Reply to WashPost: College is remade as tech majors surge and humanities dwindle

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Society devalues the humanities. That's why our society is in such a sad state.[/quote]

Wrong.  The society of today is not devaluing humanities.  Universities’ humanities departments have devalued humanities degrees in the last few decades.  In the good old days when few people went to college and fewer studied humanities, those with humanities degrees were the few, the elite of the society.  Most of them came from noble families.  They didn’t need to get “jobs” to make a living.  Then starting in the 1980’s the society was sold the idea that EVERY high school graduate should go to college.  Or at least most of them.  It was easy money for universities.  No labs were needed (unlike science and engineering), and a history class can be held in a big lecture hall of 500 people.  Therefore, the society has not devalued humanities, but universities have definitely devalued humanities degrees. [/quote]

Er, Hello, the universities don’t exactly operate in a vacuum. They mirror what society wants[/quote]

Agree.  But the society “wanted” it because the political elite has been pushing this ridiculous idea of “every child must go to college” for the last 40 years.  Germany and Japan are advanced economies but they are fine with most of their youths not going to college.  In Germany, a child as young as 11 or 12 years old decides whether he/she wants to go on college track or trade track. [/quote]

Germany also has a very progressive tax structure, a massive social safety net, incredibly strong unions, and powerful worker rights laws. All of that make it much more palatable for parents to track a 12 year old into the trades (of course the rich parents would still just send their kids to a private school).[/quote]

But it seems to me that Germany still is a competitive and productive capitalist society. [/quote]

They don't spend 3%+ of their GDP on "defense" programs so have money left over for these things.[/quote]

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