way #382 in which the boomers have screwed everyone born after 1980 with a chainsaw...

excess student debt thanks to skyrocketing tuition (largely to pay boomer admins), especially at formerly cheap state schools

The gains from education are impossible to accurately value in dollars, but economists must still try, of course.

Does a diploma pay is a slightly better question.

If your so smart why aren't you rich?

What does being smart have to do with being rich? See the problem..

//If your so smart why aren't you rich?//

Why not outsource education? That should help!

The debt chord refrain of "I owe $33k or $133k for my student loans" 10 years after graduating seems to be a Yap Stone around many a neck, judging from how much X & Y chrono zones bitch and moan about it.

Education - just another bubble

YOU front-load the loan in expectation of a high-yield asset (the job) and then sombody yells out "surprise, cockface!!" and fires an outsourcing missile down your mouth (which dropped open in surprise)

The diploma has reached the law of diminishing returns.

On a moving forward basis, what is going to be the return on the investment?

Comedy alert!

How to Reset Social Security Benefits
How to Reset Social Security Benefits - WSJ.com

By VICTORIA E. KNIGHT

Spooked by shrunken savings, even some wealthy retirees are going back to work. One way to boost income further over the long term: Reset the clock on Social Security benefits.

Retirees who collect Social Security can start over, provided they pay back all benefits received so far. Individuals can start collecting Social Security at age 62, but they earn an extra 7% to 8% for each year they defer until age 70.

The oldest of the baby boomers turned 62 last year, and many began claiming Social Security, believing that government benefits, 401(k)s and other money invested in the market would allow them to retire in comfort. But the market meltdown changed all that. Now some retirees are returning to work.

dont you believe it,

what money?

Here is a talk from TED on the diminishing returns of traditional education and how it kills creativity.

Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity | Video on TED.com

I have been in the vaults beneath Paradeplatz and I am witness to the fact they they quite full of hard assets.

But the banking jobs are history.

Try paying for a lunch with gold or filling up your gas tank by paying in gold.

//I have been in the vaults beneath Paradeplatz and I am witness to the fact they they quite full of hard assets.//

You are just down the road from me. To bad you can't get authentic Pismo clams anymore. For those you have to go to San Quintin on the west coast of Mexico where the Pismo clams are wondrerful.

I bought my Mercedes with gold. Really truly I did.

-- Try paying for a lunch with gold or filling up your gas tank by paying in gold. --

broward -
I was able to pay my way through undergrad, but the demands on my time forced me to take loans for Grad school, (for all the good it did me).
Talk about slave labour, I remember an out briefing I got, I was told that college students are the slave labours in college towns. I did not mind working in restaurants, digging ditches and I got paid for it, but when I became a grad-student at the beck and call of what I would call ultra-elitist snobs who held my degree in their hand. That... was when I realized how messed up things where.

broward,

Organonitrate backed Lead is a better currency than Gold.

Oh man, and I wanted that place, no really I did. But half a mil is a little over my head with the real possibility of being right sized any day.
Outside of Manhattan, does anyone pay Avg Sq Ft Living: $434.95 or up to $500

http://www.oahure.com/details.php?M0=2816255&AllPhotos=Y&SearchType=MLSNUM&MyPropertyType=1&MyOrderBy=&OneProperty=Y

But here is why:
47-563 Ahuimanu - Google Maps Road+96744&iwloc=A&hl=en&t=n

California Economy Grows Despite Lower Tax Revenue
California Economy Grows Despite Lower Tax Revenue - CNBC

TOPICS:Taxes | Economic Data | Employment | Economy (U.S.)
By: Jane Wells, Correspondent | 05 Jun 2009 | 06:33 PM ET

Despite the fact that California's tax revenues are down 27 percent from a year ago, the Golden State's economy is apparently growing.

Governor Schwarzenegger's Special Advisor for Jobs and Economic Growth, David Crane, released a memo today revealing data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis showing that California's economy grew 0.4 percent in 2008.

Lucifer -
Cramer: Why 9.4% Unemployment Is Good
Mad Money: Cramer: Why 9.4% Unemployment Is Good - CNBC
Some investors may wonder how the highest unemployment rate since 1983 is a positive. --
Yea, when that came on I just had to turn off the TV and go to bed.
BUT IT'S ALL GOOD RIGHT?
I just need to start smoking those green shoots.

I was at Diablo in Pismo as it was built.
Have the clams grown feet yet?

Have the clams grown feet yet?

Normal clams have something biologists call a foot.

The problem with the data is showing a causal link between education and pay. It may be that those who are apt to earn more (with or without an education) are also those who more frequently attend college. Remember what they say about educating an idiot...

