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Does US Owe the World an Education At Its Expense?
An anonymous reader writes "'Right now, there are brilliant students from all over the world sitting in classrooms at our top universities,' President Obama explained to the nation Tuesday in his pitch for immigration reform. 'They are earning degrees in the fields of the future, like engineering and computer science...We are giving them the skills to figure that out, but then we are going to turn around and tell them to start the business and create those jobs in China, or India, or Mexico, or someplace else. That is not how you grow new industries in America. That is how you give new industries to our competitors. That is why we need comprehensive immigration reform." If the President truly fears that international students will use skills learned at U.S. colleges and universities to the detriment of the United States if they return home (isn't a rising tide supposed to lift all boats?) — an argument NYC Mayor Bloomberg advanced in 2011 ('we are investing millions of dollars [actually billions] to educate these students at our leading universities, and then giving the economic dividends back to our competitors – for free') — then wouldn't another option be not providing them with the skills in the first place?"
in France. :)
They come, study, get a diploma...
And go away
For all that time, free university, free medical expenses...
F*ck socialism, it killed my country.
Oh, wait, we do.
For every immigrant that comes over here, we send the "donor" country back one of our citizens. We get an engineer, and they get a TV talk show host or a Senator. Seems like a good trade to me.
-- MyLongNickName
Yes and here's a freebie
Does the US Owe the World an Education At Its Expense?
Just a cursory fact check should inform the "editors" of this article that international students are cash cows in many universities and actually keep many colleges open.
Ironically the burden is directly the other way around. International students help fund the programs that local residents benefit from.
The best way to avoid a fight with someone is to be friends with them. The first step in becoming friends with someone is actually meeting them.
Competition between international businesses is much preferable to war between nations.
Everything is better with chainsaws.
The way this submission is crafted invites a flame war, but ok, let's tackle it.
The submitter is evidently not aware that the vast majority of international students pay full freight and then some when they attend a US school. So, in the small picture, that's why US universities market to them, at a time when US students are having difficulty ponying up (for a variety of reasons), and state legislatures are cutting funding for the public institutions.
Bigger picture, yes, we're educating the competition, but we're also familiarizing the next world elite with US culture much as the British used to, making the world ever more US-centric. Given the economics for the schools, believe me, these students are going to come. So, we might as well make it easier for them to stay AFTER we've educated them, and thus allow them to add value to the US (culturally, economically) over the long run. If we create the brains, why encourage them drain back out into the world?
Luke, help me take this mask off
Two problems with this outlook:
1. It misses the benefits of having foreign students in the US, and having our own students exposes to students from other countries without needing to travel (so those who can't afford the time/money to travel still get more exposure). These benefits are far reaching. If we became a country with world class universities closed off to non citizens - we'd rapidly feel a diplomatic bite, and face more insidious harm long term.
2. A college education is more than just job training, and the perspective and growth it provides are only allocated to a small portion of the populace. We need to be talking about making college as universal, free, and affordable (for society) as high school. Then we'll see some real progress.
The current situation does inure some benefits to the U.S., but in not easily measurable ways which is why they're not talked about all that much.
My observations when I was a college student was that international students would gain a perspective on the U.S., Americans, our life, and our culture which was different from what they expected when they first arrived. I assume when they went back home that this new perspective would cause them to evaluate their own local press and government statements about the U.S. in light of their first-hand experiences and knowledge. I had lab partners from Saudi Arabia, Ghana, and mainland China, all of whom I was able to talk with about perspectives and impressions of the U.S., and I have no doubt that each of them had a more nuanced and healthier view of the U.S. after having lived here.
If you want to stabilize relations with China and various Muslim areas of the world I think we'd be well served to invite far more of their students to study here so that when they go back home they can correct the thinking of their friends and family. Likewise the Americans who have a chance to study with them will realize that by and large "people are people", dispelling the simplistic "us versus them" mindset we seem to be afflicted with.
Cyrano de Maniac
The context of these remarks is immigration reform. I think the point is, "if they come here for an education, we should focus on attracting those people so they STAY here, and contribute to the US economy." They come here, pay thousands of dollars in tuition, and then take all the valuable skills and knowledge they've acquired, and leave the US... which doesn't really help the US expand its economy - they're not starting companies here, paying taxes here, and creating jobs here.
US immigration policy is, first, last, and only, for the benefit of the US. No country knowingly adopts and keeps immigration policy that is actively harmful to its interests, and President Obama is suggesting that US policies are harmful to us, and so need to change.
As far as "a rising tide lifting all boats," when Reagan said essentially the same thing, it was called Supply Side Economics, and Trickle-Down economics, and "Voodoo Economics," and it was roundly dismissed as foolish bullshit. Since TFS uses the phrase... I'm curious what relationship it has to President Obama's proposed policy?
