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nick d
Trad climber
nm
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Aug 30, 2011 - 09:50pm PT
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But don't come here, unless invited, and maybe not then.
Kalis ain't very well liked in Idaho, by Idahoans.
And where did you move there from?
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Aug 30, 2011 - 09:51pm PT
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This has been a big contributor to the massive growth of the for profit, "diploma mill" education industry. We see the ads everywhere: "Get your masters at University of XYZ - no admission standards, flexible schedule, (read:going to class is optional) and everybody passes!" I'm not knocking people that have degrees from certain schools - you can get a good education through them. But you you can also get a degree without learning anything.
To make matters worse, the government often pays the tuition for these degree programs as an educational benefit. So the taxpayer pays for the process that results in giving taxpayer-funded employees a raise (and gets no better service in return.) And then there are the government-subsidized student loans...
are you seriously claiming that govt. jobs-- a comparatively tiny slice of the total employment sector-- are driving university of phoenix? you've got to be kidding me. you might wish that was true. those universities don't even keep placement records that can be relied upon, let alone any tracking of career paths. and for the record, corporate america, not the govt., made the MBA the pre-req for most upward advancement.
continuing ed credits for k-12 teachers seem to be what you have in mind. but the vast majority of those folks have traditionally earned their cmes through the cal states.
the second part of yr claim, that the diploma mills are subsidized almost entirely by taxpayer money, is correct. the so-called "for profit" higher education sector is almost entirely run on federally subsidized grants and loans. the cap on the total percent of revenue that can come from federally subsidized pells and loans is 95%. most of the biggest "for profits," like UoP, are right at the limit. The only reason they aren't at 100% is that it's illegal.
(the point man in Congress trying to raise the limit to 100%? John Boehner. i guess that's fiscal conservatism 2011 style.)
i like the post, though, since what i more frequently see in these --communist-moslems-at-the-uc-system-are-sucking-taxpayers-dry threads are demands that we let university of phoenix replace the berkeleys and uclas.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Aug 30, 2011 - 10:03pm PT
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Why doesn't the majority of voters just gang up on the wealthy and make them pay all the state taxes? Actually this has already happened, in California. The wealthiest 1% pay over 50% of taxes. What we need here is a broader and flatter tax so that everyone who votes themselves benefits through the initiative system here has to bear the costs. As long as we vote ourselves benefits and send the bill to corporations those corporations will continue to leave the state.
Property taxes are already a top heavy tax on the wealthy, because they are the ones that own the most property. What should be the top rate for the wealthy? 5%? That is more expensive than a mortgage, and it goes on forever, not 30 years. Do you want to live in a state where you can only lease land from the government? Do you really think a wealthy person would?
So you're posting in this stupid forum and the thing that pulls you in is one of the politard threads? frickin deadbeat. heh. we want climbing pix dammit.
a flat income tax in california would pretty much flatline us-- we couldn't take the revenue hit. but yr correct, the same cali voters that passed prop 13 in order to give pg&e and sierra pacific 1978 property taxes in perpetuity, went back to the polls on a "tax-the-rich" initiative. the bad thing about that isn't that rich folks fled the state (just take a drive down to indian wells), but that it radically increased revenue volatility.
since the actual income of the ultra-wealthy spikes and crashes with each weird turn of the market-- or overseas markets or wherever in the galaxy the current investment bubble is located --those revenues also crash and spike. and since our budget is tied up by percentage mandates (so much each year must go to x,y or z), it makes intelligent budgeting almost impossible.
and all the stuff about property taxes and individuals doesn't help much. the action isnt happening in private homes, not even in second, third or fourth mcmansions. wealthy individuals just rent or lease their property and pass on the tax in the form of increased rents. the real story-- and the real problem with prop 13 --was that it applied to those corporations whose vast real estate empires never changed hands and so would never get reassessed. a few of the biggest agribusinesses, the railroad, pg&e, sierra pacific, the refineries, and many others, are getting 21st century services and earning 21st century rents on their leasable land, but paying 1978 property taxes. that means that no corporation that would have to compete with a corporation that was here back in the day can move in and hope to compete.
the only way to get new bricks and nortar in, is for local municipalities to then offer the same essentially non-existent taxes to any new company. no one can afford to do that. so instead, they do what they all do: compete for big box stores with shitty jobs, like home depot and wal-mart, because each time the cash register jiungles, the county and city get a cut.
one of the weird, f*#ked-up and (by voters, at least) unanticipated consequences of prop 13 was the way that it subsidized the growth of massive big box stores and dis-incentivized manufactures. the other weird, f*#ked up thing about it, is the way it shifted the property tax burden onto private homeowners, especially young people and folks trying to move into the state (including those who could bring investment capital.)
ps-- bullet granite on the menu. u should drive up
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apogee
climber
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Aug 30, 2011 - 10:15pm PT
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Funny that out of all of the findings in that study, the only one MP & fattrad try to wave around is the difference in educational backgrounds.
More relevant to the OP are these points:
*California’s state and local government employees are paid 7 percent less than their private sector counterparts, but when benefits are included, total compensation between the two sectors is similar.