I came from a world in which education was not a capital investment. In fact, I was educated to be unemployable, which the truly educated individual achieves, when analyzing capitalism.

Many of my class mates were trained to do work with in the system (law, business, etc.), but this was nor education.
The system needs people who are trained enough to complete the task, but to stupid or conditioned to realize the consequences.

In the old debtors' prisons, while the creditors paid to have them built (and you would think structures could be acquired at relatively low cost today--convert the big boxes!!) the debtors were on their own as far as getting money to pay for their food/survival. They'd beg relatives and passers by out of windows. Just ridiculously inhumane stuff that could never be revived.

adornosghost -

I came from a world in which education was not a capital investment. In fact, I was educated to be unemployable,

Oh, oh, I know this answer, you studied Philosophy specializing in morals and ethics right?
BONUS POINTS ANYONE?

I have a friend who struggled to be the first in her family to graduate college. She got herself a shiny bachelor's of anthropology. It has qualified her for the same leel of retail work that she survived on through college. No one explained to her that degree != job in field.

I have a young relative who was the first in my family to graduate college. BS in Psych. She works the same entry level nut wrangling position that she qualified for during school. I did clue her in to the part where she would need at least a masters in order to actually be employed in her field.

I delayed higher education until I knew what I wanted to do, having worked for years in minimum wage jobs alongside college grads. It sucked living on retail pay, but at least I didn't have student loans. Once I figured out what I wanted to do, I found a nearly free ride through school and now make a decent income as an RN.

I work with docs who have spent nearly a decade in higher education, 4 years of residency, further years of research, fellowship, and specialty training, all making less than their RN collegues until they manage to become attending physicians. Then, their income shoots up, but they have to repay 10 times the loans that I had to take on. Add to that their malpractice insurance, and if they go into private practice, consider that they have to pay all the costs of running their business. At the end of the day, their net doesn't look too different from mine.

Education pays, but as with any investment, one must do due diligence to determine whether the tangible and intangible returns are at all worth the risks.

In my experience, a bachelor's degree is required for a large number of desirable jobs. A master's degree is required for a smaller set of jobs so the cost-benefit ratio is harder to justify, and a phd is even harder to justify. This varies greatly by profession.

Blackhalo -

Yeah but the military can teach you the same lessons and provide a trade and pay for school as well. Plus you get paid.

Funny you said that, I went to college after going to the military which focused my rage.
They paid for my undergrad which helped me focus me "focused rage".
See the Government is good at something.

Actually, I know this is going to draw some flack, but I even the drunkest most annoying military person I meet seems more real than your everyday fake it till I make it.

Maybe because I understand how they feel spending most of their lives with people trying to kill them, simple because it's easier than people trying to kill me at home.

While I'm getting all choked up, may I just say thank you to all the Vet's out there. Now if only the politicians would give a dam?.

all ye shall witness -
All I really learned on the topic of what I wanted to do with my life was:
Most seriously not what I was studying.
There is a saying I heard, you study that which you fear the most.
Then you realize you hate it, and you move on wasting a couple years of your life, but it is better than wasting all of it.

To give an idea of how ridiculous higher education is, take Epic Systems in Madison, WI, a software vendor in the medical arena. They will generally not hire Computer Science graduates to be programmers. They will hire psychology, chemistry, and most any other major to be a programmer and train them. Tells you something, doesn't it?

"Citation? I say total BS."

I'm sure you'll find it if you look for it

To much of higher education is Country Clubbing and gives a false sense of confidence. Some higher education is priceless but most BA's are nothing more then advanced high school diploma. Dime a dozen and to easy to get, have your loan application ready for processing to get in. Past article in the Denver post stated 30% of college entries in need of remedial math and English skills.

broward- That's what I did with women

Come on, don't be a hater.
Somewhere out there is a good woman, I'm still holding up my lantern, I just know when to run.

In my experience, a bachelor's degree is required for a large number of desirable jobs. A master's degree is required for a smaller set of jobs so the cost-benefit ratio is harder to justify, and a phd is even harder to justify. This varies greatly by profession.

You should not have to look too hard.

In 1971, in the case Griggs v. Duke Power Co.[1][10], the US Supreme Court handed down a seminal ruling which framed US public policy on adverse impact. Griggs concerned a company which had rejected a large number of Black applicants who either lacked a high-school education or performed poorly on a paper-and-pencil cognitive test. Referring to the Civil Rights Act of 1964[2]

badger said of Epic Systems in Madison, WI, "They will generally not hire Computer Science graduates to be programmers". When I worked as a software development manager it was clear that while not all of the really good programmers had a CS degree, all of the really bad ones did. It is how they got into the industry in the first place. In my experience this also applies to many other fields.