International students are the ones that are paying full price for our universities, and they're the ones that keep our universities funded.
Universities court international students like it was nobody else's business.
A good part of the US GDP can be traced to actually selling higher-level education to international students. Consider that each international student brings in $50k+ to the US GDP, and multiply that by the number of students per year. It's easily a bigger industry than Hollywood.
I'm surprised that Government doesn't allow more sales of education to international students. Our economy could use that money.
Foreign money really does grow an economy. Consider also that in the 90's, the immigration door was wide open. Millions of people came to America. Now consider that each one needs to buy a house, at $100k+ each... you could pretty much explain the incredible GDP growth back in the 90's by our open border policy back then, and you saw how it hit our economy when we closed the borders after 9/11.
It's our competitive advantage that the best and brightest young people from all over the world want to come to the USA to study. It helps us to brain drain the rest of the world for our own benefit. We should do more to keep these people in the USA when they graduate. Most want to stay. Even in cases where they do go back to their own countries, we gain soft diplomacy by exporting our way of life to other parts of the world.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
There is a balance. We feel free to bomb anywhere on the world, its only fair we provide free .edu anywhere on the world. It balances out, sorta kinda not really.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
then wouldn't another option be not providing them with the skills in the first place?"
Spoken like an american who has no clue how good he has it, which is saying a lot given how terrible US education is.
In India, or China or the middle east, assuming the program you want exists there are far more qualified applicants than there are places. So that's the first hurdle. Those spots may be decided by bribes, clan, political connections, or gender. And not 'oh they bias admission to black slightly' I mean 'they don't let you in if you're a woman' kind of bias.
Once you're there you have a problem. All of those political connections, bribes, clan loyalties etc. determine who gets the test questions in advance, and who doesn't. The US system, for all of its faults is relatively honest. If you get a 70% on an assignment then you can be reasonably sure that the identical assignment submitted by someone else should have gotten about 70%. And not 100% for being in the right clan, or 0 for not paying the right bribe to the right person today.
You can't just 'give people skills'. Skills come from practice, honest evaluation and actually being taught something related to the skills you are trying to learn. Those things are work, sometimes hard work, and they cost money. Which is why some places regularly charge a huge amount of money for foreign tuition. You aren't going to become a good programmer by watching youtube videos, and you have no way to prove you know how to program if no one will honestly asses your work. That's why the very best and brightest from a lot of places get sent away: because even their own governments don't trust their own education system.
Do you have any idea how empty that would leave our campuses? (Not to mention our faculty offices ...)
BTW: I teach at University level.
That is a nice thought - we can only hope it would play out that way. Currently kids either have to come from some serious wealth, have truly exceptional high school records, or be part of a minority group to get into most Universities. BTW: I have kids in high school and have been looking into it lately.
Hey, if it also emptied out faculty offices then it could help solve our unemployment problems a bit as well!
Hosting top foreign students is about as close to "win/win" as you get, depending on how it's managed. They pay tuition. They do research. They spend money on basic necessities while here (rent, food, etc.). Sometimes, if we're lucky, they stay here after graduating and become citizens. Highly paid citizens who are likely to contribute more in tax revenue and economic activity than they consume in govt. services. That is to say, the exact type of citizen we want to attract.
Someone with a similar opinion:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/modeledbehavior/2012/10/09/the-20-billion-export-industry-that-the-government-is-holding-back/
In practice the US benefits by being able to select the best foreign students, sells them overprices education at a tremendous cost and then it will have the opportunity to keep a good percentage of them.
And of course it would be much more dangerous for the US to reject this slice of the world population, because they would be perfectly able to build a similar teaching / research structure if they would need to...
They come here, pay thousands of dollars in tuition, and then take all the valuable skills and knowledge they've acquired, and leave the US... which doesn't really help the US expand its economy - they're not starting companies here, paying taxes here, and creating jobs here.
Somehow, I think the thousands of dollars, which is more like 10s of thousands of dollars in tuition in addition to 10s of thousands of dollars in living expense, is a significant shot in the arm to the US economy.
Especially when you have to consider that if they stay, and manage to get a job, or start a business, they will
a) recruit people from their own country to move over for marginal wages, or
b) start their own "foreign aid" program, exporting cash back to their family over seas rather than spending it here, or
c) some exponentially growing combination of the above.
Of these, the foreign aid types are the worst. They take a job from the US workers, then export significant amounts of cash back to god knows where. A double whammy for the US. Even if they do pay taxes (highly questionable) they claim all sorts of deductions for back home dependents.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
I came to this country to attend university and nothing was handed out to me. I paid full tuition and all living expenses out of my pocket. So, I actually brought money in and helped the US economy. Not only that, but after getting a degree, I STAYED and became a heavily taxed US citizen. So, not sure what the point of the article is.
