Are degrees in the UK value for money?

Tabbytabitha

economic wrote: »

that's true. when i said debatable i meant i would need to see the numbers but i think the cost of providing free healthcare and other public services is more then outweighed by the money they do bring in. I think that much is obvious so you are absolutely correct.

yes if we were to cut the local students that would be good. Im all for people studying tough courses at uni so at least some ocan do research in that subject, and this usually means keeping the top 10 unis and scrapping the rest.

Surely the only reason they get free healthcare is that, in many case, the NHS can't be *rsed to bill them?

economic

Tabbytabitha wrote: »

Surely the only reason they get free healthcare is that, in many case, the NHS can't be *rsed to bill them?

That maybe so but whatever the reason, it is a cost to the taxpayer.

Tabbytabitha

economic wrote: »

That maybe so but whatever the reason, it is a cost to the taxpayer.

But it isn't a necessary cost and it's something that can be dealt with separately with the appropriate mechanisms, rather than being a reason for discouraging overseas students.

bethhursty

UNiversities are profit making machines aimed at shareholders. Fees are a small part of that. Student experience is no longer a priority, money is.

Getting a degree is completely worth the investment 100% because of the education but also the personal and social development. But institutions have money as their top priority!

Cakeguts

bethhursty wrote: »

UNiversities are profit making machines aimed at shareholders. Fees are a small part of that. Student experience is no longer a priority, money is.

Getting a degree is completely worth the investment 100% because of the education but also the personal and social development. But institutions have money as their top priority!

It depends on the university. Some of them offer courses that are the same level as people do at evening class as hobbies after work. Those can't be worth the investment of going to university. Plus if you have got a degree that is one of these hobby subjects from a really low level university it actually makes getting a job more difficult afterwards because there are 3 wasted years on the CV.

What unfortunately the less gifted students don't realise is that the more advertising about the course the lower the level of the degree available. Gifted students won't touch these courses because they know that they are 3 years of wasted time so it is always the ones who could do with not going to universty that get drawn into the money making part of university education.

Top of my hit list for useless degrees is performing arts. Most people who do amateur dramatics or musicals can get to the standard of these degrees and work at the same time. Performing arts doesn't lead onto anything either because you can't get into working in performing arts by doing a degree at university you have to attend a special college. So this is completely a hobby level degree and it appeals to not very gifted students. My feeling is that these courses are a con to raise money to pay the staff of the university.

Before anyone says I am talking rubbish I know of someone who got an Mmus on one of these type courses who actually after the course knew less about playing music, the structure of music and the history of different styles than some other people that I know who play completely for a hobby but like to study what they are playing by reading up about it. Libraries have lots of books that you can borrow for free. The reason why there is a music course at that university is simply because more people pass it and so the league tables look better. The reason why more people pass it is because the degree standard is about the same as 3 old O levels the other courses that they run also at the standard of about 3 old O levels are too difficult for the kind of student who applies to go there. They apply to the music course because of the name that is given to the music department and they don't realise that it isn't what the name suggests it is.

michaels

One of the favourite stats at the moment is that fewer people own houses at age 30. Perhaps the fact that 40% more put back the start of their working careers, family formation, etc by 3 to 4 years (plus also opting into an extra 9% taxation) may be impacting on any possible house purchase....

GreatApe

michaels wrote: »

One of the favourite stats at the moment is that fewer people own houses at age 30. Perhaps the fact that 40% more put back the start of their working careers, family formation, etc by 3 to 4 years (plus also opting into an extra 9% taxation) may be impacting on any possible house purchase....

3-4 years? More like 10 years!

Average age for marriage for a women went from 22 to 31 over the last 50 years so people are starting adult life almost a decade later. And this is for women who do get married plenty dont get married at all so really if they were included the average age has gone up much more. Also the more educated the woman the later in life they marry and are more likely not to marry at all. If intelligence is passed on genetically this could mean given enough time women as a whole would diverge from men and get less and less intelligent as being smarter and getting an education for a woman means less likelihood of having kids.

I think we and the western world in general made a big mistake in over educating everyone. There is no real need for it. There is only a certain need for each profession just because we train more of X does not mean the economy will create more jobs for X. We probably dont need more than 10% going onto higher education.

GreatApe

The only way to get the university sector under control is for the students to be given choice.
Give them a £50k coupon they can use to buy an education or a house or put it into a Pension/LISA.

It will get ownership up. It will get kids starting adult life sooner. It will have kids start working 3-4 years sooner allowing them to earn/save and pay taxes sooner.

economic

GreatApe wrote: »

3-4 years? More like 10 years!

Average age for marriage for a women went from 22 to 31 over the last 50 years so people are starting adult life almost a decade later. And this is for women who do get married plenty dont get married at all so really if they were included the average age has gone up much more. Also the more educated the woman the later in life they marry and are more likely not to marry at all. If intelligence is passed on genetically this could mean given enough time women as a whole would diverge from men and get less and less intelligent as being smarter and getting an education for a woman means less likelihood of having kids.

I think we and the western world in general made a big mistake in over educating everyone. There is no real need for it. There is only a certain need for each profession just because we train more of X does not mean the economy will create more jobs for X. We probably dont need more than 10% going onto higher education.

This is exactly the reason why young men are finding it tough and experiencing early mid-life crisis as their role in society has changed drastically. If women are more independent in terms of financially then what is the need for men to provide the finances to support life?

Of course women and men eventually want children usually so eventually most women settle down but this is still a lot less then it were 50 years ago as more women's goals and aspirations in life has changed - mainly due to the opening up of career opportunities.

I feel sorry for young white males. There is a growing amount of propaganda about how white males have it all and anyone else is has been let down by discrimination. Then you have traditional roles of men being more or less irrelevant adding to the misery.

westernpromise

economic wrote: »

This is exactly the reason why young men are finding it tough and experiencing early mid-life crisis as their role in society has changed drastically. If women are more independent in terms of financially then what is the need for men to provide the finances to support life?

Of course women and men eventually want children usually so eventually most women settle down but this is still a lot less then it were 50 years ago as more women's goals and aspirations in life has changed - mainly due to the opening up of career opportunities.

I feel sorry for young white males. There is a growing amount of propaganda about how white males have it all and anyone else is has been let down by discrimination. Then you have traditional roles of men being more or less irrelevant adding to the misery.

One thing for which such men are useful is to be divorced. I suspect quite a lot of women dream of meeting Prince Charming and then divorcing him and living happily ever after in his house without him.

As a society we need to focus on getting more women into dirty and dangerous jobs, into jobs where they can get killed at work as often as men, and at getting the instance of suicide up to that of men. Unless campaigners for equality are prepared to embrace equality of disadvantage, it will be quite hard to take them seriously.