Predictions for America's Future

Fred,

Without knowing all of the financial details of Ivy Legue schools... I'd presume that the reason why Ivy Legue schools tuition is not free because they have established a tuition that results in the number of students of a particular ambition/ability level they want. If they lower the price, they would have to do more work comparing relatively equivalent college application forms. If they raise the price, then they'd have to accept less academically ambitious/able students that can still afford the tuition.

There is a misconception that we sometimes have about voluntary trade/work relationships. Its that we think that a person who works should be compensated with wage equivalent to the increased profit he brings to the company. This is invalid... its not how profitable you are to the company, rather its what is the market value/wage can the company's specific goal/role be fullfilled with?

Post 41

Friday, February 28, 2014 - 11:21am

Dean and Fred - Ivy league schools are expensive because they can be. Also consider that ivy leagues can be considered a luxury good where within a certain range demand actually increases as the price is raised. U.S. News and World Report uses tuition as one indication of value in its rankings.

Luke - I agree with much of that article, but I'm only advocating for vouchers for the poorest students, and even then it's as an incrementalist better option than what we have now.

Post 42

Friday, February 28, 2014 - 11:52am

Luke,

Interesting article.

I still see vouchers as a good way to go but ONLY if it is just the first step. Take all the tax money collected that ends up going to K-12 schools and give it directly to the parents of the children and allow any school to cash the voucher. And with that step, kill all payments from governments to the schools. That puts the parents in charge, and puts all schools on an even basis to compete. The legislation should be clear that there are no standards. If a parent thinks some organization is a school, then he can give them the voucher no matter what anyone else thinks about that 'school.'

Then the second part of the legislation would decrease all of the different tax streams by say 20% per year and decrease the voucher payments by the same amount. That would let people gradually make the shift over to paying from their own money, and get government out of the schools totally. This whole thing would be hard to coordinate because of the different levels of government: Federal, state, county and even some cities have taxes of some sort or another that flow to schools.

Then the ideal would be that the legislation, or even better a constitutional amendment, would spell out separation of school and state. That would be the final state, and the voucher system just a mechanism to get from here to there. Too many times we see what is called 'privatization' but is really just a new form of regulation.

But I'd be happy with an abrupt, immediate constitutional amendment that prohibited government from having anything to do with education at any level or in any form. Then let every different governmental agency figure out how it will get out of taxing or funding or regulating schools.

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Robert,

I disagree with the idea of the government making any laws that discriminate on the basis of wealth or income. Giving a break to the poor, or going after the rich, are both just expressions of altruism forced upon others and movements towards the socialist goals of class warfare, and the Marxist mantra of "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need."

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And I agree with Fred. The very top schools, in a totally free economic environment, would be paying their top students. And the students that would have to pay for an education are the ones who aren't brilliant enough to be an economic plus for their alma mater.

Post 43

Friday, February 28, 2014 - 1:31pm

Robert:

Dean and Fred - Ivy league schools are expensive because they can be.

So is Villanova at 56k/yr. So is Duke at 60k/yr etc. From the outside, it looks like collusion. And they all compete for the best students. Even charging 56k/yr, they have far more applicants than open spots. But look at the numbers Merlin linked to; even today, tuition is not a major source of their revenue. Princeton has eliminated loans as part of the financial aid mix; if someone qualifies for financial aid, they get a grant, period. At Princeton, nobody graduates with -any- debt today, even though tuition and costs are over ten times what they were in the 70s...

Because the Ivies endowments relative to the size of their undergraduate classes are enormous, they could easily -- trivially -- afford to compete for the best students using tuition free awards; this -should- have the impact of putting competitive stress on other schools in the market to keep tuition low. When a year at Villanova is 56K and a year at PU is 56k then Villanova is not having to compete on price. So what fixes the costs at the Ivies and Villanova at 56k/yr? (Clearly, what the market will bear, it is that important to folks.)

Costs are not serving as a means of rationing access to a limited number of seats; even in the 70s, the Ivies had a policy of meeting financial aid, though the mix included loans back then. It's been many decades -- I'm not even sure when -- since admission to the Ivies was limited by ability to pay the price of admission. So it begs the question, in the context of the entire marketplace: without collusion as the explanation, what is the economic reason that maintains tuition costs at the Ivies?