*Private sector workers earn 70 percent of their total compensation in wages and 30 percent in benefits such as vacation, retirement benefits and health insurance, while public sector employees’ corresponding percentages are 64.3 and 35.7.
*Public sector workers in California average more hours on the job each year than private sector employees.
*Retirement benefits account for 8.2 percent of public employee compensation and 3.6 percent of private sector compensation, while public workers earn considerably less supplemental pay and vacation time, and their employers contribute much less to legally-mandated benefits."
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Aug 30, 2011 - 10:22pm PT
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klk,
I think Mangy makes a valid point, although proving, perhaps, too much. For eleven years, I served on the board of a non-profit regional university that was consistently ranked in the top quartile in US News World Reports rankings, so I'm not talking about a diploma "mill." I was on the executive committe of the board for seven years, so I was quite familiar with the demographics of our student body. The greatest number of advanced degrees and degree completion -- by far -- were government employees. Teachers overwhelmingly composed the graduate student body.
The for-profit sector, at least in the central San Joaquin Valley, makes a lot of its money with teacher credential and master's programs. I deoubt that the demand for advanced degrees would be nearly as strong if it didn't guarantee a raise.
I question whether that's unique to public employees, though, rather than to bureaucracies generally. The larger the organization, the less employees get treated individually, and the more they march in lockstep, based on allegedly objective criteria, for compensation.
I last studied compensation of government workers carefully more than 20 years ago, but even then the statistics showed that college graduates earned significantly more, on average, in the private sector. It did not, however, control for major, but I suspect that the discrepancy was even greater for the degrees in highest demand in the private sector.
For example, the California Supreme Court made it illegal to pay teachers with a degree in one major more than those with the same level of degree in a different major. Physics and sociology majors get paid the same in California public schools. They certainly don't in the private sector.
In addition, managerial employees tend to be grossly underpaid in the public sector, or the quasi public sector (such as the Postal Service) compared with the private sector. No offense to any governmental managers, but by and large, the government gets what it pays for at the managerial level.
For that reason, I think, klk, that your assertions are consistent with what I found when I last studied in this area.
None of this changes the imbalance in the pension systems, though. At this point, I think the discussion shows that maybe we really are ungovernable.
John
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Mangy Peasant
Social climber
Riverside, CA
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Aug 30, 2011 - 11:45pm PT
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are you seriously claiming that govt. jobs-- a comparatively tiny slice of the total employment sector-- are driving university of phoenix?
Are you seriously claiming that government jobs are a "tiny" slice of the total employment sector?
At least 15% of the workforce is pubic sector - not counting defense contractors.
Since a heavier weight of government employees are white collar, an even bigger percent of the white collar/educated workforce is government.
I did a short stint as an adjunct professor at the school you mentioned. About a third of my students were government employed. Sure it varies by region, but Uncle Sam is sending a lot of checks to diploma mills, and he is rewarding a disproportionate number of diploma mill graduates.
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Mangy Peasant
Social climber
Riverside, CA
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Aug 30, 2011 - 11:57pm PT
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Funny that out of all of the findings in that study, the only one MP & fattrad try to wave around is the difference in educational backgrounds.
I didn't even bring up the educational background subject, someone else did. You seriously need to cut back on the fancy vocabulary and try some reading comprehension.
Jacobs, you are a just as much a bigoted partisan hack as fattrad. This doesn't have to be a simpleton left-right debate, and many folks are discussing the issue. But you insist on bringing in the rhetoric.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Aug 31, 2011 - 12:11am PT
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john-- i know yr school and it's circumstances are not typical. lovely school, with lots of things to recommend it-- unlike the vast majority of for-profit diploma mills that mp invoked. given yr school's geographic location, i would expect that its advanced degree programs in particular would have teachers, and occasional county or city employees, as a key student demographic.
i wouldn't describe yr school as in any way comparable to the university of phoenixes-- and worse --that mp was invoking. and i for one am pretty happy to see some of my tax dollars go to support that institution and feel moderately good about having, for instance, local teachers do advanced degree work there.
and happy to hear the voice i usually associate w. yr avatar. i know it's hard. you can't imagine what it frickin costs me to post in these threads.
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apogee
climber
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Aug 31, 2011 - 12:14am PT
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"This doesn't have to be a simpleton left-right debate..."
Then why do you consistently participate in them that way?
Edit: You accuse Kali voters of not objectively considering realities- which is probably true, since they have a tendency to vote for 'bread and circuses', then you go on to cite one of the relatively lesser-significant findings of that study, presumably because it doesn't suit the narrative you are trying to create in this thread?
