Higher Education: A Self-Perpetuating Entity?

What End Does It Serve? Why It Matters To You!

Christopher Marsh

When I was at Shepherd College, I was too caught up in close friends, caring professors, and interesting classes to think about colleges and universities who must have revenue to survive.

Later, at Marshall University, and don't get me wrong, I had close friends and faculty there too, and the classes were interesting, but where the student body is at least three times as large, bureaucracy was more obvious. It was also obvious that Huntington, WV was in the middle of an area with less opportunities than, for example, Washington DC.

The Federal government, hoping students will earn more money with more education, lends money for higher education to postsecondary students.

Colleges and universities must have revenue to exist, even if they are not for profit, to pay professors and staff.

Eventually, a majority of students graduate and get a credential, whether or not it leads to a job. Some are employed, some aren't.

Here are some things I learned about life as I approached graduation with a Master's degree.

People often earn a portion of the wealth they generate for others. Football players, TV anchors, and movie stars catch the eye of America. Advertisers and producers sell us stuff while we watch news and entertainment. Perhaps we need to be informed and entertained, but public servants with clear and important roles, like public school teachers, police officers, and the military, earn relatively little compared to celebrities. Celebrities can command raises because they, and not others, are watched by Americans, but public servants can be more easily replaced.

People like to exploit profits to their advantage. If Business Person can hire people more cheaply, s/he will. His/her net profit is based on gross (actual take) minus expenses (taxes, rent, insurance, etc., but especially wages paid to workers). S/he will probably exploit profit to the company's advantage, especially if there are stockholders who like to get profits and will take their investments elsewhere to maximize profits. On the other hand, Employee Person will take advantage of a labor shortage to raise his/her wages. However, as large companies can relocate abroad more easily than families, business holds an advantage over labor.

There is no law against starving to death in America. If your degree is perceived as having little value to employers, or if you are one of millions of graduates, you might not get a job. Theoretically, you could starve or freeze to death in the United States.

As long as the number of job seekers exceeds the number of jobs available, somebody has to lose.

Let's think like a business person for a minute.

• At all times, your goal is to maximize profit, because you will probably get a piece of it.
• If you don't maximize profits (if somebody else receives profits), your stockholders won't be happy.
• The stockholders might do better elsewhere.
• The stockholders might take their money elsewhere.
• If that happens, kiss your five-year investment plan goodbye.
• Your products might cost more than those of your competitors.
• You can expect that buyers won't buy your products as much as before, under those circumstances.
• The stockholders, or your superiors in the hierarchy, might perceive the need to replace you.
• Maximizing profits means minimizing wages, among other things.
• But you can't mimimize them below the minimum wage or too low to attract employees if there are better options (but recent immigrants to the United States are a possibility, especially if they have computer skills).
• In any case, you don't have to employ somebody 40 or more hours a week, and incur overtime wages of at least $7.73 an hour, and maybe benefits as required by law. Just hire two or more people, whether or not they can live on what you pay them.
• Hiring employees who are obviously overqualified may incur some drawbacks, according to social research.
• Maybe, just maybe, if you can find some subtle, maybe illegal, way to pay a woman or another minority of equal ability to a Caucasian man about 29% less than a man, go ahead and do it, because profits rise when labor costs fall.
• If you are in a large company, the last person you would approve in an interview is a person who probably will do better than you, and replace you, in the long run.
• If all else fails, and you need cheap educated labor in a large city, target the college graduates still living with Mom and Dad down the street, especially the ones getting close to the end of their student loan unemployment deferments. There will probably always be a few of those in every large city.
• It doesn't hurt to relocate to a poor state like West Virginia: if you are only game in the county, so much the better.
• If you are on the labor end of the equation, you might accept lower wages given increased competition, because, as said earlier, it is theoretically possible for you (and your dependents) to starve or freeze to death in America, especially without the welfare system.

Isn't a rational view of the job market depressing?

Even if you succeed in getting and keeping a job, realize that what is true this year may not be true next year. Workers are easily replaced in the United States: one can often be interchanged for another. If you are thinking of marriage and/or parenthood, keep your expected salary and job stability in mind. Jobs come and go, but children still need to eat.

It goes without saying that an unplanned pregnancy, especially during school, could easily interrupt the quest for a credential, making it harder to get a job that is adequate to care for not just oneself but also a child.

Career planning is a serious business: your life could, at least theoretically, depend on your career choices. Go to the career counselor. Plan carefully. Just because a professor has a job doesn't guarantee that you will too.

A businesswoman in California, shortly before I received my Master's, remarked that one of my professors "was never in business". I am not sure if he was or not, and if he was, how he did in the business world, but I have had a lot of time since graduation to think about what she said.

"There are no points for second place" in a job interview. You need to have a first-place education. Make sure you get it. Theoretically, it could be a life or death matter.

What You Can Do

• Ask tough questions.
• Get honest answers.
• In your first semester of college, use the psychology department and/or the career center to assess your interests, strengths, and weaknesses (academic ability, emotional maturity, social skills, time and stress management skills, leadership abilities)- avoid fields that maximize your weaknesses, but maximize careers using your abilities.
• Immediately after that, consider which fields you like and can do are the most employable now and for the next five to ten years, and note what graduates make in each field, on the average.
• Consider how long it takes to become competitive in that field: is a Bachelor's enough or do you need grad school? How long are you (and maybe those depending on you) willing and/or able to wait and spend? For example, those getting off welfare often try to increase income potential in the shortest possible time.
• Check and see what recent graduates in your prospective major are doing now.
• Work with your career counselor and academic adviser to make that career a reality.
• Keep a reality check at all times by reviewing monthly the employment section in a newspaper of where you probably will look for a job (a big urban area, like the Washington Post for Washington-Baltimore-northern Virginia.
• Make sure you are getting the training- and computer skills- you need, according to the newspaper, even if you have to transfer to another school to get it!
• Try to get job-related experience, preferably off campus, but on campus if you must.
• If you have student loans, minimize your student loan burden by whatever way you can- you will pay it back later. I compared Direct and Sallie Mae consolidation loans in September 1996, and I found the Direct system more to my advantage (no student loan burden if you are earning under the poverty line, and cancellation provisions on the unpaid balance after 25 years). Perkins loans may have some cancellation provisions depending on your career field.
• Try to estimate costs of living where you are likely to work and live- consider your student loans, if any.
• If you have a disability, know your rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act, and consider exercising them if your rights are threatened.

Good luck.