In my experience, a bachelor's degree is required for a large number of desirable jobs. A master's degree is required for a smaller set of jobs so the cost-benefit ratio is harder to justify, and a phd is even harder to justify. This varies greatly by profession.

Yep. Your options are very limited without a college sheepskin. If nothing else it clicks off the first check box that Human Resources looks at.

Hint, do a google search on "lying with statistics", or as they say here.
Torture the data until it confesses what you want to hear.

And the 120 or so in the class all tortured the data to the tune of their own personal biases. The spread was staggering.

That was part of why we got that exercise... to challenge the numbers. Don't accept any numbers unless you can see the methodology & understand the 'basis' [basic assumptions the analysis is based on - those likely to be highly biased].

"Past article in the Denver post stated 30% of college entries in need of remedial math and English skills."

Who determines that need, and who benefits from the additional expenses incurred in taking those clases which don't count toward a degree? The local community college's entrance exam placed me in remedial courses despite a near perfect SAT score and consistent 99% scores on other standardized tests. I later learned that they force most of their incoming freshmen to take several remedial or pre-credit courses, which I assume is about revenue generation rather than education.

Edit: My complaint would be more credible if I could manage correct punctuation the first time round.

Comrade Coinz - In my experience:
The lawyers require: "or equivalent years of experience".
To be honest, I hire with the "equivalent years of experience" over a degree or certifications any day.
I like to ask questions like 'In the last 2 months, what was the hardest problem you had to solve and discribe the steps you had to take to fix it?'
First, if you don't see them getting pi..ed off, they are lying.
Then quantify their points.
Then I ask: 'In your life, what was the hardest problem you had to solve and discribe the steps you had to take to fix it?'
If they don't stop to think about it, they are lying, or you need to pull out the tissues.
It goes on from there, I like to know who I'm dealing with. Never in my life have I asked what Frat where you in? But I have asked, Really which ...., and who was your ....?

People on Wall Street would have you believe that if you make more money you really are smarter.

In any case, the relative pay is a reflection not of whether a degree is worthwhile but how much people without degrees make. They've unionized and sucked a significant amount of wealth from those who do get degrees. Then there's the problem of producing degrees that aren't useful. Making doctors study political science for 4 years to apply for medschool. People studying philosophy so they can get a trading job. All these people are freeloading off those who produce exports for this country but that's coming to an end. Soon you will not only make more money with a degree but it will have to be a useful one.

"I'm sure you'll find it if you look for it Smile"

lol. Oh, no. At law school, they didn't teach me to prove my adversary's case.

If you mean Griggs:

"The Court found that under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, if such tests disparately impact ethnic minority groups, businesses must demonstrate that such tests are "reasonably related" to the job for which the test is required.'

Jimi Hendrix couldn't read music and didn't finish high school. Should he be ineligible for a job as professional musician?

My SAT and LSAT scores were all in the 99th percentile. I was assigned an unusually high IQ. I will be the first to say that there is some validity to the claim that these tests are culturally slanted, and not particularly accurate measures of "intelligence".

balor, I hope you're mistaken.

I'm not keen on requiring undergraduates to take courses unrelated to their chosen field or unrelated to core cultural norms. But your ideas of usefulness, at least as you presented them, emphasize making, producing, exporting, and especially using education specifically to prepare for that work.

I don't buy it. Too narrow.

balor123 -- People on Wall Street would have you believe that if you make more money you really are smarter.

Kind of off topic rant, but on topic in a sick way.

I'm not a Wall street'er, but I have to tell you, with how quickly things are changing I'm just faking till I make it. Sometimes I feel I can never be paid enough, some times I just feel like an overpaid buffoon. For me only time will tell.

I'm in IT, and the security side of the house is just a nightmare.
How would you feel if all your doing is playing catch up, all it takes is one "no warning" vulnerability and your toast.

It's not like it never happened, how secure do you feel?

It's like knowing a sniper has you in their sights, they just have not gently squeezed the trigger yet, the are just keeping you in their sites and waiting for the perfect moment.

It's kind of like being in stock or bond market right now. Your just another target to be taken out when the time comes.
Anyone in the fire, either needs to be very good, or have some pretty good flame protection on, it is just a matter of time before you get burned.

Anyone ever read "A Mathematician Reads the Newspaper"?

Brilliant little myth-buster explaining correlation without causation, selective memory, survivorship bias and other popular crimes of statistics.

The value of an 'education' is the work product an employer can produce from that asset.

Cold comfort, that.

edit: Seriously, if that's what education has become, then it's already just trade school. Harvard's a trade school. Great.

1 currency now -yogi -

Jimi Hendrix couldn't read music and didn't finish high school. Should he be ineligible for a job as professional musician?

YES, until I heard him play. And If I were stupid I would let him leave.

