne 6y ago
You are quite mistaken on the low cost, you pay wildly higher taxes all your life, even if you never went or benefit from a University degree, let alone benefit from paying for the eduction of foreign nationals who never paid a dime in taxes and then leaves Europe for the USA once they have a degree and can get higher income at a lower tax rate there. I find it rather annoying that otherwise supposedly intelligent people that likely frequent this site simply cannot understand basic economics, let alone accounting and have essentially no moral compass for lacking any thorough understanding for these matters. Not even that, but your fake low cost European education that that poor commoner pays ~50% of their income in taxes to support, is also not universal at all and is actually quite corrupt, with the children of academics and politicians getting into University at far higher rates than a system that were not corrupt would allow for. So, no, not only is the Europeans education model horribly immoral and unethical as foreigners and the ruling class's children get "low cost" education, while the working class slaves pay for it with their taxes and are stifled in their life due to that enslavement through taxes, but it is also not low cost.
pyuser583 6y ago
How universal are they?
- nvr219 6y ago
  How uni are these unis?
donw 6y ago
> Universities in Europe are generally high quality and low cost. And not universal. You do not go to a German university from a Realschule or a Hauptschule -- you go to Gymnasium, and if you succeed there, you can go to University. Otherwise, there are professional and vocational tracks available. University slots are limited as well -- you may have to hunt around for a university that has open space for you in your program of choice, or choose a different course of study. Changing study programs is much more difficult than in the US. I would be abundantly happy if we did this in the US, but the "everybody must go to college" crowd would have none of it.
- pjmlp 6y ago
  As Portuguese living in Germany, with experience in other European countries as well, that tiered school system always pisses me off. In those countries I have goten to meet clever individuals with university degree, that in Germany with their high school background would never had gotten the opportunity to attend university.
  - donw 6y ago
    I have met plenty of absolute morons with university degrees. University is, for most people, a massive waste of time and money. Not because they are stupid, but because going to university does not further their life goals. It certainly didn't for me. University only one of many paths through life. We need to stop treating it as the only option into which we force everybody. Plenty of brilliant people go into skilled trades, or into professional tracks. There's a reason Germany still has such a robust manufacturing sector. We would do well to follow this in the US.
    - pjmlp 6y ago
      Sure, but at the same time there are lots of clever people that missed the opportunity to actually go, due to artificial barriers that consider them too dumb for university. Morons? There are morons everywhere.
      - 6y ago
barry-cotter 6y ago
> Universities in Europe are generally high quality and low cost. But they’re not universal and there’s nowhere near the level of handholding and support that’s common in US universities with high tuition, i.e. private ones. If you have a problem in a German university it’s on you to run around and solve it and if you can’t the administrators are quite likely to say “tough” if you tell them. Missed a deadline? Your problem, should have read the syllabus. Come back next year.
- OpieCunningham 6y ago
  Is that really the argument? That high quality and low cost are only possible if students are responsible for solving problems? Sounds fine to me. Students solving problems is at least half the point of undergrad anyway.
- 3np 6y ago
  From my experience at a German university, the administration is in reality very helpful and can be proactive once you reach out. They won't come chase you if you evade them for anything short of criminal, fraudulent or unsafe behavior, though, and it'd surprise me to hear if that's the case in the US.
- tnecniv 6y ago
  > If you have a problem in a German university it’s on you to run around and solve it and if you can’t the administrators are quite likely to say “tough” if you tell them. Missed a deadline? Your problem, should have read the syllabus. Come back next year. They'll say that in all the private fancy US schools I've attended, too.

