generation limbo thread - limbo in the sand

the first part is not necessarily a bad thing if we're operating w/ the assumption that more people getting a higher education is good for society/the economy/etc. second part shouldn't matter because loan payments should be automatic/income-based.

― iatee, Tuesday, December 20, 2011 5:07 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Permalink

Right, but you're basically just providing an indirect subsidy and not really a "loan" in the traditional sense. It seems like it would be more efficient to just provide a direct subsidy. Unless you think there's some value in having students pay something back -- sort of to feel *ownership* of their education or something.

well I agree but the bigger issue is that states aren't gonna be doing these huge direct subsidies anytime soon and the federal government can't directly subsidize them in the same manner

But if the fed govt just loans out money to everybody at 0% you're just going to wind up with universities charging whatever they want and profiting from the bonanza. Public money flowing into private hands, bubble economics, etc.

Maybe the federal govt could set some kind of conditions for accepting federal loan money. Not likely to happen, but none of these things are.

I dunno my money's on a serious overhaul within the next 10 years, higher ed prices are not sustainable atm

and yes, conditions would be key and would allow the gov't to actually keep prices in check, another way this issue compares well w/ health care.

look into cheaper EU degrees maybe? brits can do that, right?

― iatee, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 14:35 (4 hours ago) Bookmark Permalink

crazily i dont think i will blossom in a classroom where everyone is speaking a different language

there are some places w/ degrees in english, it's the age of erasmus

http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2011/12/economic-geography

i thought this was a p interesting post, although im still sorta chewing it over. i think a the central conclusion is offbase but idk

he makes a few sweeping statements but by central conclusion do you mean 'The picture that emerges is one in which employment growth in high productivity, tradable industries is constrained at the rate of housing supply growth in skilled cities.'?

cause that almost seems like a given to me, but again, I start out w/ a lot of the same assumptions that RA does. (I think he's 100% otm w/ the silicon valley, could really be an amazing place right now if it had properly urbanized and diversified its economy, in some ways it would be the most important city in the world if it were a city where artists, poor immigrants (etc.) could live instead of a bunch of office parks, freeways and plain looking million dollar houses.)

and this "Value creation in high productivity cities continues, but a lot of that value is siphoned off through taxes and transfered to residents of low productivity cities, who use it to buy non-tradable services" is a statement at the core of my political beliefs

otoh some things he says about population transfer need more evidence. I don't think this is a given:

"Migrating workers—even those who continue to work in a tradable sector—are those that were least involved in the process of idea creation in their old city, and they therefore contribute little to the development of a new spillover cluster in their new city."

well i think that employment can (and does!) grow faster than the rate of housing growth although im not digging through stats to prove this

i feel to dull to really post in depth abt this but i think there a couple of central assumptions abt the nature of high productivity jobs/job growth in tradable industries that are flawed in this analysis although the stuff abt income transfers is good i think

I don't think he's arguing that employment can't grow faster than housing, just that very expensive housing / an overall housing shortage will have a negative effect on growth. (and a place like SV could fairly easily fix that shortage - it's ultimately a legal problem not an economic one.)

reading it again I think we're just interpreting 'constrain' differently but he prob shoulda said 'constrained by' not 'constrained at'

yeah i realized that at some point too. i keep writing things and then giving up on them but: i think in part this argument tries to have 'friction' effects both ways - i.e. his argument abt the marginal worker vs the idea of the spillover effects (cities as economic aggregators?). idk its all a tangle atm, and while i think hes essentially right abt the big things (and theres lots of good data out there backing this up) im not sure that migration/housing is all that impt...

actually: i think the real problem is that, for a bunch of reasons, low job growth is intrinsic to 'high productivity tradable industries' at least atm so im less concerned abt value being 'siphoned' off by transfers or limited by housing stock?

yeah I agree, I think RA's going for a single narrative when there are really a lot of things going on. he's an urbanist and so he's gonna be tempted by the most urbanist-friendly narrative. but yeah the macro level productivity-eating-up-job growth, automation, outsourcing, there are lots of things going on for sure. (I'm more concerned about the lack of urban housing stock when it comes to future resource depletion / need for transportation efficiences than w/r/t economic productivity but I think he's trying to attract the Economist audience?)

this is just econ not really limboish but I'm finding it interesting, not always convincing but a different pov, dude comes from the notre dame heterodox school:

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/12/philip-mirowski-the-seekers-or-how-mainstream-economists-have-defended-their-discipline-since-2008-%E2%80%93-part-i.html
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/12/philip-mirowski-the-seekers-or-how-mainstream-economists-have-defended-their-discipline-since-2008-%E2%80%93%C2%A0part-ii.html

and relating to what hurting was talking about earlier:

http://rortybomb.wordpress.com/2011/12/20/could-dismantling-the-submerged-state-surrounding-student-debt-pay-for-free-colleges/

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/12/27/us-studentdebt-middleage-idUSTRE7BQ0T620111227