THAT IS HOW THE MARKET WORKS!
Sorry, mellow out-
How many auditions did Hendrix get turned down on? Someone recognized the talent and put some real money and guidance behind him to bring into the mainstream which before that he was rejecting.
Then it seems he did not like were he was and went over the edge.
Case in negative point, guidance is more important.

1 currency now -yogi -

Down under, no doubt the Aussies claim they were the real puritans.

No, they where convicts and damm proud of it. Really, don't try to argue with them, its just painful.

"How many auditions did Hendrix get turned down on?"

Interestingly enough, for auditions for an existing band,

zero.

"edit: Seriously, if that's what education has become, then it's already just trade school. Harvard's a trade school. Great. "

I made this observation while studying engineering. Trade school. That's OK. I wouldn't trade it for the world.

A commenter on the previous thread said 20% of college graduates didn't need to go to college... that a vocation school would have served them better. I think that person is being generous. I think the number is closer to 60%.

burnside -

edit: Seriously, if that's what education has become, then it's already just trade school. Harvard's a trade school. Great.

With one hell of a insiders club and support to make it the finest trade school money can buy.

Millilani...Oahu

here's something to look for on the way to the North Shore. How many Anglo-teachers certificates are picking pineapples?

When he played his own music it took a long time to be appreciated.

"Reasonably related" is not that harsh. If you were filling a job that could be handled by men and women equally, and you hired based on a test about sports trivia and military hardware, which had nothing to do with the job, ...

Almost all North Carolina counties are beginning to lay off school teachers. You can check the articles in all the local papers. North Carolina is in worst financial shape than California. Massive over spending. Now no money.

YLSP -

Re: Epic Systems

The sad news is that programmers are taught to be well, programmers.
They have not be tough to think outside of the box.
When the money hits reality weird things happen, I don't know, maybe a whole bunch of hoocoodanode?
Most of my time is spent with user->reality->computer.
It is some much harder than you may think, but hey is a pay check.

dybi: You mean the physical manifestation - the building? Product of guild system. And brilliant. I'm not running down trades here.

What's wrong is a blurring of what university is. Or has been.

broward -
I had three classes in college that were unexpectedly valuable

international business, business org and ethics. Ethics are situational, so that they're hard to predict even in cultural gestalt. Ethics drive markets, markets measure value, they do not determine or create it

Going to have to think about that, I also hit a dead end on morals and ethics. In short there is no such thing once you move outside of your culture.
And that is very hard for an American to do.

Case in point, I flew out that flame bait.
"Then it seems he did not like were he was and went over the edge.
Case in negative point, guidance is more important. "
But I agree, with reservations as required under the contract of living.

If you want to work as a contractor in IT you will need the degree, any degree, in DC.

I am an "Expert Witness" in computers at the Federal trial court level. How I got to be an "Expert Witness" is one of those flukes worthy of Catch 22.

Amazing how much in life is timing and dumb luck.

-- What's wrong is a blurring of what university is. Or has been. --

Yes, learning and acquiring knowledge are too different things. But in a society with a debt based economy a deterministic outcome is preferred.

Learning is fraught with uncertainty.

nova -

Amazing how much in life is timing and dumb luck.

I don't know if want to be amazed, or run for cover in terror.
Looking at my life at least.

nova - you can walk around, find someone unloading their stuff and offer to buy the boat before they run aground. Not that anyone would do it, but if you can bluff them into think your pay them more than the insurance, you can get some pretty good deals.
My second plan has been to rent my place and move on a boat, I just got too much stuff.

My daughter will start the early acceptance thing next year. I told her I don't care what she gets a degree in. Just get one. There isn't going to be any work for you so take the 4 year free ride on us.

Still was 2 - 2 million dollar yachts tied up with people on them. Both instate boats though.

My neighbor just came back from MN today. I asked him what was going on out there in the real world. His reply - In MN they are looking for work.

I used to wish my dad had bought a house for me instead of paying for my expensive private college education. Not anymore!

But I do seriously believe that an undergraduate degree has very little effect on earnings ability. Since it appears the only jobs that will be left in our country will be those that require physical work rather than the easily outsourced corporate cubical jobs, I would think that learning to be a plumber, or other skilled trade, would be much better than going to college.

Shadow,

My guess is 99.2 of the people who post here do. With that number significantly weighted towards the Ivy league.

Since it appears the only jobs that will be left in our country will be those that require physical work rather than the easily outsourced corporate cubical jobs, I would think that learning to be a plumber, or other skilled trade, would be much better than going to college.

While I don't think they will be the only jobs left, I do think skilled trades are a very good option for many people. I have a lot of respect for good plumbers, electricians, and other people in trades. The pay can be quite good, especially if you can master a trade and start your own business.

