Why doesn't Britain have almost-free education like in Western Europe?
Posted by hgk6393@reddit | AskABrit | View on Reddit | 431 comments
I live in the Netherlands as an immigrant and I observed that Dutch nationals get free college education (it is not totally free, but the amount you pay for tuition is ridiculously low). On top of that, if you manage to start a Masters program right after finishing your Bachelors program, that is also very cheap. This has massive effects on the society - people are not burdened with debt when graduating, they can afford to buy a home if they make smart choices in their 20s etc.
I have colleagues here from Britain who graduated college with 50k euros of debt. That's too much! I always though Britain was very similar to us or the Germans or the Scandinavians - large government that looks after everyone and doesn't let people make poor decisions that they will regret later.
Why doesn't Britain have free college?
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
Do you mean college or university? There is a distinction in the UK.
As far as I'm aware college is still free in England.
The UK is also compromised of 4 states. University education is free for Scottish students in Scotland.
zookeeper25@reddit
What’s the difference between college and university in the UK? Not a Brit
T4NK82@reddit
Generally university offers bachelors degrees (ba,bsc etc) , masters degrees (ma) and PhD (doctorates) as well as other post graduate courses like pgce (to become a teacher). To get into one you need either a levels or equivalent college course btec/nvq. Or if your studying as a mature student you might be able to get onto a course based on life/work experience.
College Generally offers post 16 qualifications a levels,apprenticeships, vocational courses, other qualifications such as btec and nvq. Most colleges will have facilities for courses that will help you get qualified in an industry our local one does lots in trades/construction, hospitality, beauty but also has great art/design facilities).
I hear university is around £9k a year, college courses can be free, heavily subsidised or there maybe a higher cost depending on your age or financial situation.
I graduated uni in 2007 when the fees for a year were £1k . I didn't feel like it was worth it then, the cost now is crazy
Cheap-Vegetable-4317@reddit
It's too complicated for even British people to understand!
Our school system is that you go to school until 16 and take examinations at the end, which called GCSE's (General Certificate of Secondary Education). Then you do A level (Advanced level) from 16-18. Your A level years can take place at school, if the school offers teaching for those years, but it may take place at a Further Education College. These offer post secondary school education and it is usually what people are talking about when they say 'college'. It is what the people in this thread are talking about.
Further Education colleges offer A levels and vocational qualifications, or sometimes just A levels or just vocational qualifications. Some FE colleges even offer qualifications up to degree level and these will be accredited by a university.
However, this has only become the primary use of the word college fairly recently. It used to be that the word college was completely interchangeable with the word university and until about 25 years ago, when people said 'My son is at college' it often meant university. Older people are still likely to use it in this sense.
Because of this older meaning there are still many universities in the UK that have the word college in their name. So for example, University College London , Kings College London, Imperial College, The Royal College of Art, Trinity College of music and the Royal College of Music are either universities in their own right now, or they are part of a federation of several autonomous colleges that have joined together to become a university. The Royal College of Music, Kings College London, University College London and Goldsmith's College are all autonomous institutions that belong to the University of London. The two most famous British universities, Oxford University and Cambridge University are collegiate universities, which means they are made up of smaller autonomous colleges that belong to the larger university organisation.
Just to complicate matters further, College also used to be a word for school, so Eton College and Winchester College are called College even though they are secondary schools.
So to sum up but probably not clarify at all, mostly people are talking about A level or vocational education ages 16-19 when they talk about college, and that is what people in this thread are talking about. But older people will often say college when they mean university and people who have been to Oxford and Cambridge, Imperial College, Royal College of Art, etc, may also talk about college but mean the specific part of the university an individual belongs to.
Cheap-Vegetable-4317@reddit
As people below are saying, there is no age limit for doing A levels and their vocational equivalent qualifications. However the education system is geared towards 16 to 18 years doing them, for example older people may have to pay while 16 to 18 year olds do them for free, and that is when most people do them.
TADragonfly@reddit
Universities offer academical degrees (Bachelors, Masters, PhD).
Colleges offer vocational qualifications and certifications. If you want to be a top-notch plumber, College would be a great starting point.
jordancr1@reddit
For context: Education Certificates in the UK range from Level 1 to Level 8.
High School is Secondary Education (Level 1 to Level 3) which is only available to children from age 11-18, you must attend by law until age 16. The highest award available is A-level which is Level 3, which will allows you skip college and obtain direct entry to University.
College is a lower level of learning (Level 1 to Level 5) which includes vocational learning. The highest award available at College is Level 5 - Higher National Diploma (HND). College is generally available to the entire population age 16+.
