Oh my god, it melted.

Who knew hundreds of empty classrooms could fit into a space the size of 3 of those trailers?

"Get eight teams -- the top eight teams right at the end."

Which top 8 teams would those be - the ones ranked highest in the computer, or by the coaches, or by the sportswriters? Oops, maybe we need a playoff to determine who gets into the playoff. But who would get into that playoff? It's almost as if you need a whole season to... oh wait.

Just think, this jacknuts is going to be President of the United States in a couple months.

Yes, we should of course mention the non-inflation-adjusted differences because they are much larger and more impressive sounding.

Seriously, kid, I have nothing to gain here. I am not going to play the game. It's up to you whether you want to view any given issue as an opportunity to gain knowledge, or to "win." Choosing the latter, you will only be hurting yourself.

KDR, please show me the same conclusions from a non-flaming-libertarian source. The problem is that when it comes from Cato I feel like I know exactly what it will say before I've even seen it. It's the same basic reason I don't read e.g. workers rights articles from Socialist International.

KDR, I am not going to waste my time compiling a lit review for you for the same reason I would not waste my time trying to convince a colorblind person that grass is green. In the end life is too short. If you want to use my own laziness as "proof" of your "facts" then I guess you are rightest person on earth.

Please don't equate government-subsidized higher ed with government-subsidized housing. The former actually provides a net benefit. And unlike a bad mortgage, you can't jingle-mail your diploma even in a chapter 7 bankruptcy.

Of course many students in college right now are in over their heads. I guess I just don't feel like it's up to me to tell them where they should be.

KDR81

Here is an exercise to keep you honest. The library at UNLV has a lot of article databases which contain the full text of such economic studies (most of which are not available through Google). You could go to their website, type in a search for say "higher education" + "funding" + "economic impact" or somesuch and be presented with an unbiased list of studies on the matter from all kinds of different sources. This would allow you to perhaps learn about the topic in more detail rather than carrying on in blissful but vocal ignorance.

You've helped pay for these resources, so why not make use of them. You could come back here and report on your findings without having to resort to citing cato.org, npri.org, goldwaterinstitute.org, etc. You could learn, and then the readers here could learn from you. It would be a beautiful thing.

A lot of people are ill-informed about a lot of things and that's OK. It's a complicated world out there. But I don't understand why anyone would want to shy away from the truth, whatever that might be. Or misrepresent one rather marginal side of an issue as the one established truth. I'm sure that is not your intent.

KDR81,

Allow me to reply to your pap as succinctly as possible. I'm not even going to comment on your NPRI, Goldwater Institute etc. spam. That leaves not a lot left.

1) "You bet" there is a lot of fat that can be cut. That's nice. Add it to one of the million other bets made in this town every day and roll the dice.

2) Nevada taxpayers are free to fund public education or not. The 144 year-old Nevada State Constitution happens to have a little tidbit in it that would certainly appear at first blush to mandate SOME public system of higher education at SOME level. However, voters are free to amend the constitution to eliminate this, and there is a process in place for doing so. If a small group of extremists such as yourself were to decide that this is unfair, and decide that they are not willing to abide by said Constitution, they would be free to leave the state. But they should be reminded that it's "worse" (i.e. the education system is better) almost everywhere else except maybe Mississippi, and they are comparatively extremely lucky to pay as little as they do for what they get.

3) Students are free to go to college or not. NSHE is free to hire whoever they want to teach whatever. Students are free to decide whether they want to take said class taught by said prof or not. Accreditation committees are conversely free to grant accreditation to NSHE or not. NSHE is free to continue along with or without accreditation. Employers are free to care whether a degree is accredited or not. As an avid NPRI reader, you must know what "coercion" is. Show it to me. Show me where it is happening.

4) The goal of a public university is to take from the public as little as possible in order to benefit the public as much as possible, economically and socially. That is its reason for being. The public university requires public support, by definition. If universities had the effect you describe of leeching off the public teat, providing lesser benefit than what was put into them, you would find that the NPRI junk you cited would be mainstream and not fringe. In non-fringeworld, Public higher education is a time-tested source of incalculable public benefit that has been recognized by generations of people around the world as one of the most fool-proof sources of social and economic well-being there is. It has been embraced by all developed non-libertarian-extremist peoples in every region on earth.

Good enough for me. I have absolutely no reason to be anything BUT proud of our university system for all the sometimes-unappreciated good I KNOW it is doing, even in the face of an abnormally large population of libertarian fanatics.

Nance, there are no unions in NSHE. We are talking about funding for NSHE in this thread.

KDR81, this is in response to your 2nd post. Professor salaries are absolutely set by the free market. That public universities receive partial public funding is irrelevant. Any university is free to hire incompetent BScis to teach cellular biology. That would be a joke of course, and that university would quickly become a laughingstock etc. But free market doesn't mean free labor.

1) Many years ago a bachelors degree was a privilege that was not awarded to just anyone who could walk and chew gum at the same time. The bar is now lower. It is now increasingly helpful to have a bachelor's to have any chance at getting past In-N-Out swing shift manager. Sorry.

2) Tenure is awarded only AFTER professors have demonstrated their academic worth and expertise. Tenured professors have some additional protection vs. non-tenured but this does not amount to a free job for life. On the contrary the work level does not really decline. These are extremely competitive positions and for the most part, non-Ph.Ds could not qualify for them anyway.

3) In Nevada, i.e. here, there are no such unions.

4) A college degree or Ph.D. is of course what you make of it.