Oldsters Going Back To School? A Waste Of Money And Debt You Don't Need

The buzz from the Neoliberal enclave the past ten years or so has been for the senior segment of the populace to "get more education" or "retraining" to access more lucrative work to supplement their retirement income, or even have more of it. These fools have peddled the bilge that "you're never too old to do it", and hey - with possible Social Security cuts - better to be safe than sorry.

Now, we read in the 'Retirement View'  (TIME, Feb. 20, p. 22, by Hayley Sweetland Edwards)  That oldsters:

"are now the fastest growing group of student borrowers and own, on average, $23,500, up from $12,000 in 2005."

And the real kicker:

"Altogether the over-60 set now carries $66.7 billion in student debt."

Even reading that twice made it no less incredible, mind boggling.   Especially on next reading, "the trend has Washington policy makers wringing their hands".

Well, didn't they all recite the refrain some years ago that the elderly set needed to retrain and "go back to school" to enable them to grab higher paying jobs to afford retirement? Yeppers, I have several sources ('Mother Jones', The Nation, The Atlantic) filled with such codswallop. Most recently: 'Career Pivot Is Ultimate Test  Of Self-Reinvention', (Washington Post) And now what do we behold? Well:

"This student loan crisis is preventing people from living with dignity in retirement"

The column does cite two main causes for this senior descent into student loan debt and now struggling in retirement to repay it:

1) Grandparents (and parents) are co-signing loans to support the younger generation.

2) Older Americans are increasingly taking out student loans for themselves, the proverbial "career pivot" if you will.

Both of these unwise moves can be grasped when one sees the dwindling number of blue collar jobs available - but that was always coming, if not from globalization then via automation. To fix ideas on the absolute nature of the bad decisions, the column then cites a waitress who went back to school in her 40s (not even in the 60s, like many now) to earn a degree in occupational therapy.  As the piece notes:

"While her new profession yields a higher income it has also left her with a lifetime of debt, with the consolidated loans tallied at $42, 000."

Of course, for a 60 or 65-year old this would be financially suicidal, unless one had plenty of money set aside. Like at least $600,000.

Let's look at options here. In terms of (1) it is axiomatic that no older person, over say 55, should be co-signing loans for a kid to attend university. Community college? Sure, maybe - and don't knock it!

The natural route now to craftsman status and good future work (e.g. for auto mechanics, plumbers, electricians etc.) in the U.S., as noted by Dick Hilker in his op-ed piece in the Denver Post from 2 years ago, is the community college. Hilker quoted Rhonda Bentz (the state system's media and government relations director), noting  that :

"the Voc-Technical route is the educational system's best kept secret. Students come for two year degrees and then get real jobs."

As Hilker goes on to note:

"In other words there are solid alternatives to spending big bucks at Big State U. to major in Tibetan Culture or Music Appreciation before winding up as a clerk at Mega-Mart."

A brutally frank observation, but which no rational person can dispute. And certainly a retiree or near retiree contemplating co-signing a loan for a grand kid!

Here's another brutal fact: those who believe they will be saved by higher aspirations, i.e. going into academia via the Ph.D. route, are also in for a shock. Universities across the board are now scaling back costs by hiring more and more adjunct professors and lecturers, many of whom now have to go on food stamps because they can't cobble together enough 'gigs' (teaching courses at different colleges, usually)  to earn even a lower working class level income.

The community college route also provides an alternative track for those seniors who wish to do a career pivot but don't wish to go into hock over massive student loans, say to get a university degree (or additional one).  In the case of the WaPo article on "career pivots" I cited earlier, both the individuals who achieved it were already coming from good paying jobs (one a medical doctor) so didn't have to worry about accruing lots of student loan debt. The doc (aspiring to be a statistical biophysicist)  also applied for a "Pioneer Award" from the National Institutes of Health that "made it possible for him to go back to the classroom"

But not all seniors are so fortuitous.