ChuckNorris89 6y ago

>Universities in Europe are generally high quality and low cost. The cost is low for the student but it's pretty high for the taxpayers. Not US high but still, it's not free, there's lots of bloat in the system that thrives on volume of students not on quality so they try to push forward legislation and programs to increase the number of students, especially from abroad and build more faculties/universities with more staff to hire regardless if the jobs market has need for more students or not. It's not super expensive for the taxpayers but because it's mostly free for the students, lots of them treat it like Highschool 2.0, bouncing in and out, not bothering to finish it or prolonging it till their thirties, etc. which turns into of a waste of public resources at some point.

silvestrov 6y ago
No, the cost to tax payers in Europe is less than what people in USA have to pay the college. This is because my University (in Europe) had no sport facilities whatsoever, not even a soccer field. It also had no dormitories, canteens, no fancy library, sport teams etc. It did teaching + research, and nothing else.
- SilasX 6y ago
  Right -- in the context of Europe, high quality means high education quality; it may not be high quality in the sense of all the frills Americans usually expect out of the college experience.
- user5994461 6y ago
  For reference, cost in France is about 11kE per year for undergraduate and 22kE per year for master in computer science engineering. That's what it costs the university per student, not what the student pays (up to 1k a year). This doesn't cover accommodation or canteen since that's not part of the university. I don't know what's the cost in the US but I don't imagine it's orders more. The worst number I heard from coworkers was 60k$ a year in NYC (that's easily triple income and taxes compared to France so not a straight comparison).
  - pb7 6y ago
    That's roughly how much public in-state universities cost in the United States on average[0]. Some states are significantly cheaper. [0] https://www.valuepenguin.com/student-loans/average-cost-of-college https://www.valuepenguin.com/student-loans/average-cost-of-c...
    - sudosysgen 6y ago
      Wait. You're comparing total cost in France, to cost at the point of use excluding taxes in the US. Education in public in-state universities is also highly subsidized.
      - ericmay 6y ago
        Is it highly subsidized? Any reason to think that is the case?
        sudosysgen 6y ago
        It is indeed highly subsidized, to the tune of billions a year. You can read the Financials online.
        ericmay 6y ago
        Do you mean subsidized in the sense of student loans backed by the government?
- ericmay 6y ago
  Idk. People say this but are sports the real cost driver here? Many sports programs in the US pay for themselves and more or might be close to break even. We also have Title IX (1) which in some cases will lead to increased costs. Not to mention we have, you guessed it, a Title IX coordinator at every university that has to comply with Title IX who probably makes $50,000 - $100,000. If you think about other programs at universities, you’ll see quite the glut of administrators. https://www.womenssportsfoundation.org/advocacy/what-is-title-ix/ https://www.womenssportsfoundation.org/advocacy/what-is-titl... (1) The US education system is really just screwed up by free, guaranteed government loans. If we just made loans dischargeable then most of our issues would go away overnight. The issue you have here though is that we are concerned about access to affording college for those who have to take out loans, but this route we have just makes college increasingly unaffordable. It’s a viscous cycle. I think stopping it is the way forward. Most likely sports are going away at US universities. Big football programs will stick around though because the make a killing and people generally love them. Men’s basketball too because it’s relatively affordable. For reference, as I’m watching Bloomberg there was a report that came out suggesting star quarterbacks at major Us football programs at the collegiate level should be compensated at around $2.4 million dollars. We won’t have a men’s rowing team, or women’s volleyball anymore though. Kind of sad since these are also used as Olympic training programs. But maybe we will change how we do things. I think the US will start losing a lot of sports talent though because the infrastructure isn’t there outside of the university system.
  - watwut 6y ago
    Afaik, only few super winning sports programs are earning. The rest of them costs money.
    - ericmay 6y ago
      Probably 20-30 I’d say safely make money. For the others, it depends on how much it costs. Like if they are in the whole $100,000/year they could instead fire an administrator, or ask alumni for donations. I have to think most universities aren’t losing too much money or they’d cancel the sport already, but I think with COVID-19 this is going to happen across sports in college anyway,
- nemothekid 6y ago
  >had no sport facilities whatsoever, not even a soccer field. It also had no dormitories, canteens, no fancy library, sport teams etc. Sports teams and dorms are no where near the top of the ticket of University expenses. Many of the Ivies hardly invest in sports and still come with a 60k ticket. American private universities are more expensive because American universities hire more administrative faculty and pay them more. That’s largely where the money is going.
  - srtjstjsj 6y ago