"While I don't think they will be the only jobs left, I do think skilled trades are a very good option for many people. I have a lot of respect for good plumbers, electricians, and other people in trades. The pay can be quite good, especially if you can master a trade and start your own business."

Yep! big bucks if you figure it out!

two problems with going into the medical field right now.

1. health care is a bubble.
2. the university administrators don't realize that it's a bubble, but instead believe the field is recession proof, so that they're using the potential demand via tuition increases to offset spending cuts.

After SC Governor Sanford was forced by the South Carolina Supreme Court to accept the $700M in stimulus funds that he was rejecting, the state's medical school released this nugget:

tuition increases at the Medical University of South Carolina will range from 7 percent to 17 percent, depending on the college in which a student is enrolled.

yowza. Who starts school planning for 17% YoY increases?
S.C. State tuition to increase 8.4% The Post and Courier - Charleston SC newspaper

Douglas County Oregon, unemployment 18%.

you pikers aint seen nothin yet.....

"....the curtailment of public education might in fact be one of the final casualties of this economy."

.......worse things could happen. Take half the local school administrators away, shitcan the Teacher's Union, dissolve the Department of Education and you might actually teach the kids something useful. Ask a teacher.

People saying 'the trades' are the answer weren't around for the last two RE & CRE busts. I had friends whose parents were in the trades and they went YEARS without work in some cases. Circa late 70s to early 80s then again in the early 90's... It was a real eye opener.

Had a guy change out my water softener yesterday - he said he was being pushed into early retirement - his boss said business was just too slow to keep him. So he will become laid off then go into retirement. He said three years ago there wasn't enough hours in the day to both sleep and work. They were going from development to development dawn to dusk putting in new units... now it is nothing but replacements like mine... they've cut staff 50% and need to cut more [that's why he's being let go].

The trades are as volatile as any job anywhere.

"Which lucky stiff wins the employment lottery, and why? "

young, cheap, obviously talented and willing to work 60/hrs week. which, not incidentally, describes me quite nicely at some point in the past...

O H Chick - I think he said "advanced degree".

C

"All much worse by now, I would guess."

ah... the glory days when Santa Clara County had numbers in the low 1.x seem like a lifetime ago... though few noticed or cared that a few central valley counties never left the teens, even at the 2000 high-water mark

UCONN was a good deal for me --- glad I didn't go to BC. My MBA was paid for by an employer = woo hoo!

IMO, my best education FOR LEARNING was pvt school 1-12th grade. UCONN was good for a reality check and life stuff.

C,
I know he did, that's why I said undergrad only. And since I was an econ major, some would say I have a "non-degree".

sm_landlord,
Use the SacBee interactive California unemployment graphic. Up to date and an awesome example of good graphics.

I took a class in college called "Ethnographic Films" which was nicknamed "Wednesday night at the movies", the ultimate "gut".
Pass-fail, open-book exam, class consisted of watching a documentary every week and discussing it for half an hour.

You can guess the rest.

RD, thanks.

And man oh boy, look at all that red!

It looks like roughly the same ratios, just more bad. Some of the "sick man" counties are appreciably worse, but no surprise there. They haven't had real economies since logging was banned or whatever they used to do stopped mattering. And it's only going to get worse when the state layoffs get started - the county is the largest (legal) employer in some of those places.

mp.
"Of course, I have a problem with most things I read and hear."

The curse of a liberal education, no?

My education was liberal. I was one of the last on the bottom rungs before the ladder got kicked away. Those behind paid. The entire sociology and civic-political engagement of the school changed in 3 short years. It was like watching a garden turn into a machine.

C

American gold and silver eagles have a face value and are legal tender, though you would be unwise to spend them at face value (except in special circumstances). The 1 oz gold eagle has a face value of $50 and the 1 oz silver eagle has a face value of $1.

//The entire sociology and civic-political engagement of the school changed in 3 short years.//

??? where - how so? 3 years?

And from memory I studied some astonishing horsesh!t during those years.

It'll come back to me in a minute.

C

I went to school because I liked learning things and I didn't want to be bored everyday.

No student loans.

I'm not bored everyday. I'm not sorry I took anything I took. Ended undergrad school with about 151 credits. In
4 years. So did the hub and son. Daughter got thru arch school at the U of Fla in 4 years. She was drawing in 3 dimensions at age 5 or 6. It's worked out well until now.

I don't make that much money. No student loans for law school either. Nite school. Worked during the
day. There's no reason you need 4 years of college schooling and 3 years of law school to practice law. But so
it is.

I could have gone straight to law school after high school and it would have been fine. But I learned how to read
and write there. The student loan thing is just plain horrible. We are eating our children, our seed corn. I enjoyed
college. But I would never have gone to either undergrad or law school if I had had to rack up loans like that.