The main things seniors need to know before committing themselves to student loans for any reason are:

a) If seniors become ill or incapacitated - or even if they don't - they still have much less time to pay back loans than a young sprat.

b) Making monthly payments on a loan is also likely to be a lot more difficult because first, you're likely on a fixed income and second, even if you land a better job the remuneration is unlikely to grow as fast as it would be for a young student grad.

c) The loan burden often puts seniors in a bind to the extent that - according to a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau report- those 60 and older forego medical care and taking needed prescription drugs.

By 2015, a full 40 percent of student loan borrowers were in default meaning the government can garnish wages or even Social Security benefits to service payments.

The bottom line here? Make do with what you have, give up the fantasies of "career pivots" unless you are independently wealthy (that goes for co-signing loans for grand kids too). And if you need mental stimulation go for online open  courses - such as the "open courses" offered by Yale, e.g.

http://oyc.yale.edu/courses

Bill Maher Needs A Few Clues About Socialism - And Millennials

Maher grins like a shit-eating rat as he tries now to 'shiv' socialism.

After giving a solid takedown of run- amuck capitalism in an earlier show, Bill Maher ran off he rails Friday night dumping on millennial pro-Socialists asserting "they are getting too used to getting too much shit for free". How so, Bill, when most are coming away with enormous college debt? Well, someone IS getting lots of free breaks - but it isn't millennials!

As a socialist I also found repulsive his claim that they (millennials) are "romanticizing" socialism, making me now wonder if his HBO (Time-WARNER) corporate overseers got to him and ordered him to back off the initial remarks and  bark a new script: "The Neoliberalism is all we can afford" version. The one that's dunned and dinged the middle class the past three decades even though many aren't aware of it because they don't grasp the differences between a Neoliberal and classical liberal.

First, let's remind ourselves what Maher said when he had his head screwed on straight:

""America's real religion is capitalism, and like any religion it needs a devil. And that devil has always been socialism....Republicans think if you allow a little socialism it will spread out of control. But actually it's capitalism that has spread out of control. It's eaten our democracy and it's eating our middle class - our health care system, our prison system, our news media. It's even eaten our food system so a lot of our food is no longer something that should be eaten

Capitalism is a shark, or a tidal wave...an unthinking force that devours everything in its path. Socialism is capitalism's 'lap band' - something to prevent it from eating almost everything"  -

To reinforce those points I incorporated Maher's 'New Rules' end monologue into a post on the savagery of current capitalism especially in the medical arena, noting that spiking prescription drug prices no longer even bears any relation to the laws of supply and demand. See e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2016/06/the-most-savage-aspect-of-capitalism.html

But Maher's main grousing about "freebies" concerned millennial backers of Bernie's proposal of free tuition. One would have hoped before Bill teed off he'd at least have checked  The Wall Street Journal article from  (Feb. 24, p. A6) that dealt with Sanders himself  benefiting from a free tuition plan at Brooklyn College in 1959. We learn, in fact, that:

"Eighteen year old Bernie Sanders didn't pay for tuition for his freshman  year and neither did 8,000 other undergraduates."

We further learn that "New York City's public colleges didn't charge for  tuition back then for students who attended full time during the day."

How  on Earth could this be achieved? The answer was also embedded in the piece, which provides a perspective on the history of free tuition though it is inappropriately titled 'Sanders's Free Tuition Failed Cost Test In The Past'.  On the contrary, free tuition succeeded in passing the cost test in the past precisely because "free tuition colleges flourished at a time when student enrollment was small."

In other words, when college was still regarded as the province of the select, academically able - it was workable. It isn't now because virtually everyone considers college  the only ticket to a better life. But this is belied by the facts that: a) Many incoming students require remedial courses (e.g. in math, English)  just to get on a basic academic footing - driving up costs, and b) a large number (in some cases nearly 60 percent) drop out but still have massive loans to pay off.  Both these problems and expanding college costs could be managed in a Sanders-type free tuition program by reducing the total population enrolling using qualifying markers.