Yale Endowment, with about 5400 undergrads: about 20 billion.

Princeton Endowment, with about 5300 or so undergrads: about 18 billion.

Harvard Endowmenr, with about 7200 undergrads: about 32 billion.

Brown Endowment, with about 6100 undergrads: about 2.9 billion(damned slackers...)

Villanova Endowment, with about 6500 undergrads: about 450 million.

Duke Endowment: a little confusing, because it is split into two distinct parts. One part was literally created by one man, with Duke University being one of several beneficiaries of that fund, including, other colleges, but that fund started out with 40 million in 1924 and today has assets of a little over 3 billion. So Duke U. is the beneficiary of abiut 1/3 of that 3B today, plus another 6B, so about 7 billion, and about 6500 undergrads..

Penn State, with 40,000 undergrads: about 1.93 billion. A year at Penn State: $33,000 (In State/Main Campus) $46,000 (out of state/main campus)

MIT, with 4400 undergrads: about 11 billion. A year at MIT: $59,020

UVA, with 14,600 undergrads: about 5 billion. A year at UVA: in state: $26,000. out of state: $50,000

Clearly, some of those schools -could be- offering tuition free scholarships, some could not. But doing so by any of them would put a drag on cost increases. Instead, while their endowments grow unbounded to rival the wealth of some small countries, policy wonks from these same insititutions angst about the crisis of high costs in education, rising student debt, and so on.

What species does this to their young? Youthful massive debt is being encouraged at the same time that these endowments are bloated beyond belief. Towards what end?

Some debt? Fine. Folks should have some skin in their own game. But it should scale in some reasonable manner to their economic opportunities, and with todays economies, it sure doesn't seem to.

I left school in the late 70s with maybe 5K in debt, paid it off in a couple years, wasn't a substantial burden when I was young. Today, that would could easily be $100K. That is just f'n nuts. Who does this to their young? Towards what economic end or benefit to anybody? The trustees of those endowments? "Hey, look at our bottom line grow on those glossy annual reports!"

Education, as a business, is not like any other economic activity; it is one of those odd cases of human endeavor that -can- be more than 100% Pareto efficient. The more that is taken, the easier for all. Life for everyone in our economies is improved, the more our population is educated. Not just those educated, but those who don't end up dealing with the drag us all down deficiencies of the under-educated. An educated populace creates intelligent demand for intelligent opportunities, and as well, broad opportunities. A non-educated populace creates narrrow opportunities to sell massive amounts of swill to slugs.

Imagine you are a decision maker at one of these schools. There is money pouring over the transome by the bucket full from your 18 billion dollar endowment. You are nominally charging 260 million/yr in tuition costs, but actually realizing only about 100m/yr because you are already handing out grants. That 100 million/yr in revenue is starting to look like a rounding error. You have a choice with that last $100m of endowment revenue; you can eliminate tuition/room/board totally, and announce 'free admission if you are accepted' or, you can build another student center/workout center. A really nice one, much nicer than the one you built two years ago. By so doing, you can trigger the same in all the other Ivies and other schools that can afford it. You will also inhibit tuition/cost hikes in the schools that can't afford it.

Is that unfair competition? Is that why students must take on $100k+ of debt for their entry level jobs in our economies?

regards,

Fred

Post 44

Friday, February 28, 2014 - 1:43pm

Fred - All schools provide scholarships to the absolute top students, but the majority of students pay a substantial amount of tuition. The reason is twofold: 1) the job market sucks for today's youth so they will pay nearly anything to distinguish themselves with a prestigious degree, and 2) government has greatly subsidized student debt, and the colleges raise prices to carve out the resulting consumer surplus in a vicious feedback loop. Why would these institutions give away a service that is in such high demand that 30 applicants are vying for every open spot even at the already staggering asking price?

Post 45

Friday, February 28, 2014 - 1:51pm

OK, so at Princeton today, it is almost this silly.

"How much is a year of tuition and costs?"

"A quadrillion bazillion dollars."

"I can only afford X"

"OK. Pay us X. We will give you a grant for the rest, and ... pay it to ourselves."

Post 46

Friday, February 28, 2014 - 2:19pm

Robert:

What you may not realize is the Borg have learned from those who slipped through their fingers and they have adapted.

