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One of the Most Heartless Articles I’ve Ever Read

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By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

The rising cost of higher education is one of the main ailments affecting America. The earnings differential between those with college degrees and those without has become greater during this recession. This is because the recession hit jobs like construction, which don’t require a college degree, especially hard.

So as college becomes more expensive and more important, it becomes harder for the poor to climb the economic ladder. American inequality is a fundamental problem today, and the rising cost of college doesn’t help.

With this context in mind, I recently had the displeasure of reading one of the most heartless articles I’ve ever looked at.

More below.

This article, by conservative commentator Michael Barone, argued that the rising cost of college is due to government subsidies. Specifically, college is so expensive because the government keeps on giving money to poor people so that they can attend college:

…government has been subsidizing higher education with low-interest college loans, Pell grants, and cheap tuitions at state colleges and universities.

The predictable result is that higher education costs have risen much faster than inflation, much faster than personal incomes, much faster than the economy over the past 40 years.

What is Mr. Barone’s presumed solution? Stop giving federal aid to poor people who want to attend college! After all, “government subsidies can go too far.”

Firstly, Mr. Barone is wrong on why college costs are rising so exponentially. The value of “government subsidies” has in fact gone down as college tuition has risen. The federal Pell Grant gives low-income students money to attend college. When it was first introduced in 1979, it covered three-fourths the cost of the typical four-year university. Today it covers only about one-third the cost of a typical four-year university. For private universities, it amounts to barely more than one-tenth the cost.

But that’s almost beside the point. What this article really brought to mind is my fundamental problem with conservatism and the Republican Party. Mr. Barone’s article lacks a single note of empathy for the poor. Indeed, in today’s political climate, conservatives have actually made the phrase “helping the poor” sound like a bad thing.

And this pattern is not just related to the poor. It always seems that conservatives and Republicans are against actions helping those society has left behind – whether it be minorities, immigrants, the poor, women, or whomever. Fundamentally, and to speak impolitely but honestly, they just don’t give a damn about anybody unlike themselves.


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5 comments

  1. DeniseVelez

    where they don’t teach empathy for the poor(though they have Daniel Ellsberg listed as a graduate – so it is possible for a decent human being to go through their elite program and come out with a conscience).

    Those who count themselves among the top tier of conservative elites pride themselves on being there. They are blind to having lived a life of privilege.

    I would guess that they feel a bit threatened – all the riff raff getting college degrees…oh my!

  2. Jim in IA

    I invite you to view this talk by Jonathan Haidt on the Ted Talks site.

    http://www.ted.com/talks/jonat…

    He has analyzed this question of moral values in depth. I found his work to be excellent and revealing. Although, it does have some explanation, it doesn’t excuse the apparent lack of compassion for one’s fellow human beings.

    I wish I could stay longer and talk more. I have to leave for work. Have a great day. Thanks for the thought provoking diary.

  3. Melanie in IA

    government subsidies for college. For a four-year “public” school (supported substantially by public/tax money), costs have risen ABOVE the inflation rate like this:

    1979-80 to 1989-90 1.8%

    1989-90 to 1999-2000 2.5%

    1999-2000 to 2009-10 3.8%

    The increasing rate of rise is specifically because of the DECREASE in taxpayer support over those years.

    This article from a year ago, from the Chronicle of Higher Education, poses the question this way:

    Is the assessment that federal programs “subsidize” higher tuition correct? There are two rather different points of view used to account for rising tuition in public higher education. One is the “market power model,” presumably accepted by the president. It asserts that subsidies and grants to students increase demand, which gives colleges more ability to raise tuition. The second is the “spending constraint model,” which argues that rising tuition is the obvious consequence of declining state appropriations.

    They go on:

    The spending-constraint explanation, however, does match the facts. It predicts that tuition will increase as taxpayer support falls. Since public universities are constrained by their governing boards to break even, tuition revenue must rise in response to a reduction in taxpayer support to sustain base-level expenditures.

    This explanation is consistent with the fact that state support for higher education has declined and tuition has gone up for more than a decade. The higher-education systems in California and Pennsylvania provide prominent recent examples. In both states, public higher education was once heavily subsidized but is now much less so; this has led to unprecedented increases in tuition.

    Finally,

    Today, for public universities, tuition revenues cover, on average, about 50 percent of expenditures, up from about 40 percent a decade ago.

    Coincidentally, this was written by Gary Fethke, professor of management science and economics at the University of Iowa.  

  4. Diana in NoVa

    so to hell with the peasantry. Typical Rethug.

    Myself, I think government subsidies to oil companies and rich corporations can “go too far.”  Less of that, and college could be free, or very nearly.

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