University is a higher level of learning (Level 4 to Level 8. The highest award being a PHD, which is Level 8. Masters being Level 7 and Bachelors is Level 6. Entry criteria for university requires someone to obtain qualifications at Level 3, 4 or 5 (exceptions available to people who have significant work experience in their field of study).
VexedRacoon@reddit
If you've seen Community, college in the uk is like that. Community college.
gnu_andii@reddit
College is 17 & 18 year olds. Some instead stay in school for the same period of education ("sixth form") but not many schools offer this.
Low-Cauliflower-5686@reddit
Sixth form is not a thing in Scotland
First-Banana-4278@reddit
That’s not entirely accurate. Colleges (outsides of sixth form which in England are a different thing) over below degree level qualifications (for the most part) and Universities offer degree level qualifications.
There is no age limit for either university or college study.
Balseraph666@reddit
Some colleges can offer foundation degrees and now some batchelors degrees, like Cannock College.
silvermantella@reddit
Yeah you can get lots of people of all ages doing btechs, diplomas, foundation certificates, English language quals etc at college.
Or just retaking a levels or gcses
In fact I'd argue people 19 and older make up a much higher proportion of college users overall than 17-18 year olds. Particularly when you include part time courses people do alongside working- e.g. catering/it/decorating etc
I also disagree that its rare to have schools with sixth form - they might not all have them but it's very common. In my county the vast majority went to a 6th form - the college had a reputation (possibly unfairly) for being for the people not clever enough to stay in school (which considering you only needed 5 GCSES was a pretty low bar!)
I dont know why people extrapolate their own very limited experience and decide with such certainty it must be universal
gnu_andii@reddit
Sorry if it was not clear, but I did not make any claim that my experience was universal. It is difficult to give universal answers when education is devolved across the UK and then further dependent on individual local councils and trusts. Honestly, I just wanted @zookeeper25 to have some answer other than a snide remark about Google, which was the only reply when I answered.
I don't really see any evidence that your experiences are universal either. Sixth form was certainly not common in Sheffield in the late 90s. To go to sixth form as I did, you basically had to go to one of the less than half a dozen schools that had managed to retain one, all of which were in the wealthier side of the city, about an hour's bus ride from where I grew up. It sounds like they fared better at keeping them in your county.
"I'd argue people 19 and older make up a much higher proportion of college users overall than 17-18 year olds" -- maybe but then you are comparing a three year age range with one of about eighty! My expectation - and my intention with my original statement - is that the greatest consolidation of students in a single age range would be 16-18, likely dwarfing 19-21, 22-24, etc. if you were to compare with equally sized ranges. In the other direction, I also think it's unlikely you'd find many people of 16 or 17 in a university.
There is a good reason for this. When I was at school, about 90% of people leaving school went onto college. It is likely even higher now, given the minimum wage is lower for those under 18 and (at least in England) it is now a requirement to stay in some form of education up to 18. So, if you meet a random 17 year old, it is far more likely they are in college than a random 25 year old.
SuCkEr_PuNcH-666@reddit
I went to college in my late 20's to do an HND. My brother is also currently in college at 32.
Acerhand@reddit
These days its a bit different. Even dramatically from only 15 years ago. Most schools have a sixth form now. Its actually rare for them to not have one anymore. Students also have to opt out of sixth form now, where as you had to opt in before and legally could quit education at 16(now you have to continue to 18 even if at college).
Its so common that sixth form is basically referred to as year 12 and year 13 these days at schools.
Most people at colleges will be older than 18 nowadays, most commonly 20-30 imo, but still planty of 16-18 year olds who opt for it, its just less common now due to changes over past 15 years which make it more work to go to college than just automatically going on to your school until year 13
Foolish_ness@reddit
So it's the exams you typically take at those ages, as opposed to those ages?
dont_debate_about_it@reddit
Keep in mind I many parts of England if you don’t have a college education and you’re over 19 you dont automatically qualify for free college education.
FormalHeron2798@reddit
College or technical college is usually for “trade” skills whilst university is for “academic” skills
alphahydra@reddit
College = usually vocationally-focused and most courses are at sub-degree level (Diplomas, Certificates, secondary school/sixth form level qualifications, ESOL courses etc.). Some have limited degree-awarding powers, but its not the bulk of what they do, and never/almost never award degrees at postgraduate level. There is rarely, if ever, any real academic research carried out at Colleges, except maybe at some very specialised institutions.
University = usually academically focused. Degree-level courses are the norm, and there is almost always a large amount of activity at postgraduate and postdoctoral level too. Most teaching staff are PhDs, there is a focus on producing published peer-reviewed research, and more senior teaching roles are often expected split their time between lecturing and research (i.e. actively pushing the envelope of new knowledge/discovery in their field, instead of just teaching established knowledge).
throaway_247@reddit
I can do woodwork at Oriel College?
alphahydra@reddit
No obviously not everything with College in the name is a college in the sense we're talking about (i.e. university vs college). There are prestigious university level institutions that call themselves College (e.g. Colleges of the University of Oxford) and secondary schools that call themselves College (Marr College, etc.) but they're not "colleges" in the sense of "did you go to university or college?"