    Ticket price has nothing to do with budget. The schools have endowments and scholarship for rich students to pay more while poor students pay less.
  - zamfi 6y ago
    > Many of the Ivies hardly invest in sports and still come with a 60k ticket Believe it or not, at some of those Ivies, the cost per student exceeds $70k/yr, and is covered by overhead on grants, endowment, and other donations.
- Terr_ 6y ago
  One theory goes that the whole "College ranking" apparatus has created a "race to the most affluent" situation, since high tuition costs have no negative effect on a College's ranking, and if you don't spend on facilities and things to up your ranking, then you'll lose customers to the competitor who does.
  - chmod775 6y ago
    Aren't college rankings mostly using the bullshit "citation" metric, for which researchers optimize by forming citation rings? [1] [1] not to mention self-citations, which is probably half of all citations in the US vs roughly 1/4th of them in most other places: https://www.scimagojr.com/countryrank.php?order=au&ord=desc* https://www.scimagojr.com/countryrank.php?order=au&ord=desc*
Hokusai 6y ago
> The cost is low for the student but it's pretty high for the taxpayers. That is a supposition that proves to be false. The same happens for health care. To have a centralized state sponsored education or health care system allows it to be more efficient that smaller for profit institutions that have incentives to increase cost to the students as their profit depends on that. Also, I would like to notice, that for European tax-payers it is an investment. That money spend in education brings back way more money that what the original cost was. So, to just talk about "cost" misses the point. > bouncing in and out, not bothering to finish it or prolonging it till their thirties, etc. Not true. I have never been in a classroom where anyone was above thirty, probably no one was over their 25 anniversary. But, that is my personal experience. Can you provide some data about that? I have not been able to find any statistics to confirm your statement.
- twic 6y ago
  Americans are absolutely, utterly, unable to imagine that the way they do things is not the best. It's incredible to watch from outside.
  - seibelj 6y ago
    Europeans are utterly unable to create new global enterprises at the rate of America and China, apart from a few odd balls like Spotify. Different places optimize for different things, for better and worse.
    - plafl 6y ago
      Europe is a collection of small countries. It's not coincidence that the economic powerhouse of Europe, Germany, is the most populated country. And since this is going quite off topic here is some wild idea: let's keep just a fraction of the current universities, like say 5 or 10%, force talent in Europe to concentrate in a few places, force mixing across nations. Actually this is already encouraged somehow but let's be more brutal. Just thinking out loud maybe an stupid idea.
      - 6y ago
watwut 6y ago
> bouncing in and out, not bothering to finish it or prolonging it till their thirties Very rare. Mostly because school is not paying you unless your results are super great. Meaning, if you want to eat and live inside, you need money.
- ChuckNorris89 6y ago
  Not exactly true. When parents pay your rent and food and University is free some have little incentive to take it seriously.
  - watwut 6y ago
    The parents who do that till yoir 30ties who simtaneously insist on you being formally student at university are rare. Either they cut you off or are fine paying you even if you dont study. And frankly, my impression is not that American students take school more seriously in average. They dont seem to, the paying money effect seems to be primary demanding more support and stufd from school. Not working more. If nothing else, the college experience where massive focus is on fun, parties, extracurricular acrivities, fraternities, sorrorities, networking, fun again and sport tend to be American focus.
kakwa_ 6y ago
> The cost is low for the student but it's pretty high for the taxpayers. Well, not really. In France for example, the cost per student per year looks like the following: * Classe preparatoire (math & physic 2 years course to prepare ranked for Engineering schools): ~15K euros per student per year * Engineering Schools: 10 to 25K depending on the specialty, with a few prestigious schools (Centrale Paris, Polytechnique, Mines de Paris, etc) in the 30 to 60K bracket. * Literacy student in university: 5 to 7K * Math or Physic student in university: 10 to 15K * Business School: 15 to 20K However, keep in mind this figures don't include housing. Apart from Business schools and less prestigious engineering schools, most of these are public schools with low tuition fees for students (even if these are slowly increasing, Centrale Paris raised them to 3.5K recently for example). Also, cost apart, having public schools with low/no tuition fees helps keeping open opportunities for everybody, and mitigate social and economic aspects. It reduces the "my parents don't have the money to allow me to go through university" or "do I really want I 200K lawn from the start of my professional life?" aspects. It's just better at giving more equal opportunities to every students, minimizing somewhat factors that are outside of their control like the socioeconomic background of their parents. Don't get me wrong, it's far from perfect and these factors still play an important role, but at least it's an effort in the right direction.

