education racket

table of contents:

I. introduction
II. leftist assault on education
III. customized education
IV. factors and myths
   1) money money money !!!
   2) home environment
   3) culture
   4) quality of teachers and schools
   5). INBORN APTITUDE and STANDARDS
V. test scores are overrated
VI. stealing from your grand kids

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I. introduction

we need to privatize the public schools because all i care about is myself. i don't have kids so i'm not suppose to care whether the poor kid down the street has a school to go to. this will put billions of dollars in the hands of concentrated private power which they can use to make risky investments. and if the economy tanks because of the lack of skilled workers they will just pickup their copy of milton friedman and ask the nanny state to bail them out. just kidding. i'm just repeating chomsky's fancy diatribe on right-wingers.

seriously this time. everyone believes education is a great thing. that's why it's easy to demonize republicans for refusing to spend more on education. of course money is necessary. but at a certain point, money can only do so much. example, i never even owned a computer when i was a student yet i still became a programmer. on the other hand, i know friends and family who had state of the art computer equipment and graduated computer science from good colleges but can't program a computer to save their life. in golf we have a saying, "it's not the arrow, it's the indian". when it comes to education, it's not the school or money, it's the student.

if i was given a scholarship to harvard i probably would have lost my self esteem and quit my career. harvard doesn't make you smart. it's simply a school that accepts smart students. if harvard is turning students with low SAT scores into engineers, then i will vehemently campaign for bernie sanders. i think it's safe to extrapolate my observations down the food chain and say college is not for everyone.

II. leftist and corporate assault on education

when it comes to the issue of expensive tuition fees, again i must really be missing something because for me it's just common sense to realize that with the technology nowadays, college degrees don't have to cost that much. bernie sanders is the most popular candidate but i think he is a moron for not even attempting to come up with an education reform or cost cutting plan that takes advantage of the advances of information technology.

any professor can create a free college degree in one day by creating a wiki page containing the course outline and links to the free lessons and sources. if there are sources that are not available, i'm sure there are many bleeding heart leftist professors who should be willing to provide the sources for free. thefact that they are not doing this just shows leftists are just a bunch of hypocrites. the burden of proof lies on the professors to justify why they get paid $150k a year to keep repeating a lesson over and over again even if they can just record a video that anyone can access for free (just kidding. it's just a parody on chomsky's narrative that the burden of proof lies on the corporations to justify their existence and that corporations should be dismantled if they can't provide the proof)

i'm not an expert or a smart guy but i have an ultra strong feeling there are so many ways the government can do to cut the cost of college education. we can have online degree options for certain fields that don't need that much coaching, guidance or lab activities. i'm not talking about the current online universities where you still have to pay tuition. each degree will have a series of exams you need to pass in order to get the degree. each exam will have a list of free pdf books, lab exercises, youtube lectures and and materials you need to study for the exams. the government can buy the rights to the textbooks and provide the free pdf online. exams will be standardized and proctored by private entities. i envision privately owned exam centers sprouting all over the country like mcdonalds franchises.

laboratory facilities can also be implemented like mcdonald franchises. when i was in college taking computer science (philippines), those who did not own computers go to privately owned computer cafes where they rent a computer by the hour to do their lab exercises.

maybe it's just me but i never really learned anything from the lectures of professors. we all have different speed or pace in learning and the lectures were always too fast for me so i always had to read the textbook on my own before or after the lecture. my proposal would also benefit the freaks who are very fast learners such that lectures will be too slow for them and just waste their time. that is why i was baffled when a chomsky criticized universities for utilizing more graduate students to teach to be more profitable or efficient.

the professors can become paid tutors or consultants, online or in person for those who need further assistance. a professor can become like famous rock star if a lecture or instructional video he creates for a certain subject or topic will become viral with millions of views all over the world. the professor will be paid by youtube while youtube will be paid by advertisers. the only problem is the teaching industry will become like music industry where you have the top 1% earning a lot while the rest of the 99% are barely making ends meet. but every reform or revolution always has it's collateral damage. just look at what amazon is doing to the retail industry right now. or can you imagine if america did not build the transcontinental railway because it might put a lot of shipping industry people out of work?

the big advantage of an online course is flexibility and students can learn according to their pace, any time, anywhere. you can stay in your parent's basement, no need for expensive dorms and boarding houses, which usually cost $10k a year. and it also starts to mirror the real world activities or environment where you do the learning on your own. imagine sitting by a beautiful beach learning about fluid dynamics instead of inside a classroom.