These are the sort of nuanced aspects that elude those who bash democratic socialism. It also eludes them when any mention is made of having a single payer, 'Medicare for all' system which Sanders has also proposed. But as my wife learned, now engaging in the effort to get an analogous system passed into law here in Colo., the costs automatically plummet - sometimes as much as 85% - when insurance companies are factored out of the system. The reason is that these parasites are the ones responsible for the gigantic administration costs which programs like Medicare don't have.

Anti-Medicare for all yappers, like Claire McCaskill last year, also seem to forget that enrollees would not get carte blanche free services. They'd have to pay a standard Medicare -scale premium each month as well as copays for prescription drugs and at least one fifth of the cost of medical operations, interventions - from prostate cancer treatments to gall bladder removals. In addition no dental expenses or eye problems, glasses would be covered.

 Back to Sanders' free college tuition proposal. Short of prospective students running the qualifying test gauntlet the most affordable way to implement such a system would be by use of community colleges as opposed to four-year universities. This would provide a much more accessible route for many not able to get into trade or vocational schools, and also cut costs immensely. (And look, let's be clear when Bernie proposed his plan he never intended it to mean free tuition at selective schools like Harvard or Princeton, he meant for public institutions)

While he mentioned 4-year colleges, it does make more sense to implement the program by using two year schools first and then see where that goes. If a success, then limited 4 -year colleges can be brought into the mix.  But I absolutely reject the notion that even that tuition can't be paid for! Sanders proposed a tax on all stock trades,  transactions but even a limited version - say for all hedge fund trades - could work wonders in bringing in the necessary $$$.

 In line with this it makes eminent sense to make more use of the community college system and tailor HS guidance counseling to seriously consider the A.A. degree as opposed to pushing unqualified students into 4 year schools.  In his Dec. 14, 2014 piece on community colleges used for Voc-tech preparation,  Denver Post education columnist Dick Hilker quoted Rhonda Bentz (Colorado's media and government relations director) :

"the Voc-Technical route is the educational system's best kept secret. Students come for two year degrees and then get real jobs."

As Hilker goes on to note:

"In other words there are solid alternatives to spending big bucks at Big State U. to major in Tibetan Culture or Music Appreciation before winding up as a clerk at Mega-Mart."

A brutally frank observation, but one which no rational person can dispute.

What does this all add up to? Well, that lenders need to be much more rigorous in terms of lending qualifications. It makes no sense to loan to those who are much more likely to struggle in completing a 4 -year degree, and also have trouble repaying the loan. If anything is being "romanticized" then it's not socialism per se but overblown expectations of 4-year degrees for the bulk of students who'd do much better with just A.A. degrees.

 All this means getting rid of the fanciful expectation that "college is for everyone". It therefore implies the corollary that free college tuition cannot be for everyone.  Of course, Sanders's Policy Director (Warren Gunnels) during the campaign was not fond of this solution because, well, it lacks the "broad appeal" of just making tuition free to everyone without qualification. That implied Bernie wouldn't get as many young backers, but then it also meant his campaign would have been more grounded in reality and less liable to attacks by fiscal critics- and comedian schmucks (like Maher)  who brand it a "freebie".

  I also don't buy Gunnel's worry that if the policy isn't broad most people will treat it as a special "welfare program". Exactly the converse is true. Only IF the program implemented is initially limited (e.g. to 2-year colleges) and has markers of fiscal responsibility - including holding students accountable in their performance- will it not be seen as "welfare" - as Maher seems to believe it is.

 It won't be because in order to qualify the recipients will have to demonstrate decent academic requirements like at least a 3.0 grade average and a minimal SAT score , say in the upper quartile.  The last is especially more justified now as SAT standards have been melted down to the point there's no longer even an essay portion, guessing is no longer penalized and the multiple choice options have been reduced to 4, from 5. I mean, cheese Louise! But then the SAT is no longer even regarded as a scholastic aptitude test, see e.g.
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/08/why-so-many-past-aptitude-tests-are-no.html

 In addition, if high standards aren't kept up, judging the GPA after the first semester or more likely the first year, then the recipient stands to lose the free tuition. So in other words we have a meritocratic tuition program, not simply a mindless 'gimme' free for all

This is how Bernie's free tuition program could work, and though its expectations have been  dramatically lowered from the stratosphere, they are more in line with fiscal and educational reality.  It can also be more aggressively defended as a practical solution and not just socialist jabberwocky or inflated political promising.

