Don't Send Your Kids to College | Hacker News Reader

Don't Send Your Kids to College

jamesaltucher.com

14 pointsjaltucher35 comments

Over-generalizations like this are as predictable as they are annoying.

Sure, it makes sense for some people to skip college. And maybe someone could even make the case that most people would be better off abstaining from higher education.

But what if you want to be a researcher? A scientist? Someone working on the outer boundaries of knowledge in some particular discipline? Self-study is all very well and good, but for most of the empirical sciences, to make an impact you are going to need experiences and credentials that can only be acquired in a university setting.

Money isn't everything.

If you need a professional certificate to practice, such as law, or medicine, then of course college is the only route.

But there are many degrees out there that I see as not very necessary to get. English, Art, History? If you want to be a teacher sure you need these, but you can get by on your self learned skill and knowledge alone.

People just need to make sure they're going to college for the right reasons. Because it will further their career not just delay them from it.

Tell that to Thomas Edison.

The flaw in his logic that I see is that somehow the $104,000 that was supposed to pay for going to college will somehow magically appear the first year that the kid will not go to college so that they can start a business. This is instead of how it normally appears with select education loans. I highly doubt lenders are itching to lend $104,000 to multitudes of fresh 18 year olds that dream about owning their own business but don't want to "waste time" in college.

Agreed 100%. You either go to school and use that money to gain knowledge, friends and life experience or you never see the money in the first place. At age 29 I STILL don't have that kind of money sitting around to invest. How would an 18 year old kid get access to it?

Also, that $10,000 for living expenses is a static cost whether you go to school or not. So the number is really somewhere closer to $64k.

Agreed, the math here is way off. No mention of amortization to either side of the argument: the "saved" $104,000 OR the expected $800,000. Perhaps I invested the $800,000 (or what's left after I pay my student loans)? Depending on how the $800K is distributed over my lifetime, that investment could be well over $1.4mil when I retire.

Isn't anyone else tired of articles that are completely useless to anyone outside the US?

I'm fine with political insights, drug/weapons/abortion/religion debates or US breakthroughs, but articles about ways around student loans and rankings of cellphone carriers just go WHOOSH over me.

Maybe I'm missing something, but I wish there was an [US] tag for this type of content.

Why is this completely useless outside the US? Going to college is the common course in many countries, it usually requires 3-4 years of your life and more money than you independently have at 18.

(Yeah, very cheap/free in some parts of Europe. Though those lacking Norway-style natural resources might see this change in the near future.)

I'm currently a college student. The university I attend is completely free and is one of the best available.

What about people who don't pass the entrance exam? They go to private colleges, paying a value between 0.7 and 2 times the minimum wage. And there are cheaper alternatives.

Additionally, most people in college have part time jobs, making the payment even less problematic.

And this is 3rd world South America.

For many, college is a place to safely transition from childhood into adulthood surrounded by peers doing the same thing: making the same mistakes and sharing advice.

It is also where many make the core of their life-long friends. The serious ones - the ones who come to births, marriages and funerals. It is also where many of us met our partners.

Starting a business will not provide all this.

I would suggest doing both. Start with college. This way you will have many of the support structures you will need to get you through the tough times and should it all go wrong you will have people to help you get back on your feet.

College is also a good place to find intelligent, like-minded founders.

Not to over-simplify, but I don't think one's social circle is enough of a justification for the astronomical cost of higher education. One can just as easily get involved in their community doing public service, attending shows, even just frequenting local businesses can provide opportunities to meet new and interesting people.

$60,000 to build my social club? No thanks.

"One can just as easily get involved in their community doing public service, attending shows..."

This route gets harder when all of your smart friends are gone to college.

The point to which I replied indicated that you meet your smart friends at college, generally leaving behind most of your high school relationships. If you just happen to go off to school with one or two of those "smart friends" then likely you too are a reasonable candidate for college. You didn't go to college to build a social circle, you just happened to do so whilst you learned.

>college is a place to safely transition from childhood into adulthood surrounded by peers doing the same thing

I think the transition happens after college unless one is entirely paying ones own way through college with work.

There's more to college than spending and making money, I think.

Everything is mostly always measured by money. And it seems like the author of the post reckons it's really easy for everyone to become entrepreneurs. I would say let the kids do what they want with their life - provide some guidelines but don't stop them if they want to go to college.

every time I read about the high tuition fees at US universities and extraordinary costs of higher education in the US, I wonder why only a small number of students are going to study in old Europe: no tuition fees in a lot of countries; good universities all around; no necessity to master the local language perfectly as there are a lot of programs with English as the language of instruction; many locations with relatively low costs of living (you can easily master your life with $800-$1000 a month in many areas/cities in Europe with very good universities); a thriving student life

no tuition fees in a lot of countries

As a foreign national? As, say, a US citizen without a work visa? Does that really work?