Well, yes. Along the way, there came IRS 1706, for example. But difficult is not impossible. At least, not yet. The fangs actually need to come out, to make it impossible. That(the fact that fangs will eventually need to come out to try and make it work)is the fatal flaw in all this constructivist clumsy tribal fork wielding.

It's one thing to put lipstick on a pig; totally something else to put lipstick on a wild boar. We can all easily tell its a wild boar.

Example: there is really no teeth in all these offshore corporation laws; that is lipstick on a pig. Boob bait for boobs. Nobody had more frequent flyer miles to Georgetown, Grand Caymans, than Ted Kennedy. The odd details in the quarterly asset repatriation laws were laughingly once called 'The Senate Rules.' So at least in modern times, much of the lipstick is indeed lipstick on a pig.

But it will get to the Wild Boar stage, I think, as they get more and more desperate to keep the gig afloat in DC. The latest tealeaves are the noises about killing the exemption for municipal bonds and such. (Now THAT would have an impact on those odd quarterly repatriation snapshot rules...) That exemption has been around for over a hundred years; as government at every level gets increasingly desperate to squeeze the current level of spending out of staggering economies, this is the federal government splitting from state and local government and declaring "Every taxing authority for itself!"

The cost of municipal and school district debt is about to skyrocket if that happens. This will be more than the straw that breaks those backs. Would be interesting to see. They will no doubt try to phase it in somehow. But they aren't after income with a move like this; they are after wealth, and they can only tax wealth once. (We are supposed to think it is a tax on income -- literally, the income from those investments of wealth. But the result will be a massive movement of wealth and strain on local governments and by extension, state governments. Taxing wealth is a sure sign of desperation in governments, something very short term, because long term, governments survive only by taxing income, not wealth. Income is recurring, wealth is not. It is, for sure a sign of great stress in government. One of many.

regards,

Fred

Post 47

Saturday, March 1, 2014 - 5:41pm

Robert:

Why would these institutions give away a service that is in such high demand that 30 applicants are vying for every open spot even at the already staggering asking price?

I am suggesting, because for these intitutions(look at Merlin's link), tuition is not a significant source of their revenue, and they -already- have far more applicants than slots. One result has been, creeping class sizes over time. I remember 'about 1000' per class. It is apparently up to about 1300 or so per class. And -still- they have far more applicants than slots.

What I am suggesting is, it is short sighted to look at tuition as a significant source of revenue for them, as continuing enterprises. Students pay tuition for 4 yrs, and that is it; end of revenue stream. Successful students generate patent stream revenue, yearly alumni gifts for their entire lives, and end of life gifts from their estates. The coin of their realm is not squeezing tuition out of students/parents willing to send their kids to a resort for four years with the finest in exercise/work out facilities, coffee shops, and entertainment opportunities. The coin of their realm is competing for the brightest in the world, part of whose motivation is to go compete with the brightest in the world. Offering tuition free admission is one step up in that competion; the next step would be outright monetary payments -- incentives to show up at -this- institution to wonk away....

Yes, this would increase the number of applicants for limited spots-- and those same admissions offices could be even -more- selective in skimming the best from that pool of applicants. It would be even harder to get in, the places would be even more competitive, not only internally, but between the Ivies. HS kids trying to get admission would try even harder. Pressure to keep tuition down at all schools would spread across the market. The nation would up its education game.

And, here come the opponents of 'competition,' whispering their instructions that America should not try so hard. Because of crippling their youth by trying so hard? As opposed to the present model, which apparently, is less stressful: graduating with $100,000 in debt after a less stressful, more resort-like experience.

Perhaps the argument is, among some, that we can't reward Americas most driven HS students with four years of paid competition among each other, to leave school not with mountains of debt, but money in the bank, ready to start their lives. Because that would be unfair. So best to cripple them with Vonnegut's lead weights instead.

So, which of the Ivies is going to start a bidding war? And what do we call it when collusion in an industry inhibits bidding wars? Shouldn't the Justice Department be looking into this??? Oh, wait a minute....where does half the Justice Dept come from? Silly me! Who saw that one coming!