In typical modern UK parlance, "college" used in the abstract refers to technical, further education or sixth form colleges.
wildskipper@reddit
As others have said, colleges in the UK offer different types of qualifications including the qualifications you need to attend university. They don't offer degrees.
In addition, college is also used in the large, old universities to refer to distinct academic and student communities, essentially mini universities within a university. The University of Oxford has 30 colleges for example. This is the origin of college = university in the US. When Harvard was founded it was modelled on and akin to a college, and that terminology stuck.
Distinct-Goal-7382@reddit
It's education between university and secondary school (16+18)
Dazz316@reddit
The person saying it's for 17 & 18 years old was only partially right. That is definitely one part.
They also do training for trades. Plumbing electricians, joinery, etc. They do access courses for for universities, some of which help you skip years but doing enough for the year or two you're at colleges They do everything from hairdressing to programming.
I went for a year initially at 18 doing social sciences and there was a woman in her 40s doing it. I dropped out after a year, returned at 24 to do Tech Support.
It is really just an educational centre offering things from later school qualifications to a wife stay of training and qualifications.
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
Do they have Google in your country?
zookeeper25@reddit
Naah.. only Reddit
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
That's very unfortunate.
merlin8922g@reddit
States?? What are these 4 states you speak of?
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
The Montevideo Convention on the Rights and Duties of States defines a state as possessing four key characteristics: a permanent population, a defined territory, a government, and the capacity to enter into relations with other states.
This definition, established in 1933, is widely recognized as the standard criteria for statehood in international law.
merlin8922g@reddit
Aye, I know 'state' can be used to refer to countries and non countries alike as well as positions such as 'head of state', I've just never seen it used when talking about what are conventionally referred to as countries.
For example, I've never heard anyone say 'England is a state in the United Kingdom', always a country. Or Peru being a state in South America, Spain being a state in Europe etc etc.
Just made me wonder if you knew Wales was a country.
I could see American's making that mistake.
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
I'm Scottish, I'm from a colony.
merlin8922g@reddit
That then went on to help your new king establish more colonies! Good lads!
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
Yeah man, cool bro.
motownclic@reddit
States? You mean countries?
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
No.
Pure-Nose2595@reddit
The UK is comprised of exactly one state, a nation-state, The United Kingdom. It has four constituent countries.
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
At best regions, provinces, nations, or statelets.
But let's be honest colonies.
Normal-Ear-5757@reddit
It is NOT. There are exceptions but you can't just up and take a course without getting whacked by some pretty heavy fees.
AdPuzzleheaded4331@reddit
Depends on age though? Kids under 19 will get it free. Anyone else will pay.
Ayitch@reddit
*countries
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
Country as per 1933 Montevideo Convention on the Rights and Duties of States.- a settled population, a defined territory, government and the ability to enter into relations with other states.
I was being generous with the term states.
grumpsaboy@reddit
But because of that the Scottish universities have started taking a lot more foreign students than they used to and so fewer Scottish people actually get university now
Maximum_Law801@reddit
Foreign students pay (a lot) to study in Scotland.
Full_Change_3890@reddit
Plucked that out your arse didn’t you?
Longjumping_Win_7770@reddit
In 2010 the number of Scottish students attending UK universities was 156,820 in full-time programs,
In the 2023-24 academic year, approximately 281,500 students were enrolled in Scottish universities or institutes of higher education. This figure includes 173,800 students domiciled in Scotland, 33,100 from the rest of the UK, and 73,900 international students.
Unless you have evidence for your claim it doesn't appear to be true from the figures.
reproachableknight@reddit
Basically down to a combination of things
The conversion of hundreds of former polytechnics and higher education colleges into chartered degree awarding universities in 1992.
The right wing tabloid press hated students and during the 1980s and 1990s ran several stories about students getting plastered on cheap pints at the student union bar, doing class A drugs, having promiscuous sex, going on rent strikes and staging protests against Tory politicians being given honorary degrees by their universities, all while pretending to understand James Joyce and Michel Foucault on honest hardworking taxpayer’s money. They also complained about students doing “Mickey Mouse degrees” on taxpayer’s money like sociology and media studies.
Tony Blair in 1997 wanted to get 50% of 18 - 25 year olds in university. That was more than 3x the number currently in university and it wouldn’t wash with the taxpayer
Caris999@reddit
Also, Tory party in coalition with the Liberal Democrat’s abolished free university education.
reproachableknight@reddit
No Labour abolished it in 1997. The Coalition government simply increased the tuition fees.
