A few things with which I’d like to interject…

At 18:30,
Herb believing he’s in the same boat as someone who works at McDonald’s who didn’t finish high school is a fallacious argument given the fact that he’s received a certification to advance in our economy. Not only does Herb have the potential to earn higher wages than someone who didn’t finish college, he’s also acquired the ability to learn and to think. So, really, it’s a temporal argument for Herb. He has the potential to earn a higher wage as a result of his education not only due to the fact that he received a piece of paper, but because he has learned how to think about things in our society. And in an information economy, the products that sprout from your brain are what are valued. The statistics about the benefits of receiving a certification from an instuitution of higher learning use “lifetime income” as the point of differentiation.

To Fallon’s & Amy’s point: Debt is the key to the over-evaluation of a college education.

We are now viewing college as an present investment in future earnings, and the market has organized itself to “exploiting” these hard financial decisions people are making for somewhat non-financial reasons (be they emotional, societal, or due to perceived familial obligations).

In the same way that insolvency of the healthcare industry is a result of the asymmetric information of the healthcare market, the consumers of healthcare services are ignorant of the technical aspects & true value of their care. The newest technology is not always what is necessary, but we have a predilection for believing it is. This non-rational viewpoint is something that affects the market in a negative way in the long-term.

This same trend has arisen within higher education, where the perception of value is what is distorted most. Listen to TV spots from universities, and they explicitly declare what the value of an education will mean for a student after-the-fact. This is a market, again, and the consumers of higher education can’t perceive the true value of what they are receiving. They believe the piece of paper itself is what matters, when it’s really not. The one organic thing that is often overlooked is what was discussed at the 33:00 mark where the people you know are the ones that will help you produce what you are capable of producing. That’s what college affords you, and unfortunately I feel we squander most of that potential.

At 22:45,
the point that the uneducated & poor are not invested in/knowledgable about the way in which the system operates. But the flip-side to the argument is that the capitalistic, information economy the US is now entrenched in is not conducive to allowing its subjects to reach their full potential. We do not value education in and of itself when it is the only way in which one can improve their current state, which is basically what Omar argues at the 23:00 mark. So, it’s not necessarily the poor & disadvantaged’s fault for the fact that their local school system does not provide each student with ample opportunity to fully understand the world they live in. (I, personally, have had every opportunity, both educational and financial, to achieve success in this world, and I can’t imagine how scary it would be to be wanting of anything I’ve been provided.)

But we set it up that way. Our public school system is not holistic and siloes each school district in accordance with the established municipal boundaries. This is fair when considering each school district individually, but unfair when taken comprehensively. If we are to operate as a society, we cannot derogate the subjects who are not afforded the same opportunities given systemic constraints.

It is the expediency of achieving a credentialing that will get us to the next level. The person who has the means, yes, does not have to worry about fundamental comforts and is allowed to stay informed about the structure in which s/he operates. But the shitty thing about a democrazy is that everyone is allowed their political voice once in the ballot box. It’s supposedly the great equalizer, but before that voting station is ever set up, there are so many other factors contributing to the disadvantaged’s interests being ignored. I speak of campaign finance, but that is all I will say on that subject.

At 50:30,
the point is men are socialized a different way than woman are. Collectivism, listening, and all basic communication skills are what our society values given the shift in our economy. I remember reading this article a few years ago (http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-end-of-men/8135/), and I find much value in the things it posits. The US economy does not incentivize

That’s all I got.