Now, whose best interest is all that fairness in? It isn't anyone in this nation.

regards,

Fred

Post 48

Sunday, March 2, 2014 - 7:05am

I don't see any evidence that schools are colluding (colluding how, and on what, exactly?) or that there is any lack of competition. There are 117 different colleges in the Boston area alone. New colleges sprout up every day in the U.S., and most of them charge similarly high tuitions. It's not only the ivies charging $30-50k/year now; most schools are doing it.

It's a fairly straightforward case of government subsidies distorting market prices - no conspiracy theories necessary. As I said earlier, the colleges charge a lot because they can - they know that if a student can't afford tuition on his or her own, the student can get an essentially unlimited credit line from the government in order to attend. It doesn't help that 18-year-olds don't tend to have the best grasp of money - $40k/year is just an abstraction until you graduate and start getting bills for $500-1000 monthly payments.

You seem to be asserting that all of these businesses (and that's what they are - businesses) should adopt the same free- or reduced-tuition model. That may work for some schools but not for others for an infinute number of reasons. Another example is online games and phone apps - some are free to use and make money on microtransactions, while others charge a high usage fee for unlimited service. There is no one single model that is objectively correct. However, if government began categorically subsidizing online games or phone apps, then you would see prices increase across the board.

Post 49

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 5:02am

Robert:

I didn't say they all could. I said, those that could would have an advantage in their busines model, and that this would also have the side effect of putting negative pressure on tuition at the schools who could not.

Tuition on their p/l sheets is a tiny fraction of revenue; the first Ivy (as a business entity) that offers free tuition to their student pool(the same student pool, which is skimmed from the top)would have a distinct business advantage in drawing those resources. But then they would all need to compete like that...unless they agree not to do it. Which is callusion.

They have already been caught calluding in their admission offers to that same pool, in the past. (Think about it.)

What should it be called when the Ivies, as a whole, agree to not compete for resources from the same pool?

Maybe you read their p/l differently Students pay tuition for only 4 years, but alumni make contributions for 60, then often bequeath gifts from their estates. It would be incredibly short sighted to base their revenue models, as business entities, on tuition, no matter how you look at it. Ditto revenue from patent streams and research grants. They are all in thoery competing for the same pool of resources to fuel all that, so ... why don't they compete?

regards,

Fred

Post 50

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 7:38am

Why doesn't McDonald's let children eat free with adult purchase? This would put negative pressure on Burger King's prices.

Why doesn't Sony give away Playstation controllers for free? This would put negative pressure on Microsoft's prices.

Why doesn't Toyota give GPS options away free? This would put negative pressure on Volkswagen's prices.

I'm sorry, I just find this whole line of inquiry rather silly. I've already given numerous plausible reasons why the ivies aren't all giving away free tuition, but ultimately the colleges know what works for them better than we do.

There is a distortionary force present, but it's government subsidization of research and student loan debt.

Post 51

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 8:55am

Robert,

Take a look at what Fred said about the tuition being a tiny portion of the revenue of the ivies. Some restaurants do let children eat free with adult purchasers, even though they don't have alumni or royalty income streams. And in business, the concept of "loss leader" is well known. And Fred's point was that they are competing with the other ivies not just for a head count (which is what MacDonalds is going for - market share) but for those customers who will generate the biggest increases in alumni revenues. In Las Vegas the casinos court the 'whales' - what they call the really big gamblers, who bet 100's of thousands each trip - they 'comp' them on everything (free suite, free food, etc.) because they are focused on the larger revenue stream. They don't comp those who gamble smaller amounts, just as a college wouldn't necessarily give free tuition to a student that isn't likely to turn out to be a star.

You said, "...Ultimately the colleges know what works for them better than we do." Not necessarily. Fred might know better, or you might know better and we need to hold that assumption to make what we take the time to write here worth our time. Otherwise that would be the crowning argument in nearly all situations and make it meaningless to suggest that anything might be better.

You are correct about the distortionary force present... government subsidization of research and student loan debt. But they aren't the only ones. There are other practices that are geared more for making the professors happy even if the practice doesn't work as well for the college as a whole. Tenure being one such practice. The high degree to which professors influence school policy is another. These things are artifacts of higher education that steer it away from being seen as a pure business. I suspect that with greater competition these would be adjusted as well and much more of a merit-based system would arise.

Post 52

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 9:53am

Steve - Your point is literally true - Fred *could* know better than the ivies how to run their universities - and I should have been more narrow with my objection. So I'll clarify that objection now.