Caris999@reddit
I stand corrected! Ty.
SelfDesperate9798@reddit
Scotland does
Unknownusername53@reddit
We do. The student loan system in this country is arguably better thought of as a horribly regressive graduate tax. On the pre 2023(ish) system, assuming you made no special effort to pay it off, the vast majority of earners never would and would have their debt cancelled 30 years after graduation. In the meantime repayments were an extra band of income tax, being 9% of everything earned over about 28K. The changes lowered that to 23K, basically minimum wage, and extended it to 40 years. As a simplification let's assume a constant wage across this period. To pay it off naturally, on the 30 year scheme, you would have to earn around 60K, assuming 4 year degree and max maintenance loan. Most won't earn that much. It becomes regressive when you consider that: People from wealthy backgrounds don't take on the debt and therefore aren't subject to this 'tax'. People who get a highly paid job straight out of university will pay it all off quickly for less than a teacher will spend on it.
I should note these numbers are likely slightly off, I calculated this model on my own situation 3 years ago and I can't be bothered to look it up at the moment but it gets the point across, there's probably a fade in band aswell.
Vegetable-Egg-1646@reddit
It used to be like that. Then Labour under Tony Blair decided everyone should go to university to do a degree, it didn’t matter how irrelevant it was.
Costs rose so they had to start charging fees.
Another Labour win.
PomegranateV2@reddit
It used to be like that. But more and more people started going to university so the cost rose enormously.
Once a saving has been made, no subsequent government wants to find the extra money again.
Marvinleadshot@reddit
The right wing press like The Sun etc were whinging and campaigning for students to pay long before Blair's push for 50% of people.
They constantly ran stories in the early 90s of students getting pissed "on tax payers money" it was considered by the Tories as something they might bring in and Blair said in '97, Labour wouldn't bring it in, about 2 months after his win he introduced it.
But all it has helped do is dilute the worth of a degree to the point where it's now basically pointless to go for most things, however no government has really pushed alternatives.
LibelleFairy@reddit
well, of course they did - they're propaganda machines for the bankers who get rich from handing out loans, and for the corporate and landlord classes who benefit from having entire generations of workers who are up to their eyeballs in debt and terrified of losing their incomes or the roof over their heads, so they put up with exploitative working conditions, bad pay, shitty housing, and some of the most egregiously insecure and exploitative rental contracts anywhere in Europe
the reason no government has really pushed alternatives is because the leaders of the main political parties are fully in the pockets of those exact same corporate interests
Marvinleadshot@reddit
Student loans aren't handled by banks, do you understand how they work?
brightdionysianeyes@reddit
The student loan book (essentially the loans & the right to collect payment) is sold off every few years. Cameron sold the legacy loans in the mid 2010s, then May/Johnson sold the rest from 2017-2022 1.
The government only owns the 2023-2025 student debt, all other repayments are facilitated by the Student Loans Company but the returns go to the private financial firms which bought the student debt.
Fluffy-Antelope3395@reddit
The student loans company is still going? Are they still an utter shit show?
Whoisthehypocrite@reddit
How exactly is the government selling off the loan books while still being responsible for the terms and conditions and servicing of the loans any different to raising debt in the gilt market to fund the student loans. Either way the government pays interest to the private sector.
brightdionysianeyes@reddit
Because they sell the loans to the private sector for less than the value of the loan & expected interest. Otherwise the private sector wouldn't buy it as it would be unprofitable.
It also means any subsequent government can't cancel the debt or renegotiate repayments without paying off the private companies.
It's short termism basically.
Whoisthehypocrite@reddit
You are misunderstanding what is going on because of your ideological view on this.
The private sector will buy government debt at the prevailing rate for risk free bonds. It has nothing to do with the original interest rates only what current market rates are and no different from buying gilts.
It will also have no difference on government ability to renegotiate or cancel the debt. If it hadn't been sold and they cancel it, then they never get the money. If they have sold it and cancel it then they got the money and have to pay it back. There is no difference
Selling the student debt can be a very good financial decision for government. If rates fall, it can sell the debt at above race value. So £100 of debt can be sold at say £102. Plus selling the debt allows government to reduce debt levels and hence it's financial profile.
brightdionysianeyes@reddit
Nope. You are failing to appreciate the mathematics.
This is not government bond debt. This is not gilts. This is the right to collect student loan debts from individual citizens. These loan debts have a higher interest rate than bonds/gilts (currently for the 2012 onwards cohorts the interest rate is 7.3% while UK government bonds between 3.5-4.5%).