One of the most interesting overall conclusions of that study is that public vs. private compensation rates are not very different at all. Too bad that doesn't fit the FauxNews narrative, but it is what it is.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Aug 31, 2011 - 12:21am PT
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Since a heavier weight of government employees are white collar, an even bigger percent of the white collar/educated workforce is government.
sorry about your time in the mills. but yes, in the absence of real data (and we don't have any), even if 1/3 of uop students came from public sector, that still means that the main driver is private sector.
from what ive seen in the studies that are just now coming out, voc-tech has been the main driver. and that's mostly private sector. in particular localities (i.e., many rural localities where local employers are mostly school districts, prisons or other govt. agencies), then yeah, i'd expect that public sector is heavily over represented.
the real problem, as i clumsily tried to point out, isn't that govt. agencies want their employees to be well educated and to continue improving their skills, but that we are using tax money to subsidize private, for-profit "schools" that as you know typically have no regular faculty, produce no patents or research, and create no public infrastructure that feeds back into the economy.
historically speaking, rates of fraud at that type of institution have been horrific. one recent study found fraud rates of nearly 2/3 under the GI Bill, esp. at southern regional voc-tech institutions. and the recent investigations suggest some pretty nasty practices at the marquee for profits.
i'm doubting we'll see a clean-up. ironically, the electorate would scream if we were to turn all that dough back into public colleges.
not that any of this has much of anything to do with the current budget debacle, except insofar as i regularly see people claiming we should divest in higher ed in cali so that the for profits can work their free market magic.
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Elcapinyoazz
Social climber
Joshua Tree
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Aug 31, 2011 - 11:13am PT
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The quality of the four-year degrees of public sector employees is not necessarily equal to the public sector Many government employees' compensation is tied to their education - get masters degree, automatically get a raise.
You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.
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apogee
climber
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Aug 31, 2011 - 12:33pm PT
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"It's just unbelivable how naive Obama is, he touts green jobs, throws money at at projects the are not economically viable and this is what happens....."
Yeah! What we need is another good war! Why can't that weak-kneed pansy grow a set, and take us back to the good ole days when wars served first as economic expansion tools, and second because of an actual threat to the US?
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Mangy Peasant
Social climber
Riverside, CA
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Aug 31, 2011 - 01:34pm PT
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"This doesn't have to be a simpleton left-right debate..."
Then why do you consistently participate in them that way?
WTF?
Show me the post in this thread where I mention Republicans or Democrats.
I can point out plenty of yours, in damn-near every thread about any issue even slightly political.
Four posts later:
Yeah! What we need is another good war! Why can't that weak-kneed pansy grow a set, and take us back to the good ole days when wars served first as economic expansion tools, and second because of an actual threat to the US?
Didn't take long.
Lame generic talking points, completely irrelevant to the discussion topic.
Look in the mirror, Jacobs, and you'll see Elfont staring right back at you.
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apogee
climber
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Aug 31, 2011 - 01:43pm PT
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As long as we're cross-posting all the polititard threads...
Are you kidding me, fattrad? How many times do I have to express my disappointment with Obama and the Democrats before you get it?
We're all Republicans now.
At least until a true progressive party comes forward.
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Wade Icey
Trad climber
www.alohashirtrescue.com
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Aug 31, 2011 - 01:48pm PT
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Mangy Peasant
Social climber
Riverside, CA
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Aug 31, 2011 - 02:06pm PT
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Many government employees' compensation is tied to their education - get masters degree, automatically get a raise.
You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.
Really?
http://govcentral.monster.com/government-payscale/articles/6945-what-determines-where-you-stand-on-the-gs-scale
I'll admit that my choice of the word "automatically" was a not the best fit. But, in many government jobs, there is a pretty rigid association between education level and pay scale. (In some jobs, like teachers, the raise is, in fact, "automatic.")
One particularly egregious case: http://reason.com/archives/2005/01/01/cut-rate-diplomas
I personally have known government employees who required PhD's for their position and received the PhD from diploma mills. I remember one guy who had a PhD from Southern California University (Go Trojans!...err...wait a second...)
This stuff happens in government because government hiring and promotion processes often simply look for "check the box" qualifications. Got a PhD? Check! Sure, it can happen in the private sector also, but private companies that hire people with advanced degrees typically require more scrutiny, like an interview process where the candidate must discuss their research, thesis, etc.
The diploma mills have figured all this out, and are taking advantage of it. Their recent, explosive, growth is not entirely driven by government employees - but a disproportionate part of it is.
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apogee
climber
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Aug 31, 2011 - 02:12pm PT
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"One particularly egregious case:"
Oh, yes...please provide more egregious cases. Always helpful in discussing issues in rational terms.
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Homer
Mountain climber
742 Evergreen Terrace
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Aug 31, 2011 - 02:21pm PT
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I'm missing the connection between quality of education (e.g degree in pottery, etc.) and compensation.
Where is that information available? Is that just noise, or is there some non-anecdotal evidence of that?
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Aug 31, 2011 - 02:31pm PT
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half of 2011 and traction in North America with a number of orders for very large commercial rooftops, Solyndra could not achieve full-scale operations rapidly enough to compete in the near term with the resources of larger foreign manufacturers," the company statement says.
http://www.contracostatimes.com/top-stories/ci_18795740?nclick_check=1
FACE IT, OBAMA IS A LOSER.
The evil one
I'm not quite sure that I see why another demonstration of failure by private capitalism demonstrates that Obama is a loser. More that China is a winner over America.
Is that why the winner of the Supertopo Contest gets a Chinese hat?
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