The bottom line is that no free tuition program should be expected for students not academically inclined in the first place, or who need remedial courses just to catch up with peers. Or those likely to drop out before completing their degrees.

In the meantime Maher needs to STFU about Millennials grafting for "free stuff" and examine the practical basis of how such a system could be expedited with minimal damage to the economy. It is feasible but there must exist a will to do it!

Sen. Bernie Sanders's Free College Tuition Plan Is Feasible Under Specific Conditions

Many students entering college are overwhelmed by the demands of the courses. More needs to be done to ensure only those who are thoroughly prepared merit free college tuition.


In a recent salon.com piece, noted author Camille Paglia wrote :

"It is an intolerable scandal that college costs, even at public universities, have been permitted to skyrocket in the U.S., burdening a generation of young adults with enormous debt for what in many cases are worthless degrees. The role played by the colleges themselves in luring applicants to take crippling, unsecured loans has never received focused scrutiny."

 

Adding:

"The annual college ranking by U.S. News & World Report, which began in 1983, triggered a brand-name hysteria among upwardly mobile parents and turned high school into the nightmarish, gerbil-wheel obsession with college applications that it remains today....The steady rise in college tuition, leading to today’s stratospheric costs, began in the 1980s and was worsened by a malign development of the 1990s:  the rapid swelling of a self-replicating campus bureaucracy, whose salaries exceeded those of most faculty."

These points are germane as they pertain to Sen. Bernie Sanders's proposed free college tuition plan, which I will show here can feasibly work - provided we adopt some specific assumptions . The key condition or assumption can be found in a recent Wall Street Journal article (Feb. 24, p. A6) that dealt with Sanders benefiting from a free tuition plan at Brooklyn College in 1959. We learn, in fact, that: 

"Eighteen year old Bernie Sanders didn't pay for tuition for his freshman  year and neither did 8,000 other undergraduates."

We further learn that "New York City's public colleges didn't charge for  tuition back then for students who attended full time during the day."

How could this be achieved? The answer is also embedded in the piece, which provides a perspective on the history of free tuition though it is inappropriately titled 'Sanders's Free Tuition Failed Cost Test In The Past'.  On the contrary, free tuition succeeded in passing the cost test in the past precisely because "free tuition colleges flourished at a time when student enrollment was small."

In other words, when college was still regarded as the province of the select, academically able - it was workable. It isn't now because virtually everyone considers it the only ticket to a better life. But this is belied by the facts that: a) Many incoming students require remedial courses (e.g. in math, English)  just to get on a basic academic footing - driving up costs, and b) a large number (in some cases nearly 60 percent) drop out but still have massive loans to pay off.  Both these problems and expanding college costs would be managed in a Sanders-type tuition program by reducing the total population enrolling.

This elicits the question of where will the bulk of students leaving high schools funnel their aptitudes and energies if not in 4-year colleges and universities? The answer is in vocational-technical areas, for which there are many mid-level aptitude jobs available (e.g. aircraft mechanics, auto mechanics, electricians, plumbers etc, )

Are HS grads too "good" for these jobs? That's nonsense given the entire German labor system is predicated on apprenticeship for a craft. A terrific aspect of the German "master craftsman" model is that once one gets through the program required - including taking a number of examinations- he receives the equivalent recognition (including a certificate) of a Bachelors' degree. This is achieved with no additional cost.

The nature of master craftsmen in different countries can be found here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_craftsman

Clearly, the U.S. is in need of a similar system as opposed to expecting all HS grads go through the college route.

