FirBirGir wrote:I don't think it's the degree per say (though I'm sure career students are among the OWS ranks), the cost is driven by their choice of schools. Except for a few specialized professions, the name of the school you graduated from doesn't factor into getting a job or how much you're compensated. I'll use my doctor as an example - I didn't choose him because of the school he graduated from, I choose him after reading his reviews, getting references and ensuring he was board certified. He's a DO instead of a MD but again, that didn't weigh into the decision.
The type of degree you go for
does weigh into it. If you were going for a mere business degree at a local college that would be one thing - and relatively cheap. However, if you are going to study to be a doctor, you are looking at having to go to a couple of schools, and it costing significantly more. The U.S.'s post-secondary education system runs quite a bit different than ours, for example. While BFT suggests the traditional brick and mortar schools may disappear, I don't think that's the case here, nor in Europe. Not that that's necessarily bad, but it's specialization in a different way. On the other side of the coin you have a bunch of these smaller, local colleges that charge people for garbage degrees that don't mean anything and don't get you anywhere. I've seen some of those graduates come to Canada and try to throw some kind of "expert" title to themselves and it doesn't really get them anywhere.
FirBirGir wrote:I don't believe they are all over-educated though I do think those complaining about student debt made some bad choices. If someone has to borrow money to get an education, they should look at it like any investment, determine what combination of degree, school and debt load will provide the best return then pursue it. There may be studies that analyze debt by school or by degree. That could show some patterns in how students make choices. A friend of mine got his degree at a 5-year school that cost him several hundred thousand and this was more than 20 years ago. It took him 10-15 years to pay off his loans. The funny thing is, he's worked at the same facility his whole career and my niece recently got a job at the same facility with only a BS degree from a community college. She was able to do it by working while she was in school and avoiding student loans like the plague. In the end, she will net a much larger income because she spent far less getting her degree.
Oh, no of course they're not
all over educated. It's a relatively small slice of them that I'm referring to. And I agree about student debts and bad choices. A lot of people do that. And a lot of people get student loans and don't look at it as an investment in their future. I think that there ought to be more prep in high school. Unfortunately most people have to rely on guidance counsellors...you know, the people who are in that line of work due to a complete failure to plan their own future.
FirBirGir wrote:I'll have to go find the article but it wasn't a right-leaning publication. I think the author was going for a "put up or shut up" point of view. People who protested in the past and were gassed, beaten and jailed may not be fully sympathetic to OWS when they complain about being told by the cops to pick up their trash...
No no no. Actually in all cases I've seen of the major gatherings the protesters have been keeping them very very clean. (in fact when the unions in NY started backing the protesters they organized to clean up the park completely). What I've seen of protesters actually complaining about in OWS are the reasons you mention above that were complaints of the 'boomers back in the day: police brutality, gassing, beatings, and jailing. The Oakland clashes were instigated by police...something completely omitted by major news media as all their helicopters suddenly had to return for refueling at the exact same time, just before the police advanced. Interesting, no? Oakland police also completely deny having weapons while advancing on protesters, despite the numerous pictures and videos taken of them, denied having flash-bang weapons (again, despite videos showing them using them), denied using rubber bullets (despite the evidence of spent shell casings and wounded protesters) and then you have the former-Marine who ended up in the hospital after a gas canister was lobbed at his head. In New York the police were using underhanded tricks to jail protesters needlessly, beating protesters, and pepper spraying women they had corralled who were of no threat whatsoever. So to say that the protesters only have to complain about picking up trash is completely false.
FirBirGir wrote:But you have to use what's in place to do it. I look back at the animal rights activists of the past that tried to affect change by not using the system and took matters in their own hands. They did more damage than good for their cause when the bombed factories and attacked people. Animal rights activists that used the system (and knew how to do it), have made great strides in reducing animal testing and abuse. We have to face the fact that legislation requires politicians. Separating business from government requires legislation and only those in office can do it. They won't like it but there are ways to force a politician to do what you want. #1 way is to vote. If the guy you voted for didn't do what you wanted, vote for someone else next time. Eventually, politicians will get the message.
This comes back to the comment about Obama. If the protestors aren't happy with the past 3 years, why should they reelect him? He made a lot of promises and has spent a ton of money but what has really changed? Obama is a product of today's political machine. He happens to be a Democrat and liberal-leaning but he's a career politician above all else.
So voters should look for candidates at any and all levels that support term limits, campaign reform or any other foundational change to our government/political process. The Mayors we elect today could well be the Senators of tomorrow.
Eddy
Generally speaking, yes. All forms of government were based on one or two previous forms in some kind of mashup. As it stands now, we owe a lot to Feudalism. Does this mean we need to use the existing system to make a new one? No. We can make something completely new if we want to. But no, ideally we don't want to throw out what we already have because there is plenty of work put into the current systems that make them good. Throwing all that out and starting from scratch would jeopardize that work.
I'm kind of a pessimist, I guess. I have little faith that voting for someone in the running now (for example) is going to fix things after 2012. I don't see it happening. The majority of front-runners in the republican party scare the hell out of me with their Dominionist dark-age world views. They're nuts.
Obama is a Bush clone, he's not desirable either.
You've got a green party in the U.S. but really, that'll never likely get the steam it needs to be taken seriously in the U.S. Europe has power green parties. North America isn't there yet, although in Canada the Green Party holds a couple of seats in Parliament.
Also, no one said anything about re-electing Obama. I understand basically OWS protesters have said "great. thanks for the support." but are not siding with anyone. They know Obama is a fraud, they know the republican front-runners are equally fraudulent, or even worse.
As for career politicians...aren't they all?
Good money in it. After you get out you either write books or work for the companies you did big favours for while in office.
