Elite schools make it easier for people who have money (but aren’t too academically inclined) to get into positions of political power by building credentials and connecting with a community of smart people.
If you take 2000 valedictorians and 500 rich douchebags, have the 500 rich douchebags pay to educate the whole lot, and everyone comes out with a common brand stamp, who benefits?
Answer: Everyone involved!
Taking away federal funding (as if that were politically possible) would slow it down a little bit, but the rich douchebags are really, really rich. They'll just pay a little bit more. I don't know how you're going to stop that without a totalitarian state.
What about the rest of us? Did we benefit that George Bush (who claimed never to read a book at Yale) got the certification of an elite degree? What you are saying is the equivalent of saying everyone in the mafia benefited by being part of the mafia.
And btw before anyone talks about how Yale (or any other elite school) is private and can make their own decisions - no - they receive MASSIVE amounts of government funding. Princeton receives more per capita government funds than Rutgers.
So the only thing that would matter is whether or not the Bush-type families of the US benefit from the system that is in place. The commenter is positing that the answer is "Yes". I agree with that assessment.
(1) It would look bad for everyone involved.
(2) The schools would lose their prestige.
Right now, if I want a good lawyer, I look to Yale, followed by Harvard/Stanford/Chicago. I have a 70% chance of getting a brilliant lawyer, and a 30% chance of getting a rich douchebag. For law firms, it doesn't actually matter too much, since reputation is mostly circular.
If I want a good engineer, I look to MIT/Stanford/Caltech. I have a 80% chance of getting a good engineer, and a 20% chance of getting a rich douchebag. That's not a guaranteed hire, but it gets you in the door. Hopefully, my interview will screen out the rich douchebags, but it doesn't always. That model is breaking down a little bit, since people are starting to notice that the typical engineering applicant from e.g. Georgia Tech, Northeastern, or similar is better than MIT/Stanford/Caltech+++.
Upside to rich douchebags: They're past the first round of all hiring processes. Between university brand and network, their kids can always find at least upper middle class jobs. In a best case, they can go on to be president! Or if they're running a company, they don't look obviously nepotistic.
+++ It's worth noting there are sample biases here. Most qualified MIT/Stanford/Caltech graduates can find jobs without going through proletarian hiring processes, so the people who do actually apply for jobs through my web site are prefiltered.
What we're talking about is the connection, during formative years, of the academically gifted to the ultra wealthy and ultra powerful. The idea that this would result in less prestige is fanciful in the extreme.
The thing that gives elite universities their reputation both their academic reputation and the elites that attend them. If they lose the academic reputation, the unis become irrelevant and might as well be a party house for rich people; no one will care except tabloids. If they lose the elites, the universities will still be prestigious universities.
So to spell it out, what I’m saying is that rich people attending elite universities are not important for elite universities. It mainly benefits rich people.
I think when people say Princeton receives a lot of federal money, they are talking about research grants, and possibly the effective subsidy that comes from the tax deductible status of donations from rich people. Each of these adds up to a lot more money than the Pell grants.
If you take away the rich people, the school won’t be able to afford to operate this way.
I believe the point was that these schools don't need to accept subsidized student loans or other forms of federal funding. That doesn't mean only admitting rich people; they have enough resources to offer student aid to bring in the academic overachievers on their own, thus maintaining their reputation without federal help.
"Overhead" then funds $200 million buildings, million dollar salaries, yacht clubs, financial ponzi schemes, press/legal/branding departments, and what not.
The rest would have significantly less spots in college, if this funding method was gotten rid of. So less people would be educated.
If rich people going to an elite college results in significantly more spots at that college being funded, then that is a benefit.
And only some of that money comes from donations. Much of it are your taxpayer dollars at work. The direct way is to donate money. The indirect way is to swing government funds.
Ok, well it is more people than the amount of spots that they take up.
> Those schools have more money. No one else does.
Ok, so if an elite person takes up one spot, but the extra money allows 2 more spots to open up, then that is a net increase in total number of slots. So that is still a benefit to the extra people who can go to that college.
Subsidizing college education ultimately opens up a spot in higher education for everyone.
It's short-sighted to view the wealthy people manipulating our institutions with their money as our providers. They literally paid for the opportunity for people to view them that way.
Where do you find these numbers? Have a link?
Even in my own state, the flagship university was threatened with a cut off of public funding under the previous governor. It was a bit of an open secret that internally to the university, a large number of people wanted the funding to be cut. This would mean they'd no longer need to carry the financial burden of all the automatic admits from within the state.
In reality, it’s the rich that benefit by getting connections to a network of future political operatives, academics, media people that allow them to use their wealth in order to advance their political interests.
It is pretty much pre-ordained that those are intelligent and those who are rich will find ways to network with one another so that both of their causes are advanced. For the highly intelligent that might be getting funding for a startup idea. For the rich that might be having access to network effects to cement their political power base.
It's not that the current system is inevitable, it's that any deviations from the current system which may be possible are relatively minute when it comes to this particular facet. All of human history has told us so.
He got jobs and power because his daddy was President. Not because he went to Yale.
I think these schools think its the opposite. They'd rather have someone who already has power within their network.
* A community of rich folks who get to look smart-by-association
* A community of smart folks who get networked into the power networks
All the decision-makers would lose out on this. Why would this even fly? George Bush Jr went to Yale and Harvard. He looked smart. And, a bunch of people were friends with the President. Folks like him make the laws.