What I don't like is the arrogance of someone walking in off the street - lacking the local knowledge and years of experience of a business - and making all manner of assumptions about how the business is inefficient. It can make for amusing armchair quarterbacking around the fireplace, but the mindset itself can be pernicious. This same argument is made daily by interventionists in support of government take-overs, public-private partnerships like 38 Studios, new business regulations, antitrust lawsuits, and so on.

Ideas about new and creative business models are fine, but once accusations start flying about "why prices are so high" at this company or that company, and how backroom collusion must be to blame, that's a step beyond where I am comfortable. This is the sort of hypothesizing I see on progressive blogs all the time - the next step is always "how can we step in and fix this."

Post 53

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 10:23am

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it true that an Objectivist would not consider collusion agreements between companies that they not compete with eachother on prices of products or try to recruit eachothers employees... would not consider such collusion a crime? It may be foolish... but not a crime. Its only when gorvernment makes such businesses a monopoly by outlawing competition that such collusion would be considered evil by us... but then its not really that collusion is the crime, instead its the government's enforcement of monopoly.

The Ivy's have a monopoly only on brand. We are the Ivy schools... those other schools aren't the Ivy schools. They have a monopoly on this brand image. That's fine with me, I don't want nor care about their brand, but they are free to distinguish themselves like that if they want. A huge portion of the college business model is all about brand loyalty and brand image control?

(Edited by Dean Michael Gores on 3/03, 10:25am)

Post 54

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 10:59am

Robert,

What I don't like is the arrogance of someone walking in off the street - lacking the local knowledge and years of experience of a business - and making all manner of assumptions about how the business is inefficient. It can make for amusing armchair quarterbacking around the fireplace, but the mindset itself can be pernicious. This same argument is made daily by interventionists in support of government take-overs, public-private partnerships like 38 Studios, new business regulations, antitrust lawsuits, and so on.

Whoa... Fred isn't arrogant, so hopefully you refer to something else that you are disliking. He attended the ives which is different than "walking in off the street - lacking local knowledge," and he is a highly successful businessman with decades of experience making a profit. And there is no slippery slope type of "mindset" that ever would slide Fred's views into government intervention. When you know his views better you'll understand why I'd say that.

On Objectivist web sites we also see accusations flying about, and they are followed by "how can we step in and fix this" - but the answers take the form of "eliminate this law" - "get the government out of this area" - "let people know about...." - etc. (Or at least that should be how it goes).

Dean,

You are correct. "Collusion" in a free market would be legal. And you are right about the 'monopoly' on brand. I don't know how much brand loyalty or image rate in importance to the college business model.

Post 55

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 12:25pm

Steve - I didn't say Fred was arrogant, and I don't believe that he is. I like Fred. I called the presumption of knowledge in his argument arrogant. We all have arrogances in our own ways.

Having attended a school back in the 70's (or at any point in time) doesn't confer to Fred special knowledge about its business operations or qualify him to substitute his judgment for the school's - any more than being a supermarket customer qualifies me to run a supermarket chain or judge its business strategies. Nor does being a small business owner make him an expert in all things business.

After repeatedly accusing the ivy league schools of price collusion, Fred asked in a comment, "Where is the Justice Department?" That implies an interventionist mentality to me, but I'll take it as a mere rhetorical excess if he wants to clarify it as such.

(Edited by Robert Baratheon on 3/03, 12:27pm)

Post 56

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 1:23pm

Robert:

I have a long running history of criticism of the inbred nature of the Ivies; I think they are tiny, inbred, mandrels of thought, that were easily over-run.

My drive by line on Justice may not have been clear; it was a continuing criticism of this ongoing inbred nature of the Ivies. For such tiny schools, they have an inordinate influence on our machinery of state(including Justice; including the whole damn thing, including both houses of Congress, the White House, and the USSC...including even the faculties of other institutions. All pouring out of these tiny, few mandrels of thought.) I don't think this has been healthy for our free nation, precisely because they are tiny, exclusionary, inbred, easily over-run(and so, were), and to this day, they attempt to be mandrels of thought. Attempt to be. And are wildly successful. For every John Stossel or Napoleano that sneaks through without being successfully deconstructed and reconstructed into a proper thinking adult, there are hundreds of the other kind; the 'correct thinking politics' kind. It has been an intellectual rout, by design, by plan, by actionm which has crippled nearly every institution of this once free nation. A handful of dead German philosophers have succeeded in over-running and critically injuring an outbreak of freedom in the world, an existential threat to the tribe uber alles.