learning outside the university encourages creative and independent thought and inquiry, challenging received beliefs, and exploring new horizons free of external constrains. when i was in college i was writing pro communist essays even if i didn't believe in them just to please the professors and get high grades. now i'm free from that mental jail so i'm writing blogs that's challenging received beliefs and exploring new horizons free of external constraints.(another parody on chomsky's narrative)

social development can be addressed by joining social clubs - snowboarding clubs, triathlon clubs, off campus fraternities, or in my case NAMBLA (joke).

of course an online degree is lesser quality to a university degree. but it's still a good enough option. a university degree would be like a bmw while an online degree would be like a toyota corolla. hey, toyota corolla will still take you from point A to point B.

i think the corporate sector is preventing my idea from happening because there's no profit. this is the true corporate assault on education. unfortunately, most leftist intellectuals also earn their living from teaching in profitable universities. so i would understand if the left is also participating in this assault on education.

III. customized education

the good news is there are major efforts to try to impose a business model on the educational system to get it to produce graduates who will be useful for the business world. the government is trying to convert universities into commercial enterprises. coincidentally this is taking it's extreme form in the university of wisconsin where i was born while my father was taking his masters degree as an eisenhower scholar as part of the monroe doctrine. it baffles me that chomsky instead denounces this and calls this the "corporate assault on education". he didn't really give a good explanation.

maybe it's a good thing because technology and automation are causing middle tier jobs to disappear. i think the economy is moving towards very few high level jobs and more low level jobs that only require technical or community college degrees. i met some programmers who never even went to college who were way better than me even if i had a BS degree. i don't think a country with many 4 year degree holders working in starbucks is a happy country. if you have a B.S degree in philosophy from berkeley i think this will just make you enlightened enough to constantly bitch about your job as you drive that 18 wheeler.

maybe high college tuition will force people to decide more carefully if they should go to college or not. individuals are the best decision makers of their abilities and potential. i apologize to the left for sounding like hitler. i understand leftists believe all humans have equal abilities and it's the lack of educational funding from evil republicans that's causing the inequality. which to me is stupid because how do you explain those millions of people who have good jobs even if they started with the same or even less opportunities as those who are struggling? how do you explain siblings raised in the same environment and provided the same opportunities and one becomes a lawyer and the other becomes a drug junkie?

democrats act as if a college degree is an elixir or the holy grail and there are no alternatives. i say "act" because i know they are smart enough to realize that college is not for everyone and maybe high college cost is a way to weed out those that would just be wasting time and money going to college. besides they can always go to a community college which is cheap.

what about those who are intelligent and can really make good use of a good university education but have no money? no problem. they can get a loan then get a high paying job after graduation so they can easily pay off the loan. what if they can't get a high paying job? then that means they never were intelligent in the first place and never should have gone to college or they should have just went to community college. i got a high paying job in silicon valley and the only requirement for that job was an AA degree or community college degree. the best judge to decide whether one should go to college or not is the person, not the government.

it's possible there would be students who deserve to go to a good university that ends up in a community college. but i don't see any reason why those students can't acquire the same knowledge as a good university. it's not like the books used on good universities are made of gold which makes it too expensive for community college students to buy. a student can't say community college is holding them back unless they easily perfect all the exams. and if they easily perfect all the exams, i'm sure the professor can advise them more advanced studies or learning goals. that is if they already didn't get a scholarship to a good university. the geniuses usually are awarded a scholarship to MIT or cal tech. also if they are smart enough to attend MIT, chances are their parents are also intelligent enough to earn a good living so they can easily pay full tuition. 33% of MIT students are in full scholarship and 72% graduate with no student loans.

there are also state universities (e.g. cal state) that's like a middle ground between community college and good universities. although chomsky says private businesses are trying to take over and turn it into for profit institutions. i agree that should not happen and we should try to stop that. but how can the left gain credibility in advocating for real issues if they keep advocating for issues that normal people find crazy?

if we make college free, then there will be a lot of waste unless we are a small, homogeneous population with a high base of competence like norway, denmark or canada. here is just another example of a highly intelligent leftist who is naive about human nature - Where in the world is it easiest to get rich? | Harald Eia. leftists are all talk and no impact on society. it's better to get policy guidance from someone like elon musk who has the biggest impact on combating climate change. he says a college degree is really not that important:

i'm not an expert but i think if there really is a problem, we need to do some sort of approach where we identify the possible skills needed and design the educational system accordingly instead of just focusing on test scores and more funding for education.

