Do you feel "the system" is working more or less as it should?

[dead0man]

For the most part, yes.  It could always be better, but that's true of pretty much everything everywhere....nevermind that what's "better" to one person might be "much much worse" to another.

[dead0man]

You don't need a degree to succeed in IT and there are lots of those jobs.

[dead0man]

Unfortunately, this kind of thinking rarely bothers to consider that the trades also require aptitude. Most of this analysis is under-girded by the classist assumption that while only a real genius can, say, write a legal brief, interpret a financial statement, or analyze an argument, any idiot can repair an engine, sow a field, or wire a building. This is ridiculous.

Is it though?  By any measure it's easier to learn how to sow a field than it is to learn how to write a legal brief.  Can just anybody do it?  Of course not, but most healthy people of working age can.  Repairing an engine or wiring a building are more challenging, and a little aptitude in that direction would certainly make it easier, but still, at least in my experience, much easier than learning Trig.  Troubleshooting can be taught, but some people are naturals and some have to work at it.  Just like nearly every other skill humans deal with.

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You're probably right, the problem is, High School kids with any sign of intelligence or drive are told "you have to go to college".  Welding would never be mentioned by most counselors or teachers.  That's a problem

[dead0man]

The good news is that if a housing bubble were to burst, the damage would be much more contained than in 2007-2008. The banks are way less leveraged than they were and there aren't billions and billions in toxic assets on their books(at least yet).

Oddly caused by the same problem of the "experts" telling the lay people that the smart thing to do is buy a house (or go to college), and the govt's fault for trying to make it easy for people that probably shouldn't be buying a house (or going to college) to do it.  And then those people that shouldn't have bought a house (or went to school) are the ones that end up screwed over the hardest.

[dead0man]

The good news is that if a housing bubble were to burst, the damage would be much more contained than in 2007-2008. The banks are way less leveraged than they were and there aren't billions and billions in toxic assets on their books(at least yet).

yeah, but it would still be leveraged onto the average joe's back anyway.

@Simmy et al. I think the one of the main problems with saying "too many in college" is that reinforces that higher education is for a upper, upper-middle and middle-middle classes, while working-class people are wrong (even a drag on the economy) for thinking above their station.

It may do that, but it doesn't have to do that.  If you're fit for college, then you should be able to go.  But not everybody is fit for college, and we shouldn't tell all HS kids that they are.

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Are even the people with sh**tty grades told they should go to college too?  I was under the impression (and feel free to correct) that in the UK those tests you take when you're 16 mean everything.  If you screw 'em up, get used to saying "you want chips with that?" kind of thing?  That would be good.  That's not how it is here. 

I barely graduated HS, me and school don't get along, but I was still told by EVERYBODY that college is my only option.  My parents were ok with me joining the military, but they would have preferred me going to college.  The adults at school were even worse.  "you're so smart, you HAVE to go to college...if you make good grades you can go to a "good" school, why aren't you making good grades, you're so smart!, anyway, lets get you enrolled at the local community college, do good there and you can transfer to a "good" school in a couple of years...it's actually better this way because you can save yourself some money" <if its better, why aren't they encouraging everybody to go that route?>  So I did community college for a couple years, it went exactly as well as HS....actually a little better because I could make my own schedule and the classes were slightly more interesting, but it was pretty much the same as HS.  I eventually dropped out, worked a little construction and then joined the USAF.  Best mistake I ever made.

It's just not true that everybody should go to college.  Hell, it's not true that everybody should go to middle school.  I'm not saying education should stop (it should never stop), I'm just saying the current system harms many individuals.

[dead0man]

err Gustaf, you missed my point.

liberal capitalism is the best solution that has been tried out at the moment. But to say such a system is the best humanity can come up with would basically border on misanthropy.

I'm against complacency and this Whiggish idea that the whole of human history is a march of inevitable progress to the current day. The current "system" is better than various other methods humans have governed themselves under, but it is riddled with flaws and should not be treated as sacrosanct.

But the topic isn't "is the current system the best possible system", and nobody is arguing that it is.