Also mathematically you are wrong on the selling debt. The private company makes a profit dividend, money which could otherwise be returned to the taxpayer at large through the exchequer or the students themselves. Otherwise there is literally no incentive for the companies to have bought the debt in the first place.
Student finance was set up to cover the costs of tertiary education, not to become a money maker for financial companies.
Whoisthehypocrite@reddit
You don't understand finance or how bonds work. Stick to your day job and try to be rational and not ideological. You are stuck in a mid set of private bad public good.
brightdionysianeyes@reddit
My day job is finance babes x x
BG031975@reddit
Bet you’re skint then.
brightdionysianeyes@reddit
Refinancing existing debt at a higher interest rate is more expensive, and if you have sufficient capital to avoid incurring additional interest payments you should avoid additional interest payments.
Like you don't even need to be a professional to understand this, you just have to understand that 7.3 is more than 4.5 and you're good.
Basic maths, you intellectual fanny.
BG031975@reddit
Fanny by gaslight!
brightdionysianeyes@reddit
Bicycle fanny
BG031975@reddit
Fancy a bum?
brightdionysianeyes@reddit
Your comments are in and they've been described as "tedious, boring and stultifyingly ill-informed." So thanks for that.
After-Cell@reddit
Sounds like Murdoch pushed killing education on behalf of the loan industry.
It’s amazing that something so unpopular can get through.
If this, then anything. The emperor has no clothes.
apainintheokole@reddit
A good proportion of the people i went to Uni with, did spend their loan getting pissed, or buying playstations etc. They would then get to the end of the month and realise they were broke!
Marvinleadshot@reddit
Then that's on them.
StillJustJones@reddit
It was nowt to do with the amount of people in higher education. It was an ideological choice by right leaning governments.
Absolutely a way to keep great swathes of the population in a state of servitude.
libsaway@reddit
I mean, it has to be paid for. Either from the general population, or the people benefiting from it. We have amongst the lowest taxed lower earners in the western world thanks to that.
StillJustJones@reddit
‘Or the people benefitting from it’
You mean society as a whole? We all benefit from a better educated better trained highly productive population…
bateau_du_gateau@reddit
In what way has society benefited since the push for 50% to go? Be specific. Should be easy for a graduate of your prowess.
StillJustJones@reddit
I can’t be bothered to continue to argue with thickos who are ideologically set in their ways…. Thankfully there’s plenty of evidence and strong arguments to prove there’s value in an educated population.
With an educated population there’s better social mobility, better social cohesion, better health and quality of life outcomes, higher voting uptake, higher adhesion to social contracts, less child poverty, less crime, less likely to be reliant on state or charity support, less abuse of drugs and alcohol…. The benefits go on and on and like ripples in a lake continue to spread.
Read this: https://www.hepi.ac.uk/2024/01/25/the-value-of-higher-education-in-developed-economies/
joesnopes@reddit
Anything published by HEPI on the value of higher education finds it hard to get past the Mandy Rice-Davies Test:
'Well, they would say that, wouldn't they.'
StillJustJones@reddit
Well you’re not going to find any right-wing or libertarian think tanks doing studies and research into anything to explore societal cohesion and outcomes that help the general citizenry.
Aaaaand…. if you’re a ‘well they would say that’ kind of person you’re not going to want to accept that kind of research anyway. 🤷♂️
libsaway@reddit
I don't think that justifies the general population paying for my expensive Computer Science degree. I'm quite happy to pay for it myself.
Weepinbellend01@reddit
They benefit from you being a more productive citizen and paying higher taxes. It’s not a zero sum game.
You can benefit as well as the general public! It’s why education is one of the best ways to have a country develop further.
Far_Reality_3440@reddit
I think thats an argument to fund degrees based on whats needed in the country and discourage people from doing degrees that won't lead to a job.
libsaway@reddit
They do, but the benefit is vastly concentrated with me. I'm happy to fund my own education, and I think advantageous financing is a great way to do it.
And hell, you look at the figures and we're doing pretty damn well on tertiary education. Extremely good universities, pumping out good numbers of grads.
Weepinbellend01@reddit
If something is a net positive, why stop it if one party is significantly favoured.
Sure in your case you can fund your own education to provide more to the system. But in lots of other cases, more people can provide a net surplus to the system with cheaper uni fees.
It also incentivises being more productive. For example let’s say instead of paying 9% of your paycheck each month, student loans were rolled into your taxes too.
It would incentivise going into higher paying professions as you “offset” you student loans, giving an incentive for people to go into higher paying jobs providing more into overall taxes. Are you picking up what I’m putting down?
The current system penalises the poorer parts of the population and overall just drags down take home pay of the most productive members of society (young hardworking people).
TrainingVegetable949@reddit
The individual benefits the most though.