The idea that a foreign country would subsidize one's college education is pretty alien to a US citizen. Just going to a state university in a different state costs extra money in the USA.

Or are you just asking: Why would people who are already lucky enough to have some kind of "old European" citizenship ever want to study in the USA instead? I'll let those folks answer that question, since I don't really know.

Tuition fees for all European countries [pdf]

http://www.cesifo.de/pls/guestci/download/CESifo%20DICE%20Re...

"Norwegian universities and state university colleges as a rule do not charge tuition fees for international students. However, you should take into consideration that living expenses in Norway are higher than in many other countries." http://studyinnorway.no/sn/Tuition-Scholarships

You do need a student visa, and there are other requirements pertaining to language and bringing the student up to par with what Norwegians learn in secondary school. (As I understand it, our last year of upper secondary school (videregående) is more similar to what is taught freshman year at an American College.)

Non-EU students pay fees in Scotland, but these are often still cheaper than full fees for top US universities. I think in Scotland the fee is between £10,000-15,000 per year, whereas EU students don't pay anything (in an odd quirk English students still pay fees, but no more than £4,000).

Related article about this: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/01/education/01scotland.html?...

As a foreign national? As, say, a US citizen without a work visa? Does that really work?

yes, it does. I don't know about every european country, but at least (at state universities) in Germany and Finland there are no tuition fees for non-europeans as well.

As far as I know, only the courses tought in the local language are free.

the language of instruction has nothing to do with tuition fees (in both those countries, at least).

Anyone qualified (high school equivalent or better) who has good enough grades to get accepted into a study program can study at Norwegian universities. Tuition is 170 USD a year.

Distance from parents is probably a big one; worry about emergency situations while separated is another. After that, accreditation, I guess.

Simple: financial aid. As US citizens, if we qualify, we can attain federal financial aid and scholarships, thus lowering our overall cost of attending college significantly; sometimes lowering it so much as to be free, or nearly free.

The same is not true if we attend a foreign institution.

if this would be true for the majority of students, there wouldn't be the discussion about extraordinary costs of higher education. or do I get something wrong here?

of course I am not suggesting everybody to study abroad, I am just wondering why only few young (US-)americans are considering to study in Europe. especially with the prospect of not having to pay up a huge education credit while gaining a lot of experience as well for those without a proper financial background.

Right; and I'm not saying everyone should attend a US school. I'm just saying there is a significant number of students who are US nationals that get federal grants and funding. They would not get this funding a foreign nationals in another country.

For that group of students, it is much harder to attend a foreign school. Not to mention cost of travel to visit parents and family. 4 years is a long time.

I don't know where this "college is a bad idea" MEME started from but it is very bad advice that seems to be entirely based on ridiculous financial considerations.

The folks that I know who didn't go to college ended up struggling much harder and much longer to get to the same places as those who went to college-- and these are the LUCKY ONES.

There's also the "education" component that followers of this meme tend to ignore. Education is more than simple job-preparation. It is not merely an an advanced vo-tech program.

This article is practically pointless; congratulations on parroting Peter Thiel on this matter.

To be honest, my college experience was pretty easy for me, but I did learn something that I would have never learned by starting a business. That is communication. College is the best place to learn about yourself and become comfortable with talking in social settings.

Also, through college, I met some of the smartest people I know, and I hope that in the future we can build a business. Without school, I would have never had the opportunity to engage with such minds.

So much college discussion is based off the money you could make extra with a degree vs the amount of head start you can get joining the workforce at 18.

Past providing for my basic needs these minor differences matter very little to me, I was perfectly happy studying and getting by with low income just as I am now doing a startup on low income. Sure I could end up in a job a few years down the track and be x amount of dollars behind the theoretical person who started at 18 and worked their way up but it doesn't worry me one bit.

I go to a university (BYU) with annual tuition of 5k. My wife also attends and is on full-tuition scholarship. I work part time, get Pell Grants, and will graduate in 4 years with zero debt. Total monthly cost of living (for both of us) is $1200-$1500.

It's not MIT or Stanford, but it's a good school with plenty of opportunities.

I wonder if the guy who wrote this went to college himself...

I don't see how to permalink to comments on his page, but he does reply with the following:

"I ultimately paid for every penny of college through loans I was lucky enough to pay back. I also worked about 40 hours a week in jobs to pay my living expenses and took 6 courses a semester plus summer so I could skip a year and avoid an extra year's tuition."

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