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cindy25
05-08-2011, 01:20 AM
received this e-mail; I knew living standards had dropped but never thought that much

e-mail follows

America's College Bubble Next to Burst

The National Inflation Association (NIA) is pleased to officially announce that it will soon be releasing its hour long documentary 'College Conspiracy', which will expose the U.S. college education system as the largest scam in U.S. history. NIA has been producing 'College Conspiracy' for the past six months and plans to release the movie on May 15th. NIA members will be given the first opportunity to watch this must see documentary, which we hope will change the college education industry for the better.

NIA expects 'College Conspiracy' to take college education by storm and expose the facts and truth about tuition inflation to prospective college students. Almost everybody applying to college has heard the oft-repeated statistic that Americans with college degrees earn $1 million more in lifetime income than high school graduates without a degree. This is one of those statistics that gets repeated so many times that just about everybody accepts it as fact, but nobody actually does the research to confirm whether or not it is true. 'College Conspiracy' will prove once and for all if indeed this so-called statistic is true or just a myth.

If 70.1% of high school graduates enroll in a college or university, how does a college degree give you an advantage over the rest of the population? Back in the early 1960s, Americans didn't need to go to college. We were a creditor nation with a strong manufacturing base. With an unemployment rate of only 5%, jobs were available to almost everybody. Less than 50% of American high school graduates enrolled into college. For those who did attend college and graduate with a degree, it was actually something special that made you stand out from the rest of the field, because not everybody had one.

American college tuition inflation has been out of control for the past decade. During the financial crisis of late-2008/early-2009, almost all goods and services in America at least temporarily declined in price. The only service in America that continued to rise in price throughout the financial crisis, besides health care, was college education. Despite real unemployment in America reaching 22%, students were brainwashed into believing that if they were lucky enough to be blessed with the privilege to get half a million dollars into debt to obtain a college degree, they will be on a path to riches and have a guaranteed successful career; whereas those who don't attend college are destined to be failures in life.

The current college education bubble is one of the largest bubbles in U.S. history. The college bubble has been fueled by the U.S. government's willingness to give out cheap and easy student loans to anybody who applied for them, regardless of if they will ever have the ability to pay the loans back. Student loan debt in America is now larger than credit card debt, but unlike credit card debt, student loan debt can't be discharged in bankruptcy.

During the 1970s, college students were able to afford their own college tuition without getting into any debt, simply by working a part-time job year round or by working a full-time job during the summer. Not only that, but most college students were also able to afford their own car and a small apartment. However, since 1970, Americans have experienced a 50% decline in their standard of living due to the Federal Reserve's dangerous and destructive monetary policies. You never heard of parents setting up college savings accounts for their children 40 years ago, but thanks to the Federal Reserve, this has become the norm.

The biggest competitive threat to Wal-Mart today in terms of market cap ($192 billion) is not Target ($35 billion) like you might think, but is actually Amazon.com ($89 billion). Wal-Mart is able to offer the lowest prices out of all brick and mortar retailers, because of the size and scope of the company, which allows them to be profitable even at extremely low gross margins. However, while Wal-Mart's stock price is only up 16% from where it was exactly 5 years ago, Amazon.com's stock price is up 470% during this same time period.

Amazon.com's stock price has risen by a 29 times higher percentage than Wal-Mart due to the fact that they sell their products over the Internet with substantially less overhead costs. NIA believes that the future of college education is over the Internet and that Americans in the future will be able to receive a better quality education from the best professors from all around the world at only a fraction of the cost of a traditional brick and mortar college education.

For the vast majority of college courses, there is absolutely nothing that students can learn in a huge multi-million dollar lecture hall with hundreds of other students that they can't learn at home listening to that same professor on a computer. The only reason online colleges haven't taken off yet in America and still have less than a 1% market share of U.S. higher education is because America has a college-industrial complex that cares only about profits and not educating students. The people who control the system simply don't want the system to change, because they are making way too much money by turning American students into indentured servants.

Back in the 1980s when Americans graduated high school, they would get hundreds of thousands of dollars into debt to buy a house. Today, millions of Americans have mortgage-sized debts, but still live with their parents. All they have is a piece of paper called a college degree, that is rapidly declining in value even faster than tuitions are skyrocketing in price.

'College Conspiracy' was made possible by the personal stories that were submitted to us by thousands of NIA members. NIA's staff spent the past six months traveling across the country, interviewing our country's top expert guests in nine different states. Please tell all of you family members and friends to become members of NIA for free immediately at http://inflation.us so that they along with you can be among the first to see 'College Conspiracy'.

Blueskies
05-08-2011, 01:52 AM
Short answer: No. Liberal propaganda.

BamaAla
05-08-2011, 05:02 AM
The costs of higher education are insane, but I think this article really down plays the importance of a degree. If you've looked for a job in the past few years, you've seen that (at least) a bachelor's degree is paramount if you want to make more than $10-$15 and hour.

I was lucky in that I stepped straight from a college campus into an already successful business; however, with the recent storms, that business is threatened. I can't fathom looking for a a good job without the benefit of a degree.