Another alternative is to make more use of the community college system and tailor HS guidance counseling to seriously consider the A.A. degree as opposed to pushing unqualified students into 4 year schools.  In his Dec. 14, 2014 piece on community colleges used for Voc-tech preparation,  education writer Dick Hilker quoted Rhonda Bentz (Colorado's media and government relations director) :

"the Voc-Technical route is the educational system's best kept secret. Students come for two year degrees and then get real jobs."

As Hilker goes on to note:

"In other words there are solid alternatives to spending big bucks at Big State U. to major in Tibetan Culture or Music Appreciation before winding up as a clerk at Mega-Mart."

A brutally frank observation, but which no rational person can dispute.

What does this all add up to? Well, that lenders need to be much more rigorous in terms of lending qualifications. It makes no sense to loan to those who are much more likely to struggle in completing a 4 year degree, and also have trouble repaying the loan.

All this means getting rid of the fanciful expectation that "college is for everyone". It therefore implies the corollary that free college tuition cannot be for everyone.

Of course, Sanders's Policy Director (Warren Gunnels), is not fond of this solution because, well, it lacks the "broad appeal" of just making tuition free to everyone without qualification. That implies Bernie wouldn't get as many young backers, but then it also means his campaign is more grounded in reality and less liable to attack by fiscal critics who brand it pie in the sky.

Let's even say his 50 c tax on each Wall Street trade starts out raking in the coppers, say to achieve the needed $750b over ten years. But how long is that likely to continue? Eventually the traders (and quants)  will figure out a refined scheme rendering those taxed trades redundant or too obscure. Then how will all that tuition be paid for? I also don't buy Gunnel's worry (ibid.) that if the policy isn't broad most people will treat it as a special "welfare program"

No, it won't be because in order to qualify the recipients will have to demonstrate sterling academic requirements like at least a 3.0 grade average and a minimal SAT score , say in the upper quartile.  The last is especially more justified now as the SAT standards have been melted down to the point there's no longer even an essay portion, guessing is no longer penalized and the multiple choice options have been reduced to 4, from 5. I mean, cheese Louise! But then the SAT is no longer even regarded as a scholastic aptitude test, see e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/08/why-so-many-past-aptitude-tests-are-no.html

 In addition, if high standards aren't kept up, judging the GPA after the first semester or more likely the first year, then the recipient stands to lose the free tuition. So in other words we have a meritocratic tuition program, not simply a mindless 'gimme' free for all.

This is how Bernie's free tuition program can work, and though its expectations have been  dramatically lowered from the stratosphere, they are more in line with fiscal and educational reality.  It can also be more aggressively defended as a practical solution and not just socialist jabberwocky or inflated political promising.

The bottom line is that no free tuition program should be expected for students not academically inclined in the first place, or who need remedial courses just to catch up with peers. Or those likely to drop out before completing their degrees.

All of which militates for the country to seek alternative training and educational paths for the bulk of the population.

Obama's "Free" 2- Year College Proposal: How To Pay For It?

Two weeks ago, Obama surprised everyone with a daring proposal  that "would make community college free for everyone who is willing to work for it". Alas, the White House provided no details on how it might be implemented, but one expects that will be taken care of when Obama delivers his State of the Union message.

In respect of the plan, Obama also noted in a Facebook message:

"It's not just for kids. We have to make sure that everybody has the opportunity to constantly train themselves for better jobs, better wages, better benefits."

This intention to make community college accessible for all ages is good, and I already cited (in my Dec. 15 post) a Denver Post op-ed by Dick Hilker who quoted Rhonda Bentz (the state system's media and government relations director)  that :

"the Voc-Technical route is the educational system's best kept secret. Students come for two year degrees and then get real jobs."

 Hilker went on to note:

"In other words there are solid alternatives to spending big bucks at Big State U. to major in Tibetan Culture or Music Appreciation before winding up as a clerk at Mega-Mart."