My son actually got a job as a counselor to druggies after getting an undergrad psych degree. Now getting a masters
in Public Health. The job as drug counselor was intensely wearing. Eventually he wants a Psy D or PhD. Since there
will be no jobs for a while, he may as well stay in school. I'm pretty well convinced those school loans
will never be paid, any more than the HELOCs were.

99% of what I advise or know about thelaw I learned after I left school.

My hub's experience at Hopkins was quite wonderful.

Too much money is like to much manure, and I think it has stunk up higher education.

Sorry, it's late random musings.

I still try to get to the Margaret Mead film festival at the Nat. History museum every so often.

I think I got the most education from that class.

Oh yeah, ripping Baudrillard was one of the sideshows, not sure how that joined the circus, prolly through sociolinguistics class.

Stand back and behold:
"The exchange of signs (of knowledge, of culture) in the university, between "teachers" and "taught" has for some time been nothing but a doubled collusion of bitterness and indifference (the indifference of signs that brings with it the disaffectation of social and human relations), a doubled simulacrum of a psychodrama (that of a demand hot with shame, presence, oedipal exchange, with pedagogical incest that strives to substitute itself for the lost exchange of work and knowledge). In this sense the university remains the site of a desperate initiation to the empty form of value, and those who have lived there for the past few years are familiar with this strange work, the true desperation of nonwork, of nonknowledge. Because current generations still dream of reading, of learning, of competing, but their heart isn't in it--as a whole the ascetic cultural mentality has run body and possessions together."

This was about the time he was saying gulf war one was about as real as donkey kong.

Mind you, I've felt a similar approach might be handy for risk management meetings.

C

Was that supposed to mean something, C?

I loved my art classes, esp art history. My undergrad degree is in art. Design is endlessly useful.

Some industry stalwarts– Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers–are gone.

What makes you think Bear is gone? It's alive and well. A company with employees, its own name, identity, customers, etc. Living inside JPMorgan.

I also believe that college degrees have been devalued.

A lot of people who went to college shouldn't have. Many might have been better off in some kind of vocational program.

Personally, I value experience more than schooling.

I seem to recall Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle, giving a speech years ago - maybe it was a commencement speech - where he advised all college students to drop out and start their own businesses... I've owned several businesses, employed thousands of people, and I can vouch that talent and education are 2 different things... I had a black ghetto guy turn into one of the best managers I ever had and he left for a much better job too... Then I had people who had masters degrees who were basically worthless - didnt know how to do anything, or didnt care to do anything but thought they should get paid anyway... America wont turn around an be competitive in the world again until the majority of the work force realizes that this is a competition, and you have to be better than the other guy to get the job and the income... An old girlfriend used to say that women had to be twice as good as men to be considered equal, but fortunately it wasnt that hard...

question had something to do with a bag associated with voodoo. I immediately thought of conjure bag...

Happened across that one while flipping channels. What is a gris gris, Alex?

School and experience both is what is needed. Time to contemplate is certainly worthwhile, except few
will actually do it.

And I suspect that the conjure bag writer got the meme directly or indirectly with CR and mp.

if you see a double post, don't delete it, since it's probably not really there.

There is no post. You must only realize that it is not the post that has changed, you have.

Citizen Allen M,
Did you ever point out to any of your Micro-Economic professors that their theories don't work if everyone in business adheres to them? I did that once, and the prof acted like I was Linda Blair spewing green vomit. It was quite amusing.

If you believe there is a post, then it is true for you...

The problem with competitiveness. We actively discourage the production of composites structural engineers at RPI through a perverse combination of obstacles and impediments and worse. Anybody comfortable flying in a next generation aircraft knowing that merit is not the sole determinant of who designed those wings?

What if you don't believe there's a post.
What then, hunh, hunh?

Blogster solipism. (sp?)

I'm really just talking to myself. I should post the same thing many many times.

Wait, I have!!!

About recourse and deficiency judgments.

I guess I wouldn't repeat my self so many times that recourse is useless if you
all weren't out there thinking it meant something. . . .

I thought you said it did mean something? Didn't think you were snarking.

I am troubled by the injustice and lack of equal treatment that I see. The current educational system is designed to further that injustice. Mind you, this comes from someone who is not a so-called liberal.

As some of you may or may not be aware, I have a friend who lives in a ghetto on the east coast, and I received a telephone call from him this afternoon. If this man didn't have bad luck, he wouldn't have any luck at all.

I got to know him several years ago while working on a project in New York, and he impressed me. It was evident he had lived a long life in a very short span of time. He asked me for a $200 loan once--to buy a beater automobile--and he impressed me when he paid it back. I gave him $500 when his daughter was born and he at first refused it, thinking that I was offering charity.