Brooklyn Red Leg
05-08-2011, 05:42 AM
If you've looked for a job in the past few years, you've seen that (at least) a bachelor's degree is paramount if you want to make more than $10-$15 and hour.

Most jobs I've seen that pay that well require a professional license and some training. That is quite a bit less than the amount that goes into a college degree. Plus, 4+ years of college puts someone at a competitive disadvantage because they lack the oft requisite of 1-2 years (or more) experience most jobs now require.

brandon
05-08-2011, 06:08 AM
It's impossible to objectively put a quantitative metric to living standard. How many "points" does a flat screen HDTV count towards?

lynnf
05-08-2011, 06:54 AM
It's impossible to objectively put a quantitative metric to living standard. How many "points" does a flat screen HDTV count towards?


ridiculous! yes, it's hard to quantify such things, but consider that those kind of things are canceled out by other things: how much is losing 4th amendment rights worth?

as one who lived through the 70s, I can say it is plausible that the living standard has dropped 50%.

a relatively decent fast food lunch back then would have cost about $3 or less and now it's $5 or $6. new car maybe $7 to $10 grand, now $11 to $16 grand.

that's just the inflation part of it. many jobs that were around back then don't exist here anymore. and wages for many jobs have been held down by introduction of illegal aliens. many workers that had good jobs back then have had to become underemployed in lower level jobs now. of course, that doesn't hold true for some that climbed the ladder and got promotions, etc, they are doing better than they did in the 70's.

and, then look at how the national and state debts have soared.

what's not to like?

lynn

cindy25
05-08-2011, 07:12 AM
there is a difference between cost of living, which is easy to quantify; and living standards. I don't think anyone would doubt that standard of living in the 70s was far higher than the 30s. there does seem to be a decline since then.

and this was the first time I saw a figure mentioned.

demolama
05-08-2011, 07:20 AM
I don't know artificial heart research is much better today than it was in the 70s I think that counts for something. I don't know if it has declined but rather been highly retarded from where it should be.

lynnf
05-08-2011, 07:22 AM
there is a difference between cost of living, which is easy to quantify; and living standards. I don't think anyone would doubt that standard of living in the 70s was far higher than the 30s. there does seem to be a decline since then.

and this was the first time I saw a figure mentioned.

yes, there is a difference -- and both of them are inextricably linked, also.

just think, there are many ways that the ordinary person of today lives better than, say King Henry VIII, or, say Julius Caesar. that still doesn't make us King.

what good does it do to have the best healthcare in the world, but not be able to afford it?

lynn

Mahkato
05-08-2011, 07:28 AM
The biggest competitive threat to Wal-Mart today in terms of market cap ($192 billion) is not Target ($35 billion) like you might think, but is actually Amazon.com ($89 billion). Wal-Mart is able to offer the lowest prices out of all brick and mortar retailers, because of the size and scope of the company, which allows them to be profitable even at extremely low gross margins. However, while Wal-Mart's stock price is only up 16% from where it was exactly 5 years ago, Amazon.com's stock price is up 470% during this same time period.

Amazon.com's stock price has risen by a 29 times higher percentage than Wal-Mart due to the fact that they sell their products over the Internet with substantially less overhead costs.

Anyone who doesn't realize that smaller, newer companies can easily attain higher growth percentages than older, established companies is not worth reading. If I sell my first cheeseburger on Tuesday and sell five cheeseburgers on Wednesday, SHAZAAM!, my company is experiencing 500% growth! Compare that to McDonalds and INVEST NOW!

TNforPaul45
05-08-2011, 07:39 AM
Anyone who doesn't realize that smaller, newer companies can easily attain higher growth percentages than older, established companies is not worth reading. If I sell my first cheeseburger on Tuesday and sell five cheeseburgers on Wednesday, SHAZAAM!, my company is experiencing 500% growth! Compare that to McDonalds and INVEST NOW!

Funny that you mention inaccuracies, and the article was talking about stock price growth, whereas you are talking about simple sales percentages. The articles point is that higher education has stagnated in all its flavors in the US and when ever a organization group stagnates, then the door is open for fraud and the maintenance of the status quo.

VIDEODROME
05-08-2011, 08:40 AM
I'm not sure we should all be running to online education to earn degrees on our laptops.

But we shouldn't need insanely overpriced Text Books and campuses either.

Somethings like Math or especially computer programming may work great online, but I still see value in interacting with instructors for somethings

Brian4Liberty
05-08-2011, 11:18 AM
It's impossible to objectively put a quantitative metric to living standard. How many "points" does a flat screen HDTV count towards?

TV is the opiate of the masses. Therefore, it should score the same as a constant supply of cheap drugs.

Mahkato
05-08-2011, 12:18 PM
How is the sale price of a stock different from the sale price of a cheeseburger? In either case, the smaller company has an easier time attaining triple digit growth (or double digit losses) than an established company.

cbc58
05-08-2011, 12:39 PM
How is the sale price of a stock different from the sale price of a cheeseburger?

When was the last time you paid capital gains on a cheeseburger?

I remember when a one income family did fine and you could go to McDonalds and get a hamburger, fries and a drink, plus change back from one dollar. That was their big sales pitch - change back from a dollar.