StillJustJones@reddit
Because they gain the ability to be socially mobile which has massive benefits to the next generations, therefore massively benefitting society.
TrainingVegetable949@reddit
I think my point in still valid though. Society doesn't benefit to anywhere near the level that the individual does for their degree.
MidnightPale3220@reddit
On the contrary. The cost to the society is quite low.
A university degree appears to have new max price of around £10K per year. At average of 4 years and max price, that's £40K maximum currently, afai understand.
Assuming society pays that cost, even if it was distributed evenly (which it isn't due to progressive tax), that'd be the 10K (per year) distributed over 30 million working people, which makes it around, what, £0.00003 per year per working person per one university education. So, you could have 10K educations given for the price of a single coffee per working person per year.
And after the student gets the degree, and gets a job, he starts to pay into the system himself. Being better educated and hopefully having a better paying job, he is also contributing to next educations provided then, too.
StillJustJones@reddit
It does over time.
In my view it’s the kind of thing that’s a generational investment in society.
It’s a leveller.
Something that our inherent established classist system doesn’t seem to be up for…. There’s a short term view about such things.
Same with the NHS, clearly expensive, but there’s massive value in having a healthy and well treated population…. But yet it’s being dismantled brick by brick, trust by trust… because there’s no long term view.
TrainingVegetable949@reddit
I am not sure I understand what you mean. The majority of the extra value that you can create as a result of reading your degree goes to private profit, both to the worker and the owner. The taxman benefits from higher wages but that is as a result of skills and not education.
Society hasn't benefitted from my degree anywhere close to how much I have.
StillJustJones@reddit
Really? Maybe you come from a privileged background already?
Is the leg up in life you have coming from your parent’s education and social standing? Did some of that trickle down already? What were your expectations in life from teachers, family and peers?
What kind of social and class status would you have without the access you had to higher education?
How would your access to higher wages, quality housing and routes to a better life have been?
What about the degree educated ‘you’ passing knowledge, aspiration, expectation to the next generation?
Not questions I want answers to, but perhaps some to reflect on.
I’ve worked within Adult Social Care, public health, and community and voluntary services for over 25 years and I can confidently tell you that life chances, quality of life outcomes, overall health outcomes for you and those around you (not just family but wider community) dramatically rise when you and those around you are well educated.
TrainingVegetable949@reddit
This comes across sort of unhinged as it isn't really relevant to me but you are making my point.
> What kind of social and class status would you have without the access you had to higher education?
My socio economic status would be much lower if I hadn't done my degrees. Access to education has improved my life far more than my life has improved society and it isn't even close.
StillJustJones@reddit
Are you being purposefully short sighted here?
Your improved socio economic status improves that of those around you by huge amounts.
Your kids will have better outcomes. Your whole family, social circle and community will have better outcomes. All through education.
If you are well educated there is a better chance in your community for better social cohesion, tolerance and for there to be lower crime rates. There will be better social mobility and higher chances of social capital being built/trickled down.
Better educated people are less likely to be smokers, have longer life expectancy, have better health literacy, are less likely to excessive users of drugs and alcohol…. All wins for society.
Surely you understand that the opposite of those have HUGE costs personally and to society as a whole.
TrainingVegetable949@reddit
I understand the point you are making but it doesn't detract from the point that the degree holder benefits orders of magnitude (maybe an exaggeration?) more than the general population per degree and it makes sense for them the bear the majority of the financial cost.
Far_Future_3958@reddit
that's just not true, you're assuming people with degrees are more productive but that isn't always true, the UK already has the most overqualified workforce in the world by quite a margin
ChrisGunner@reddit
I don't think paying someone to do a course in Anthropology is "better educated better trained highly productive".
jackjack-8@reddit
Society wont benefit from your lesbian dance theory degree.
TheHalfwayBeast@reddit
It'll do more good than most people with a Business degree. At least lesbian dance theorists aren't steering the runaway train of end-game capitalism towards the extinction of all life on Earth.
jackjack-8@reddit
I’m not calling for ‘free’ business degrees either.
StillJustJones@reddit
Fuckin hell…. That’s a crock of shite and a standard daily mail/GBeebies kinda trope.
Yes society will benefit from a community who are skilled and educated in arts, performance and theatre.
Look at the Edinburgh Fringe - brings in a fortune and is world renowned. Britain is known for its actors, artists and performers… except more than ever it is now becoming class exclusionary as the costs for entry to the arts means anyone without wealth is screwed.
jackjack-8@reddit
Tell you what get your hand in your pocket and sponsor a local budding artist.
Not all degrees are equal.
guytakeadeepbreath@reddit
We're half a percent under German, France, Spain, and Sweden.
libsaway@reddit
Half a percent what?
guytakeadeepbreath@reddit
Average taxation percent for low incomes.