He learned Friday that he has a probable tumor at the base of his brain, and he is in ferocious pain. He displayed tremendous grace and character during our telephone conversation.

As it is, he's a tremendous human being, but he could have been so much more.

Yeah, there's an invisible hand, and it's working to the detriment of a lot of deserving people.

JPM: Bear Stearns, meet Smith Barney.

First team to sell a trillion Ponzis gets to keep the job.
Hope you got the competitive guys not the liberal artists, they're useless...

A batch of Eveready Bunny crumb crunching curtain climbers visited the bunker today - that was maximum entropy stress testing... It's a good thing that most people have their kids when they are young - I am way too old and tired to keep up with those little cyclones...

I thought an economics degree was actually difficult - I dont have one so I dont know, but it's not one of the easy degrees is it? Dont you have to take a lot of math and statistics for Economics?

Most econ majors take a lot of math.

I remember taking a grad level course in 'transfer math' - La Place, Fourier & the like... it was all math majors, engineering, physics majors & econ majors... I was the only undergrad and got smoked. But I recall the econ grad students weren't slouches - they stacked up pretty well with the physics, math & engineering grad students. I passed the course by sheer determination - it was an ugly win.

Ok, rotting houses.

Squirrels.

Ponies.

So there.

Actually it's nice to know someone has read my posts and remembered 'em,
even if they didn't like them.

I found it entertaining. Especially since I spent most of my life in SoFla and could picture the situation clearly.

Liz dont forget the mold - every time I see one of those real estate videos of a moldy house I think of Florida... Had a friend who went through Andrew and he had the most amazing pictures...

I was totalled in Andrew.

We got policy limits from our insurance co, in about 5 minutes. No arguing whatsoever.
Thank you, Pru.

Those students who like the pretty graphs get their MBAs from Harvard or Stanford.

I thought they went straight to Wall Street & got the MBA thingie at night FOR FREE...

The sensors are really dense around Merritt Island. Much of it does actually link together, along with whatever
the tv people have going. This does not mean you will know whether it'll rain where you are or not.

It could be pouring on your windshield, and the back car window dry.

A friend in Andrew had a sunken living room. Week later it was still sunken. The dirty black water was amazing.

He had blown in insulation rather than the kind in long strips. It is far worse and comes down as gunk.

Is that anything like maximizing our strategic potential or is it some other kind of horse pucky?

Many of my epstemes are, indeed, untethered, come to think about it?

It's 11 pm. Do you know where your epistemes are?

The hub took Fourier stuff too early and it nearly killed him, but he still uses it. Not
that I know what it is.

Me too - I wasn't ready for it back then... a couple years later would made a world of difference. LaPlacian Transfer stuff though I used right away in chem engineering dynamics & 'process control'. Wonderful stuff...

I think an ontological black hole is next after the root canal. It certainly sounds more painful.

C

I always get ontology mixed up with epistomology. Or was that episiotomy? Seems like I had a couple of
the latter.

Isn't ontology the study of knowledge?

From Wikipedia - Ontology is the philosophical study of the nature of being, existence or reality

Wiki sez the study of the nature of being.

Damn. And I've also forgotten the difference between backwardization and contango, tho
I do remember that it comes from con tenere.

The one thing I'm sure of is the IMF will screw up worse than we are doing.

I've never really understood the Special Drawing Rights - Does any money actually change hands? It's like a loan? But countries such as the US put money into the IMF and then we can get a loan back? Or it only loans money to countries who cant afford to pay it back?

It's a symbol of a symbol.

In an early terrible novel, Heinlein threw together a whole bunch of his later themes--written in '39, not published until recently, for very good reasons. But it does describe modern life quite accurately.

Anyway, he describes a commodity based SDR sort of thing, where if you take your Benjamin down to the
treasury or fed or whereever, you could get a bag of wheat, a soybean or 2, a nugget of silver etc. He said nobody ever
does this but the stuff is there, so you could go get it if you actually wanted to and that makes all the difference.

Liz - is it warm down there in Florida? It snowed in North Dakota today - enough to stick to roofs & cars. And we aren't talking in the mountains. Here in Minnie it was cold but not that cold but bad enough I had to build a fire or my wife was going to start up the furnace [mid-40s].

Up here we would say it is good sleeping weather [if you haven't put the down comforter away]...

Went to a graduation party for a close family friend. Kid will go to a prestigious private university to pursue an Engineering degree. And will come out about $60K in debt.

I spoke with his aunt, who's an associate with a NY law firm - she did work on the Wachovia mess last year - and had an interesting conversation. She doesn't want to spend her life doing big law, but sees it as the row to hoe to pay off the law school debt; once that burden is lifted, then she'll feel free to pursue something of greater interest, like writing.