i notice america is already doing something like that - now it just takes 18 months to get a registered nursing degree instead of 4 years. and you can get it in a cheap community college. you just need to pass the board exam, after which you can easily find a job starting at $60k a year. meanwhile, the rest are spending $40k on tuition in a universities after which they will be working in starbucks or working in a totally unrelated field earning $24k a year. we just need to broaden or extrapolate what they did to nursing to other jobs that are technical in nature.

actually my observation tells me america is probably over educated. i know too many people working in a field something they are over qualified for or they are not making use of the $40k college course they graduated from. which is ok because knowledge and education will always improve someone's quality of life in some other ways, maybe in terms of attitude, life philosophy, hobbies etc. in other words, a plumber with an engineering degree would tend to have a better quality of life than a plumber with only a high school degree. the plumber can read chomsky or  enjoy writing blogs that destroys the leftist agenda. note my opinion about america being over educated is not based on statistical facts and data, just personal observation.

update: amazing how i wrote this article on 10/31/17. then on december 2018 i see this JP Morgan CEO jamie dimon interview. it shows the greatest minds of our country are already implementing my ideas. this video also highlights the figure of speech: "government sucks at everything".

IBM is also partnering with new york city and new york state in creating P-Tech Schools that would bridge the skills gap. the skills will then be used to bridge the missile gap (joke). the program includes six years of high school and community college rolled into one. there are currently 200 P-Tech schools and  the program could eventually reach millions of students. many jobs simply don't require a four-year degree, and P-Tech fills that gap with students that are prepared for the work that needs to be done in our new economy. any person with common sense will feel this is very good for our country but the left will scorn and denounce P-Tech school which makes the koch brothers and the military industrial complex happy because it undermines the left's influence and power.

IV. factors and myths

1) money money money !!!

here is a video of an agent hired by corporate tyranny to assault public education:

it's really not that hard to figure out if we are spending enough or not. are student's having difficulty getting educated because they can't afford the text books? are the classrooms overcrowded? the average classroom size in america is between 21-25. my high school class size was around 30 and pretty much all of my classmates are very successful in their careers. do you even know of an american who is suppose to be smart but lack education because there was no money for his/her education? of course not. a child's academic gift is easily discovered at a very early age and if that kid belongs to a poor family and low standard public school, that kid is easily given a scholarship to a higher standard school so he/she can grow up to find a cure for cancer. the problem with the leftists is that they idiotically believe all kids are gifted and have the potential to get a good education.

the government does not even have to be involved. many private charities will be more than happy to help. libertarian small government policies are not as evil as what obama and the big government democrats want you to believe. many libertarians are actually charitable we just don't want the government to force us to be charitable through 50% tax rate like canada.

even during the racist segregation and women subjugation era of america, genius black girls still ended up in NASA (watch the movie "hidden figures").

i don't even think higher standard schools need to cost much more money. in a low standard school, the teacher will say, "class, read chapter 1 tonight because we will have a quiz tomorrow". in a higher standard school, the teacher simply has to say, "class, read chapters 1 to 5 tonight because we will have a quiz tomorrow". i even think low standard schools need better teachers because it's harder to teach students who are less smart. it's easier to teach smart students and in extreme cases, you don't have to teach them they will teach themselves.

i'm sure the democrats are smart enough to know this. the reason why democrats want to over spend on education is political - to make the democratic base happy, an important part of which is the teacher's union. but nowadays, more and more democrats are starting to wake up and realize that our educational system needs more reforms, not more money - http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/how-teachers-unions-became-the-paper-tigers-of-education-reform/article/2633676. the real assault on education is done by the teacher's union.

all the democrats i know agree that the teacher's union is wrecking our educational system. or maybe we are just brainwashed by propaganda as part of the corporate elite's assault on public education. propaganda is always the left's go to scapegoat (https://ian-crystal.blogspot.com/2019/06/propaganda-scapegoat-of-the-left.html).

bernie sanders is proposing that funding for free college will come from speculative wall street taxes. sounds great. but it's never that simple. he needs to produce a study that shows his proposal will not impede investments and economic growth. after there was a study that showed medicare-for-all will save $5 trillion in 10 years, i switched sides and now i support medicare-for-all. why not? https://truthout.org/articles/new-study-shows-medicare-for-all-would-save-us-5-1-trillion-over-ten-years/

it baffles me when people talk about government spending without making sure the audience knows the context. everyone is guilty of this. every time you talk about policies that involve government spending, you should briefly say how much the US government collects in taxes every year (~$3.6 trillion) and provide a simplified pie chart of government spending (~$4.3 trillion). if you do this people will be shocked at how much we spend on defense. they would want to trim $200 billion from the $700 billion military spending so that everyone gets health insurance - https://ian-crystal.blogspot.com/2014/05/crystal-care.html, it's also moronic to say our debt is $21 trillion (i used to be guilty of this). it's better to say our debt is 100% of our GDP. because $21 trillion is small if our GDP is $100 trillion.