AdPuzzleheaded4331@reddit
Tbf, the grants you pay back are not bad. Though if you can get the grants then yeah that would suck.
Whoisthehypocrite@reddit
Clearly if only one person went to University it would be easier to fund than if the entire population did.
The real issue here is that the school system is so shit that universities take up the position of giving someone school leaving skills.
Dry_Yogurtcloset1962@reddit
labour were the first ones to introduce a proper fee.
LibelleFairy@reddit
yes - it was Tony "war criminal" Blair's Labour party
the biggest coup of the conservative establishment in the UK was their full on takeover of the Labour party in the 1990s - Labour have been right wing since Blair
for a while, they hid underneath a facade of social progressiveness (marching in the Pride parades, same sex marriage, that kind of thing) but with Starmer they are now going full mask-off and letting the last bit of pretense drop
StillJustJones@reddit
Your point is? I stand by my comment. ‘New Labour’ were in charge… not ‘left wing’ at all…. Barely centrist to be honest. Look at the shit they got the NHS in with all the ‘public, private initiatives’ … we’ll be paying those shitty deals back for generations and the quality of the builds and infrastructure was incredibly questionable.
SnooMacaroons2827@reddit
You're right, apart from it was the Tories (John Major specifically) that introduced PFI as a form of PPP. Blair's mob ran with it.
chat5251@reddit
Ran with it? Sprinted with it more like...
Dry_Yogurtcloset1962@reddit
I don't think they were left but they also weren't right, just horribly centrist
StillJustJones@reddit
They were further right than Labour’s socialist roots had ever been.
Dry_Yogurtcloset1962@reddit
Yeah- so centrist
InternationalBat9903@reddit
"Centrism" doesn't exist.
crowwreak@reddit
Yeah, Tony Blair's Labour.
MoffTanner@reddit
The amount of people going to uni has steadily increased almost non stop since the 40s... With big boosts in the rate of increase around the time fees were introduced by Labour and then increased so heavily by the coalition.
It's difficult to argue it wasn't a contributing factor to the decision to outsource the funding.
Sophie_Blitz_123@reddit
Other way round. They start charging for it and their income depends on it. They are then incentivised to cram their subjects as much as possible, they market it like a product and they lower their entrance standards.
The UKs version is particularly ridiculous because fees don't rise with inflation they are capped ergo every few years a crisis of funding is guaranteed. Some subjects are far cheaper than others, so this leads to situations where they cram in humanities students so that they can afford the engineering department.
Unusual-Thing-7149@reddit
Yep. Free degrees for me. My brother went to medical school for free too. Ah those were the days...
Serious_Escape_5438@reddit
I got my degree for free, both my younger siblings had to pay.
DadVan-Soton@reddit
It was never funded by govt. It was funded by local authorities.
The universities lobbied Whitehall to change the rules and let them get more money. Their argument was that Britain would fall behind the EU unless universities were better funded (lies) and this was Tony Blair’s fault.
Initially loans were super-low interest, and Cameron though no fuck that, and upped the interest at a time when inflation was effectively 0%
Wild-Wolverine-860@reddit
People also started getting degrees in Harry potter and stuff that really doesn't have much use to the country as a whole.
So I'm all for charging for them, as a graduate, should earn more over their career.
I know it depends on when you graduated I did so 20 plus years ago, how you pay it back a d when etc. but as far as I'm aware very few if any? Pay up front for degrees? It's norm just a % over X salary etc and I don't think its classed as a debt when looking for finance/mortgage etc.
I may be wrong on some minor points but good old redditors will correct me!
dubblw@reddit
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone: published in 1997.
Universities stopped being free in the UK: 1998
They’d have to work bloody quick to get a curriculum and degree together in time to get a “Harry potter degree” for free in that time.
BabadookishOnions@reddit
It's also not really that strange for it to be a module on a literature course, it's one of the most well known and influential recent works of literary fiction.
dubblw@reddit
I didn’t say Harry Potter didn’t deserve to be on literature courses, I said it was impossible for “Harry potter” degrees to be the reason why students now have to pay fees at university.
BabadookishOnions@reddit
I wasn't accusing you of saying that, someone further up implied it and I was adding on to what you said about it making no sense to be mad about this?
Psychological-Fox97@reddit
Oh come on mate you didn't really believe the Harry Potter degree story did you?
You're one of those people thay thinks they put litter trays in school toilets for the kids thay think they are cats and dogs aren't you.
Does kinda highlight the failings of our school system I suppose.
OilAdministrative197@reddit
Yeah i mean the harry Potter thing was just right wing rage bait, think it was like one modules on an English degree at one uni and it's probably one of the most influential British texts in modern British history so hardly wild. It's not like were pumping out millions of wizards yearly.