I wish that she'd talked with him before his decision. Unfortunately, I suspect that she did and said that the degree from the expensive school was necessary.

sigh

Good night, folks.

it does describe modern life quite accurately.

Is it the writing or the accuracy that makes it horrible?

lawyerliz (profile) wrote on Sat, 6/6/2009 - 8:28 pm

Damn. And I've also forgotten the difference between backwardization and contango, tho
I do remember that it comes from con tenere.

Easy way to remember backwardization and contango.

The normal shape of the price curve for commodities is for prices to be higher the further out they are due to the costs of storage.

Backwardization means that prices are backwards of "normal" (i.e., near term prices are higher than more distant prices.

Contango is the simply the opposite of backwardization (i.e., the prices are normal).

Also, Danny Debit always sits on the left by the door, so he can keep an eye on Connie Credit who always sits on the right by the window.

Well I just went and read 3 articles on SDR's and I dont know much more than before... I'm still not sure that this is anything more than a book entry - not sure if any money changes hands... It's vapor money, but you can trust us...

mp:

I'm sorry to hear about your friend, but there's something that I don't get. Perhaps it's the hour.

Is this "invisible hand" God? Or some reference to the lack of job opportunities which sent on this path despite his being a quality individual? Of a combo with God just whacking him a la Job?

No offense intended.

'Course I don't go out in the sun. I'm not racially mixed and the burns can be horrid and downright
dangerous. I could use l little melanin.

Yeah, it's been fun, guys, but I need to go to bed.

Sabbatai (dressed in a red robe) promised retaliation, red was the color of Israel's upper kingdom Judah, and meant power and dominion and rule. The color of Alpha/Omega in the second beam me up after the first humiliation and scourge.

Terrible, OT, but interesting nonetheless. The economic implication is abstruse but there if dwelt upon.

There once was a great discounter of notes, pioneer of the industrial & textile revolution, floater of bonds of Enlightenment Europe, friend of William of Hesse (broker of Hessian troops that faced Washington) and consummate banker of generational talent. Rotschild. The Red shield.

RD, very nice graphic from SacBee.

If only the time scale on the left spanned decades. As it is, it looks to me like there is a strong seasonal component in the inland farming areas (winter 2008 in Colusa (20%) for example vs. July 2008 at 9.2%).

Imperial county with 26% unemployment! U-3! U-6 must be 45%. What a disaster.

I'd like to find out more about the dynamics of seasonal farm workers in Cali (as a recent immigrant myself). I naively thought that they would not be be able to get it, perhaps this is wrong.

oops

OH girl, not true if you allow random allocations of capital and ability.

There are much deeper problems.

Almost anytime you see differential calculus or any other fancy math, you know you are being conned.

Wall Street obviously didn't understand this.

One of the biggest problems in most of the graduate programs in economics is the blind adherence to the fallacy of rational consumers.

Someday this war's gonna end...

NervousRex (profile) wrote (in reply to...) on Sat, 6/6/2009 - 8:58 pm
Imperial county with 26% unemployment! U-3! U-6 must be 45%. What a disaster.
I'd like to find out more about the dynamics of seasonal farm workers in Cali (as a recent immigrant myself). I naively thought that they would not be be able to get it, perhaps this is wrong.

Crops don't pick themselves. Yet. I see them every day. It's strawberry prep season and cabbage harvest time right now in my microclimate. They'll work their way into the Central Valley for other crops soon enough.

LL:"Maybe the internet will make barter actually competitive and all this money nonsense will just go away. "

One more convert. Each one teach one, as it is said.

My favorite Ten Commandments trailer

"Is this "invisible hand" God? "

It's the system, homedad, "the system."

Good night and good luck.

As for me, it's time for some scotch and some piano.

YouTube - Estate - Piano Solo

OT-Deflation vs Inflation and the US Dollar

Stolen from the comments section at:

The Gaping Hole in the Deflation Argument, Part II | The Underground Investor

Austin Gardiner wrote:

So with the US definitely a debtor, I put my money on inflation, not necessarily hyperinflation but enough to eat away at the value of the debt. This is why China is uneasy about holding so many US$. I can only think of one reasonable response from China.

Citizen,

That would have been an excellent class. I was done with undergrad and on to a mfa program by the time she first published. I'll have to get the pdf through a Blackwell's portal.
My gateway author was j. Munro.

'Western investors will not understand what is going on until they quit thinking like 'western investors'

makes sense. Profit and control are not always the same outcome.

"America wont turn around an be competitive in the world again until the majority of the work force realizes that this is a competition"

Well said. We'll have to repeal a bunch of laws and change a lot of attitudes before this can happen.