georgeecollins 6y ago

Are Universities in Europe really that high quality? Certainly some are, but as a parent researching schools I have been really surprised by how many European colleges are a bit mediocre by the criteria I was evaluating. For example, Spain and Italy have some of the oldest colleges in the world. But in many ways there are four or five colleges in California that are better, four or five colleges in Texas, and across the US many many colleges than any college in those countries. I know a lot of people will disagree because there are so many ways to compare colleges. But what I look for is the strength of the top faculty (not necessarily the teachers but who you might work with as you get more advanced), the facilities, the quality of the research that comes out of that University. The US really has an impressive number of schools that attract top faculty from around the world and produce world class research in many fields. A lot of European colleges seem to give you a good education. But if you really wanted to be an expert in something, or just get the experience of working with top people, it is amazing how relatively strong US colleges are. I know I am making a lot of generalizations, perhaps unfairly. So if you disagree or see it a different way please correct me. This is something I am really trying to learn about.

alexpotato 6y ago
Speaking as a dual US/Italian citizen there are some things I would add to your picture (which surprised me when I first learned them). I should also add, my picture is a bit dated since I last looked at this in the early 2000's but a lot of this is still true: US vs Italian "high school" - Finishing Italian secondary education is most equivalent to US high school + at least the first year of most US universities - I believe this is true for most major European countries and boils down to the expectations for students being higher in Europe than in the US US vs Italian universities - It's true that Italian university is free - It's also true that "anyone" can attend - However, there is a mandatory "advancement" exam at the end of the first year that MOST (~70% in the early 2000's) students fail which bars them from continuing - The above is what sometimes skews comparisons between US and Italian colleges - To complete university, you are required to do a "thesis" and then defend it. Historically, this was done orally in front of a panel - There is also the effect that because university is free and housing is usually paid for by parents, taking 5+ years to finish is both normal and somewhat socially acceptable (this is more of an interesting side bar) Long story short, this means the Italian university is really Sophomore year of an American university plus some graduate level work. A good example of this is how there is(was?) no separate law school in Italy since you are essentially doing advanced level courses in "undergrad". Another comparison: at the time (early 2000s) multiple people in senior level positions in European companies mentioned to me that in their opinion, having an MBA from a top US school was equivalent to a degree from a top Italian economics school like Bocconi University. Since most US companies thought of the MBA as the "advanced" degree, they weighed it more heavily so it did "matter" in that sense but not from an education only perspective.

indymike 6y ago

" Higher education for a lot of organizations is just an easy way to cut the application stack down" This is an easy way to ensure you do not have a diverse workforce, or even the best people for the job

graeme 6y ago

You completely missed the point. The author said pick two out of three. High quality, low cost, universality. As you say, you can have high quality, and low cost. But European university isn’t as universal as north american universities are.

BurningFrog 6y ago

> You do not need a degree 30 years ago to do lots of jobs that now require one This is part of the problem. Stop demanding a formal degree for jobs, allow anyone who can do the job to do it, and much/some of these problems will go away.

srtjstjsj 6y ago
The majority of people don't go to expensive private college for the degree , as that is available cheaper elsewhere. They go for the feeling of elitism. Some of the worst money wasting colleges are the scam trade schools like University of "Phoenix".
- hpkuarg 6y ago
  University of Phoenix was founded and is based in Phoenix, Arizona, so if you want to put scare quotes on a part of it, maybe "University" of Phoenix is the better way. ;-)
  - dodobirdlord 6y ago
    I think their point is that most of the University of Phoenix's programs are online.
    - jessaustin 6y ago
      The time is past, when one could disparage online learning merely for being online.
      - donw 6y ago
        I don't think that UoP is being disparaged -- it just sounds a bit odd to tie a virtual university to a physical place. On the other hand, "University of 4Chan" doesn't have the same ring to it.
- chii 6y ago
  > They go for the feeling of elitism it's not a feeling - it's real. Connections with other highly connected (and rich) people will give you more opportunities that merit alone won't give you.