Community colleges, therefore, are  a definite solution that is both realistic and rational. Especially given that nearly 60% of incoming college students now don't finish their degrees. Thus, as Hilker put it: "California is now considering making a community college degree mandatory before a student can enter a state university"

Hence, Obama's free community college proposal could well lead to a more economic approach to getting a 4-year college education - and hence much lower student debt.  Alternatively, a student who can't finish a 4-year degree will now have an option, in most cases,  before s/he comes to the point of quitting. So rather than waste tens of thousands of dollars the student  will come away with something (A.A. degree or trade certificate) allowing them to economically advance.

 

 

Community colleges also provide a major economic solution because they can be accessed for half the cost or less of state universities, mainly because they aren't research institutions "where professors get big bucks for not doing much teaching" in the words of Hilker. This is also a boon given 51 percent of college students, according to a recent Brookings Institution study, don't even know how much student debt they will owe. (28 percent of entering freshmen don't.)

In respect to Obama's proposal, the White House said that if all states participated, some 9 million students could benefit - saving an average of $3,800 per year for a full time student. One projected cost estimate (cited by Carly Fiorina on Bill Maher's Real Time last Friday) is $60 billion.

Carly Fiorina

Ms.Fiorina then stated: "This isn't going to be free, and someone will have to pay for it ....taxpayers!

 

 

But there are ways to take it on using budget  offsets, as opposed to adding that amount of new taxes. For example, if we withdrew all our remnant 10,000 troops from Afghanistan by mid-year, that would save about $60 billion which could be put towards this education plan. Take your pick: bottomless waste pit or constructive education!

Another option is to cut $60 billion from the bloated defense budget itself. A rational place to start cutting is the white elephant, problem-laced F-35 which cost overruns currently estimate to lead to $0.3 billion each before production ends. Some 2,335 of these are planned - and to make a $60 billion offset all that's needed is to reduce production by 200. That leaves 2, 135  F-35s- still more than enough for all service branches!

 

 

Let's also bear in mind that under the plan states would put up part of the funding.

 

 

There are also ways to control costs by stipulating qualification requirements as well as retention of benefits.  For example, not every manjack who thinks he wants to go to college should be given a free pass. There must be preliminary evidence of being a serious student, say in his or her high school record. At the very least then, a high C (e.g. 2.8)  average ought to be the minimum requirement for entry into the program.

 

 

What about continuing the program? Under the Obama proposal participating students would be required to maintain "a modest grade point average". Of course, the devil here is in the details. What exactly is the definition of a modest grade point average? Is it 2.0? Is it 2.2?  What about 2.5? This threshold will have direct bearing on continuing costs.
 

The plan on paper looks promising but we will be looking for Obama to provide many more details about it in his State of the Union!

Four Year Colleges Aren't The Only (or Best) Solution for High School Grads!

LEFT: Loyola freshman Theology class, ca. 1964.  All incoming students had at least  SAT scores  in the upper 25th percentile - and no such thing as remedial courses were heard of.  Also, the SAT was a genuine aptitude test back then -not an achievement test.


  I have always believed that a college- university degree is not just about getting a top paying job, but also being given the tools to attain a better quality of life.  Those tools include: critical thinking and reasoning skills, exposure to a wide spectrum of ideas, philosophies, and 3) appreciation of literature and art.  Sady, most high school grads and their parents aren't looking for college to teach the art of living but in fact to earn a good living. Though, most will be majorly disappointed as they will end up either over-educated with nothing to show jobwise for their investment, or they will have spent thousands of dollars they can't afford - with no degree- and ending up with a minimum wage job.

Is there an alternative that is rational and practical? Yes, and it requires people - students and parents- not to look at a four year college as the only solution for high school grads. As reported in the Denver Post November 15, Colorado now needs 47 percent more  workers to fill "middle skill" jobs: RNs, airplane mechanics, auto mechanics, electricians, plumbers etc. Colorado, also, is not unique in such mid-level skill job needs - one can find them across the country.