...That is why we need comprehensive immigration reform."
Does anybody REALLY believe that this is why Obama want's 'comprehensive immigration reform' (translated: amnesty)?
Or do we think that he wants to pass reform so that he'll have a few million illegal aliens granted citizenship so that they can vote for his party?
Yes, all those 15 million illegals that crossed the Southern border, along with their offspring are hard at work studying and excelling in various STEM disciplines so that they can help build a better USA. "Fields of the future?" I think it's more likely that they're working in the fields right now.
I've got nothing against hard working immigrants. If I was in their shoes, I'd be doing the same thing. I blame the federal government for a deliberately failed immigration policy.
Meanwhile, they learn the local language and culture. They are more likely to do business with you.
The reverse is also true: US students will learn that there are people outside the US with different cultures and beliefs to their own and that, if they want to do business with them, they will need to take this into account. Since they provide this education for free to US students perhaps the question should be "Does the rest of the world owe the US an education?"...or we could just agree that its a mutually beneficial arrangement that we all learn about different peoples and cultures and leave it at that.
This is the most blatant lie I have read in a long time. US has benefited enormously from the influx of highly educated immigrants, whose education was paid for other countries. The US got them FOR FREE...
I bet that there are many, many more fully-educated foreigners coming to US than people who pursue their "cheap but good-quality" (really?) education in US then move abroad to benefit other nations.
The ones who peddle the idea stated in the summary are either disingenuous or don't know how good they have it.
I have to undo some mod points, but this is so wrong I couldn't leave it unchallenged.
Great. You found ONE.
The problem is staggeringly large. For you to sacrifice your precious mod point to hand-waive the problem away is ridiculous.
From Investopedia:
Each year, billions of dollars are sent by migrant workers to their home countries, with some estimates putting the total value of remittances at more than $200 billion. For some countries, remittances make up a sizable portion of GDP.
The Economist: on these private transfers:
Since 1996 they have been worth more than all overseas-development aid, and for most of the past decade more than private debt and portfolio equity inflows. In 2011 remittances to poor countries totalled $372 billion, according to the World Bank (total remittances, including to the rich world, came to $501 billion). That is not far off the total amount of foreign direct investment that flowed to poor countries. Given that cash is ferried home stuffed into socks as well as by wire transfer, the real total could be 50% higher.
And, don't forget Wikipedia
Remittances are playing an increasingly large role in the economies of many countries, contributing to economic growth and to the livelihoods of less prosperous people (though generally not the poorest of the poor). According to World Bank estimates, remittances totaled US$414 billion in 2009, of which US$316 billion went to developing countries that involved 192 million migrant workers. For some individual recipient countries, remittances can be as high as a third of their GDP.... A majority of the remittances from the US have been directed to Asian countries like India (approx. 66 billion USD in 2011), China (approx. $57 billion USD)and Philippines (approx. 23 billion USD)
Next time, before you burn a whole mod point, do just a tad of research.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Speaking as a Replubican, the American right wing that I'm familiar with doesn't have anything against legal immigration. I certainly don't see anything wrong with cutting all the red tape and bureaucracy out of the process to get a greencard. Get rid of all the crap and have straight forward tests on US history and English and if you have a degree in something that matters or a good job lined up you're in. Most people I see objecting to this are actually quite a bit left of me. They feel that the US should do more to care for it's own citizens and guide more of them into these fields and they certainly don't like corporations getting work visas for these kids after they are out of school instead of hiring locally.
International students paying MORE money to Universities to fill their coffers drives prices up? Did you even read what you wrote? International students are only charged higher BECAUSE Universities don't have enough money, and would have to raise tuition prices for locals OTHERWISE.
our riches are built on two weak neighbors and an ocean that kept the war out in the 1930s/40s. We were the only ones that didn't get blasted into the stone age when mechanized warfare happened. The middle class (which is largely what people mean when they say 'our riches') was an accident following WWII. Pretty much everyone fought in the war and they came back war heroes entitled to a bright future. That plus fear of communists seizing your factory kept good paying jobs here. Well the baby boomers are retired and the current war vets are coming home to Walmart jobs. The US isn't vibrant, it's rapidly dying as a bunch of ppl with low self esteem and the opposite of an entitlement complex race to the bottom.
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What makes American schools the best in the world (especially at the graduate level) is that they admit the best students in the world. Stop admitting the students, and the schools will no longer be the best. It's that simple. Furthermore, top professors/researchers choose their universities on the basis of where they have access to the best students, which makes this proposition a vicious cycle. So, American schools would lose their edge in less than a generation.