2) home environment

home environment is a factor but contrary to popular belief, it's not that big of a factor. we all know siblings who grew up in the same home where 1 sibling has impressive educational achievements while the other sibling grows up to be a pot head who did not even graduate high school.

but home environment is still a factor. so instead of throwing more money at our education budget, maybe we should try to address the issue of of broken family homes in poor black neighborhoods. it's pretty obvious that kids from broken homes tend to under perform in school. yet you never really hear the democrats and liberal media address or even bring up this issue. instead they focus on identity politics, blaming the plight of poor black people on racism. a lot of people got fed up with this false narrative such that they would rather vote for someone as disgusting as donald trump rather than be subjected to another 8 years of liberal agenda. that is why supposedly prestigious institutions like CNN are losing credibility - people can see through their bias or liberal propaganda. CNN may be correct in condemning trump's disgusting behavior, but CNN never supports policies that promote fiscal responsibility, economic growth and national security - issues that are way more important than trump's clownish behavior which is mostly just cosmetics.

3) culture

you keep hearing how china and 20 other countries are kicking america's butt in terms of test scores. but you never hear that maybe that's because in america it is cooler to be able to throw a perfect spiral than be good at math. i'm pretty sure throwing more money at our education budget will do nothing to motivate a child to practice math instead of practice 3 point shots.

there was a time when america used to recruit nurses from the philippines. it was not because of lack of education or low test scores but americans simply did not want to work as a nurses at that time. the 2008 crisis was a blessing in disguise because it changed the attitude of americans. nowadays, enough americans are willing to work as a nurses. what changed? answer: NECESSITY. necessity is the mother of all reforms (or was that invention?). no money was involved, contrary to the democrat's automatic solution to problems. the economic recession and hardships simply changed american attitude and culture.

4) quality of teachers and schools

of course a teacher can make a big difference in someone's education. a person destined to become a bank branch manager can become the CEO with the right inspiration and guidance from a teacher. a person with a potential to become a neuro surgeon might only end up being just a regular doctor if that person went to really bad schools. but note that being a branch manager or a regular doctor is still pretty awesome. but there are people who just can't be well educated due to their inborn aptitude even if the are sent to the best schools or given the best teachers.

according to this harvard scientist, 10% of the population can't be educated or trained to do any job. not even serve in the military. this destroys the conservative's narrative that anyone can succeed if they just move their butt. this also destroys the liberal and leftist narrative that everyone will be educated if college is free.

i remember in one of obama's speech he thanked his teachers because without them he would not be where he is right now. so what about the hundreds of other students who had the same teacher who are currently working in jobs they hate? what obama said was correct but it had nothing to do with government policy. do we have a shortage of teachers? are teachers suffering economically because they are not being paid enough? america is one of the few countries where teachers can afford to buy a car and house. are we having a problem of under qualified teachers?

the obama adminstration made significant improvements to our educational system without spending more. but that's because republicans controlled congress, and i'm sure if the democrats had their way they would have wasted money to make the teacher's union happy.

5). INBORN APTITUDE and STANDARDS

this is the biggest factor. and again. throwing more money at our education budget will do nothing to change people's inborn aptitude - https://ian-crystal.blogspot.com/2019/06/inborn-aptitudes-and-standards.html

V. test scores are overrated

no this is not a trump tweet. politicians on both sides of the aisle likes to point out that china and many countries are kicking our butts on test scores. but maybe test scores are not that important. what if we only need to have a small percentage of the population to have high test scores. truck drivers and many blue collar jobs don't need high test scores and these jobs are the backbone of our economy.

china and many other countries may have higher test scores but america is still the leader in technology. other countries are not exactly inventing the iphones and latest medical breakthroughs.

also chomsky idolized his uncle who never went past 4th grade.

VI. stealing from grand kids

we have to appreciate that elementary and high school education is free and there are already many high paying jobs in america that only require a high school degree. jobs that give you a standard of living that is insanely way higher than even engineers and doctors in most countries - https://ian-crystal.blogspot.com/2019/06/stealing-from-your-grandkids.html

(for more of my knowledge bombs, click the "ian's knowledge bombs" banner at the top of this article and choose any article in the table of contents that piques your interest)