Are High School students too "good" for these jobs? That's nonsense given the entire German labor system is predicated on apprenticeship for a craft. A terrific aspect of the German "master craftsman" model is that once one gets through the program required - including taking a number of examinations- he receives the equivalent recognition (including a certificate) of a Bachelors' degree. This is achieved with no additional cost.

The nature of master craftsmen in different countries can be found here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_craftsman


As noted in the section under U.S.:

"While guilds as such do not exist, many trades continue the apprentice-journeyman-master model. Carpenters, electricians, pipefitters and plumbers are notable examples. Even in academia, the tradition survives, with elementary, middle and high school completing general education; with post secondary degress awarded in the Associates, Bachelor and Master levels; and PhD students as apprentices, post-docs and associate professors as journeymen and full professors as masters."

These are aspects of which most people may not be remotely aware.

The natural route now to craftsman status and good future work in the U.S., as noted by Dick Hilker in his op-ed piece in the Denver Post yesterday, is the community college. Hilker quotes Rhonda Bentz (the state system's media and government relations director)  that :

"the Voc-Technical route is the educational system's best kept secret. Students come for two year degrees and then get real jobs."

As Hilker goes on to note:

"In other words there are solid alternatives to spending big bucks at Big State U. to major in Tibetan Culture or Music Appreciation before winding up as a clerk at Mega-Mart."

A brutally frank observation, but which no rational person can dispute.

Here's another brutal fact: those who believe they will be saved by higher aspirations, i.e. going into academia via the Ph.D. route, are also in for a shock. Universities across the board are now scaling back costs by hiring more and more adjunct professors and lecturers, many of whom now have to go on food stamps because they can't cobble together enough 'gigs' (teaching courses at different colleges,usually)  to earn even a lower working class level income.

These are facts, not fantasies.

In the case of astronomy, we in The American Astronomical Society are regularly besieged with dire warnings of the pressures brought to bear by budgetary constraints on astronomy and astrophysics jobs. One editorial in an AAS Newsletter noted, for example, that more than 6 out of 10 jobs for Ph.D. degrees in astronomy are currently outside the academic marketplace. The percentage is slightly better (5 of 10) for Masters recipients.

The newly minted astrophysics or astronomy Ph.D. basically faces a herculean task in getting his or her foot in the academic door. First, he must compete with postdocs - those with Ph.D.s already in hand who now are hired at lower than standard pay rates to teach classes and work for 3-5 years "earning their stripes". Next on the totem pole are the graduate teaching assistants who teach tutorials as well as lower level classes and problem-solving sessions. 

Finally, there are the adjunct lecturers, who are paid by the hour only and hired just to teach a course or two. Adjuncts receive no benefits at all and are what some call the "temps" of the academic world. 

Prognostications now are for academia to go nearly 90% adjunct by 2030, with the attendant economic insecurity.  There are no trends, meanwhile, to counter this as universities are scrambling for more funds not to hire more general academics in their disciplines but to hire more 'star' professors, Nobel Prize Winners, etc. - who can bring in the research grants - but who also cost a lot to support.

Community colleges, meanwhile, are a definite solution that is both realistic and rational. Especially given that nearly 60% of incoming college students now don't finish their degrees. Thus, as Hilker notes "California is now considering making a community college degree mandatory before a student can enter a state university"

Thus, a student who can't finish a 4-year degree will now have an option, in most cases,  before s/he comes to the point of quitting. So rather than waste tens of thousands of dollars the student  will come away with something (A.A. degree or trade certificate) allowing them to economically advance. 

Community colleges also provide a major economic solution because they can be accessed for half the cost or less of state universities, mainly because they aren't research institutions "where professors get big bucks for not doing much teaching" in the words of Hilker. This is also a boon given 51 percent of college students, according to a Brookings Institution study, don't even know how much student debt they will owe. (28 percent of entering freshmen don't.)

It is time for serious alternatives to four year colleges, if we are to get the massive student debt - now over one trillion dollars- under control.