This whole 'free tuition' thing is not my bright idea; it has been proposed every year, since at least the 90s, vigorously by the folks at Yale. We are at least two decades -- an entire generation -- past the time when at least one Ivy League school has been plaintively apologizing for the massive size of their endowment and asking the question aloud, "Why don't we offer tuition free admission?" to compete for the best students in the Ivy pool.

These schools are not broadcasting for students; they are all fishing in the same pool. They aren't printing applications on matchcovers, "Please Apply To The Ivies." They all target the same pool, and no matter how large or small that pool is, they all target the same top of that same pool, because they understand their brand, and they understand their business model, and they understand the coin of their realm..

So they have a marketing problem in their model(and they got caught addressing that problem via collusion in their admissions offices not all that long ago.) If they are all roughly the same size and they all offer admissions tot he same pool of students, then each student is going to accept at only one of seven, and six out of seven of those same pool offers will be totally wasted, which means, having to over offer. There is a convergence on their 'brand.' To address this, admission offices were pooling their offers. They were 'cooperating' on admissions -- trading students like baseball cards. Early Admissions was also a means to address this-- they hoped to address these conflicts early and then fill their available slots with the rest, from their 'waiting lists.' At least when a ballplayer is traded, he's a party to the economic transaction.

These same institutions cry out about doing something about the educational loan bubble, and so on. (A trillion in student load debt these days, in these economies.) My argument is, me claiming bullshit on all those elephant tears. They have in their p/l statements a trivial and effective means to address that -- a means that, without collusion, would probably have long erupted already.

What do you think is keeping Yale from going it alone and doing what its representatives keep claiming all the Ivies should do, based on their apologetic/embarrassment over being successful business enterprises? If they really believe that, then they should just do it; all the Ivies would have to follow, no matter what their druthers would be. That would be competitive pressure bringing costs down in the marketplace. So what prevents that? The Ivies would be the last place int he world anyone would expect anything but lip service to erupt over 'free markets' and guess what? Exactly right.

Imagine a business enterprise where most of your income -- by far -- is not based on revenues from your customers in your store, but, from gifts those same customers send in long after they left the shop, and even, when they die-- as gifts -- to their old 'business enterprises.'

Not all, but ... enough to generate an 18 billion endowment from underclasses the size of a large highschool.

What is their once paying customers lifelong incentives for hurling all that post educational gratitude at their alma mater? When they are marketed to with those annual giving campaigns every year, what is the pitch? Is it "Watch our endowmnet grow to rival small countries net worth, while your children mortgage their futures several times over?"

Slowly changing .... Princeton undergrads no longer get loans as part of their undergraduate package; it is all grants. So why not go all the way? What is putting drag on the competitive pressures, if not collusion?)

regards,

Fred

(Edited by Fred Bartlett on 3/03, 1:29pm)

Post 57

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 1:53pm

Robert,

I didn't say Fred was arrogant, and I don't believe that he is. I like Fred. I called the presumption of knowledge in his argument arrogant. We all have arrogances in our own ways.

Who wouldn't like Fred :-) To not like Fred is probably some form of character flaw.

If I wanted to pick nits (and I often do), I'd question if a presumption could be arrogant without the person who is doing the presuming being arrogant. Maybe, maybe not. And when you say "We all have arrogances in our own way," isn't that sort of coming back around via the back door to bite Fred in the ass as having an 'arrogance in his own way'?
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Having attended a school back in the 70's (or at any point in time) doesn't confer to Fred special knowledge about its business operations or qualify him to substitute his judgment for the school's - any more than being a supermarket customer qualifies me to run a supermarket chain or judge its business strategies. Nor does being a small business owner make him an expert in all things business.

Actually, Fred's attendance might well have done exactly that. We don't know his rather unique mind was seeing and thinking during those years, or the years after, do we? You can say that attending a school wouldn't of necessity confer special knowledge to Fred, or to anyone, but that isn't the same as saying that it did, or it didn't, in any particular case. You have no idea what knowledge Fred carried away, do you? I think it would be tough to make an argument that Fred could not have acquired enough knowledge of the ivies then or since that would be adequate to make the statements he did without a pretty in-depth audit of all he has read, seen, thought, discussed, etc.

