Quote (Thor123422 @ 30 Nov 2020 08:30)
If anything it creates a glut that is filled by other countries.
We don't educate enough skilled professionals so we import them. My school was a great example of what not to do. We had a great business department that was ridiculously funded, spent millions on a new football field, and had a crumbling chemistry physics and engineering department and a biomedical department that was only good for turning out premeds with zero options if they dont get into medical school.
This is pretty common in the states. Our educational priorities are way out of whack and it mostly stems from private influences bilking the system just like our healthcare system
@bold: maybe, but I was talking about top end researchers, about the upper echelons of human achievement where you're really constrained by IQ and talent. Even if all talented Americans had great funding and opportunity to pursue a career in research, your population of "just" 330m would still not be able to produce as many of these top tier people as you can utilize. Siphoning them off from China, India or Europe is to your benefit. The problem you're mentioning is only indirectly related to the point I was talking about.
But yes, you're right that the American system is wasting a lot of talent because the profit-orientation gets its priorities wrong. Case in point: coaches in college football. Nick Saban being paid a salary of $8.6m per year by the University of Alabama is definitely what the state needs.
Quote (bogie160 @ 30 Nov 2020 02:00)
I mean that discretionary spending on infrastructure, technology, sciences, and education represent good investments from which we can expect to reap rewards.
The problem isn't that government spends money on these things, but that the money spent is poorly used and wrapped up in layers of bureaucracy and red tape that imbed perverse interests into the process. Bureaucracy needs to be streamlined, regulations of firing government employees cut, but at the same time there is a dearth of investment that needs to be rectified, and government salaries need to go up if government agencies have any hope at siphoning off a small slice of private sector talent.
100% agreed.
This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Nov 30 2020 04:07am