Tertiary Education and the American Way. (March 11, 2012)

The Princeton University economics Nobel Laureate and New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman, has some telling comments about the current path of public tertiary education in the United States and the views of the Republican Party's two leading presidential candidates.

He notes in his column of March 8 that the Grand Old Party (GOP) "has taken a hard right turn against education, or at least against education that working Americans can afford... embodied in the persons of Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney."

First he quotes Mr  Santorum as "declaring that President Obama wants to expand college enrolment because colleges are 'indoctrination mills' that destroy religious faith," while Professor Krugman quotes Mr Romney publicly advising a student: "Don’t just go to one that has the highest price. Go to one that has a little lower price where you can get a good education. And, hopefully, you’ll find that. And don’t expect the government to forgive the debt that you take on." (our emphasis).

Professor Krugman then proceeds to quote some depressing statistics regarding those lower priced institutions, which as he says were the public universities: "Adjusted for inflation, state support for higher education has fallen 12 percent over the past five years, even as the number of students has continued to rise; in California, support is down by 20 percent. One result has been soaring fees. Inflation-adjusted tuition at public four-year colleges has risen by more than 70 percent over the past decade. So good luck on finding that college “that has a little lower price.”

Furthermore, those cash strapped state schools have had to cut costs to the extent of axing whole departments: "which also happen to be precisely the areas the economy needs. For example, public colleges in a number of states, including Florida and Texas, have eliminated entire departments in engineering and computer science."

Then in explanation of Messrs Santorum's and Romney's views: "It’s not hard to see what’s driving Mr. Santorum’s wing of the party... he’s right to feel that our higher education system isn’t friendly ground for current conservative ideology. And it’s not just liberal-arts professors: among scientists, self-identified Democrats outnumber self-identified Republicans nine to one. [It suggests] that scientists find it hard to support a party in which denial of climate change has become a political litmus test, and denial of the theory of evolution is well on its way to similar status."

As for Mr Romney: "[O]ver the past 30 years, there has been a stunning disconnect between huge income gains at the top and the struggles of ordinary workers. You can make the case that the self-interest of America’s elite is best served by making sure that this disconnect continues, which means keeping taxes on high incomes low at all costs, never mind the consequences in terms of poor infrastructure and an under-trained work force."

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Professor Krugman's column elicited almost 900 comments, here is just one:

Kathy Wendorff -- Wisconsin

When I went to college, in the early seventies, it was possible to work your way through a good state school -- and I did. Without incurring crippling debts. Looking at the options available to my college-age children -- that is no longer possible. Even if they worked 30-40 hours a week at minimum wage (assuming they could find such a job in this economy) , leaving them no time or energy for classes or study -- it wouldn't cover tuition, books, room & board, etc. Lucky for us, our family has been able to handle the costs. But once again, our system is moving toward valuing inherited assets (our kids may not have inherited a stock portfolio, but they were born into a comfortable middle-class family) over hard work. -- Is that really the direction our country wants to go?