The same is true of what knowledge Fred has regarding business practices. You don't know what he knows about business which means your inference that he was making unfounded statementa about business principles was itself without foundation.

If someone wanted to be kind of weasely they could say, "Hey, I didn't mean that Fred was making these unwarranted assumptions. I was just saying, in general, that this is the case."

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Nor does being a small business owner make him an expert in all things business.

To make that obviously true statement as if it were a valid argument that Fred hasn't adequate knowledge of business for the context in which he wrote is simply a fallacy. If I were to say that, "Posting to a forum where reason is a hallmark, doesn't mean a poster only makes rational posts" that would be true by itself, but to go on and imply that it means a specific post of yours is not rational would be a fallacious argument.

I think that when someone addresses a particular post, and presents an argument directed at that post, that they should avoid using general terms when it would be very easy for any reader to assume, with good reason, that those general terms were brought up, and apply to, the specific person or argument made in the post being referred to. I understand that you were not calling Fred arrogant, but the structure of that paragraph leaves that open as a reasonable possibility to the reader.

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After repeatedly accusing the ivy league schools of price collusion, Fred asked in a comment, "Where is the Justice Department?" That implies an interventionist mentality to me, but I'll take it as a mere rhetorical excess if he wants to clarify it as such.

I don't blame you for mistakenly thinking Fred was being serious. That was sarcasm on his part and I guess I've just gotten use to his writing style (personality). I'm sure that if asked, Fred would stay he was perfectly happy with any business colluding with any other business to do whatever they wanted with their prices - all part of free association.

Post 58

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 2:53pm

Dean:

The Ivy's have a monopoly only on brand.

The last hundred years of the White Houise:

The Ivies show up in 10 of 19 of the occupants of the White House in modern times. (6 of last 10).

The service academies, 2 of 19 (1 of last 10).

Congress? the USSC? Two of the last two USSC justices are -identical- former Princeton radical feminists, cookie cutter repeats; the woman who whispers in POTUS Columbia/Harvards ear at night is a former Princeton radical feminist. As celebratory as we all are of that particular point of view, is it really necessary to have the last 2/9 of the USSC represented by that singular point of view?

That's not a monopoly. But what it is, even if just to me, is an uncomfortable dependency on a tiny, inbred, club, easily over-run, mandrels of correct thought, with undue influence.

Imagine you were a global competitor of the USA, competing on the world stage. Would you have, if it were possible, targeted the tiny Ivies and attempt to influence thought in these tiny, concentrated, elitist clubs, with their fully paved four lane on ramps to the machinery of state as well as other faculties in other institutions? Would you focus your efforts on a natural chokepoint, or would you shotgun such efforts across the entire spectrum of universities in the USA?

What would stop you from attempting that? Our police state? Our closed campuses? Our tradition of absolute academic freedom? A sense of goodwill towards the USA?

What would stop you from significantly succeeding at that, and turning what was once an external struggle to defend freedom into a self-destructive internal struggle? A crippling blow to the intellecutal underpinnings of freedom in this nation, the damage from which would survive long after the external conflict had faded for a generation or more?

What would have prevented such an idea from fruition?

I ask that question because I am lacking an explanation for the following: why would the Ivies be so uniquely and deeply over-run with correct political indoctrination, if not as the result of being deliberately and successfully targeted by those who would benefit from such a course of events?

Should we just categorize this odd imbalance in the ivies as a result of natural inbreeding -- bright people prefer Totalitarianism, and will dress it up in whatever description is necessary in order to sell it to we dolts?

Or, were these institutions deliberately and successfully targeted by the enemies of freedom in the world?

Here is the correct thinking response to such a question: Ha! What enemies of freedom in the world? America had slavery. RaceGenderClass. .... Entire pages of response, to be duly and rotely repeated from the Instruction Manuals....

American intellectuals were convinced that the greatest academic sin imaginable was to study cancer with the intent of finding a cure, instead of embracing it....applied to Marxism in the context of a free nation.

regards,

Fred

Post 59

Monday, March 3, 2014 - 2:58pm