TempLogsForOne 6y ago

You are quite mistaken on the low cost, you pay wildly higher taxes all your life, even if you never went or benefit from a University degree, let alone benefit from paying for the eduction of foreign nationals who never paid a dime in taxes and then leaves Europe for the USA once they have a degree and can get higher income at a lower tax rate there. I find it rather annoying that otherwise supposedly intelligent people that likely frequent this site simply cannot understand basic economics, let alone accounting and have essentially no moral compass for lacking any thorough understanding for these matters. Not even that, but your fake low cost European education that that poor commoner pays ~50% of their income in taxes to support, is also not universal at all and is actually quite corrupt, with the children of academics and politicians getting into University at far higher rates than a system that were not corrupt would allow for. So, no, not only is the Europeans education model horribly immoral and unethical as foreigners and the ruling class's children get "low cost" education, while the working class slaves pay for it with their taxes and are stifled in their life due to that enslavement through taxes, but it is also not low cost.

pyuser583 6y ago

How universal are they?

nvr219 6y ago
How uni are these unis?

donw 6y ago

> Universities in Europe are generally high quality and low cost. And not universal. You do not go to a German university from a Realschule or a Hauptschule -- you go to Gymnasium, and if you succeed there, you can go to University. Otherwise, there are professional and vocational tracks available. University slots are limited as well -- you may have to hunt around for a university that has open space for you in your program of choice, or choose a different course of study. Changing study programs is much more difficult than in the US. I would be abundantly happy if we did this in the US, but the "everybody must go to college" crowd would have none of it.

pjmlp 6y ago
As Portuguese living in Germany, with experience in other European countries as well, that tiered school system always pisses me off. In those countries I have goten to meet clever individuals with university degree, that in Germany with their high school background would never had gotten the opportunity to attend university.
- donw 6y ago
  I have met plenty of absolute morons with university degrees. University is, for most people, a massive waste of time and money. Not because they are stupid, but because going to university does not further their life goals. It certainly didn't for me. University only one of many paths through life. We need to stop treating it as the only option into which we force everybody. Plenty of brilliant people go into skilled trades, or into professional tracks. There's a reason Germany still has such a robust manufacturing sector. We would do well to follow this in the US.
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    Sure, but at the same time there are lots of clever people that missed the opportunity to actually go, due to artificial barriers that consider them too dumb for university. Morons? There are morons everywhere.
    - 6y ago

barry-cotter 6y ago

> Universities in Europe are generally high quality and low cost. But they’re not universal and there’s nowhere near the level of handholding and support that’s common in US universities with high tuition, i.e. private ones. If you have a problem in a German university it’s on you to run around and solve it and if you can’t the administrators are quite likely to say “tough” if you tell them. Missed a deadline? Your problem, should have read the syllabus. Come back next year.

OpieCunningham 6y ago
Is that really the argument? That high quality and low cost are only possible if students are responsible for solving problems? Sounds fine to me. Students solving problems is at least half the point of undergrad anyway.
3np 6y ago
From my experience at a German university, the administration is in reality very helpful and can be proactive once you reach out. They won't come chase you if you evade them for anything short of criminal, fraudulent or unsafe behavior, though, and it'd surprise me to hear if that's the case in the US.
tnecniv 6y ago
> If you have a problem in a German university it’s on you to run around and solve it and if you can’t the administrators are quite likely to say “tough” if you tell them. Missed a deadline? Your problem, should have read the syllabus. Come back next year. They'll say that in all the private fancy US schools I've attended, too.