Yeah none of us pay it up front, I think nowadays after a masters, student loans probably like 50k no including housing and living etc which could easily be the same again. Ironically it results in our most skilled and talented like doctors who spend the longest at uni having the highest debt and so the highest incentive to leave the uk after graduating. Most of the them have probably 70-100k debt now assuming 5-6 years education.
That said you never really need to pay it off, it's essentially a 10% tax on earning so if youre a grad you pay 10% higher tax than non grads on the same salary. Think you need to earn around 75k before you even start paying off the interest on the loan because the interest rates are so high. Its basically designed to be impossible to pay off.
Uk is actually more expensive than america because so many people get scholarships in America for relatively mediocre performance or staying in state which isn't the case in the UK.
LibelleFairy@reddit
this is misrepresenting history
student tuition fees were introduced in the late 1990s - right through until the mid 1990s, tuition was free, and a lot of students qualified for grants - free money from the government to assist students from poorer backgrounds with costs of living while they studied
but through the 1980s and early 1990s, economic policies and deliberate political decisions completely re-structured the economy of the country, and a lot of the jobs people could walk into straight out of secondary school just disappeared - tertiary education became an expectation, and then a straight up requirement for any job that would offer any semblance of financial security
LibelleFairy@reddit
when "New Labour" emerged, there was a deliberate political push to get as many people as possible into university, ostensibly as a way of supporting opportunities social mobility - it was one of Blair's big electoral promises - and concurrently with this push, young people who chose not to go for tertiary education were increasingly stigmatized and portrayed as lazy, unambitious, etc etc etc
so young people were pushed into university degrees by teachers and parents and popular narratives, and the (perfectly justified) belief that a degree was increasingly becoming a basic requirement for a secure financial future
then the absolute *** in government pulled the rug from underneath those very same kids, first by abolishing grants and introducing student loans - these were pushed heavily onto 17 and 18 year olds in the second half of the 1990s - teenaged young adults who had absolutely zero way of understanding how taking out these loans would fuck up their life were getting marketing propaganda shoved through the letterboxes of their student halls from loan providers telling them to "get 10k now! buy that car! free mobile phone with your new loan!" - and they were handing these loans out to anyone and everyone. (Source: I was there. I witnessed this shit first hand.)
Once student debt had become entirely normalized (and this happened fast! over 2 or 3 years max!), the government introduced tuition fees, arguing that "there are now too many students and universities can't cope financially unless you all start paying fees". When the record number of students was a direct consequence of the entire political establishment pushing kids into university!
"You won't ever amount to anything, you useless lazy arse layabouts, unless you get yourselves to university!!!" >> "There are too many of you at university!!!! Each of you has to pay us thousands of pounds immediately!!!! Did you think this would be free?!??? You entitled little shits!!!"
These fees were initially capped at somewhere around 3k a year, but then those caps were progressively lifted over subsequent years.
And of course the introduction of tuition fees fully embedded student debt as the norm, because hardly anyone has families who can afford tuition fees and living costs upfront, and voilà, 30k+ student debt became the standard for recent graduates... who then walked straight into the spiraling housing bubble and crash of 2008, and all the shit that came after that
basically, it was a massive and deliberate stitch-up by the usual cunts (CEOs of financial institutions making an absolute killing from loan repayments, the landlord class and exploitative industry executives who now have cohort after cohort of cowed, indebted workers and renters who are too terrified of destitution to stand up for their rights, and private corporations sniffing around universities to turn them into profit making enterprises pumped full of loan money extracted from the students)
it probably wasn't a deliberate, planned out conspiracy ... but there was a constellation of political and economic decisions that created feedback loops that ended up being unstoppable, creating a systemic vortex of shit that young adults have been fed into ever since
so this is a PSA to the Netherlands, Germany, Scandinavia, anywhere where tertiary education is still affordable for young people: this shit is coming for you, too! Watch out, and protect what you have, because it is precious - and it can be destroyed within a matter of 18 months to 2 years, like it was in the UK - and there will be no going back, for generations
Hivemind_alpha@reddit
“More and more people” were forced to go to university in order to eliminate the political third rail called “youth unemployment” statistics.
Higher education was turned from the next step for the top 10% academically inclined school leavers, into the universal option of all school leavers. The complexity of degree studies was adjusted down accordingly. This was presented as a democratisation of access to HE, but was more motivated by eliminating a couple of million from unemployment figures and hiding the absence of decent vocational training.
ahnotme@reddit
Previously the thinking was that education is an investment. The reasoning was that a well educated workforce is more productive than a less educated one. By investing in education the government can obtain a growth in GDP that benefits the nation as a whole. The government can then recoup its investment through taxation and use that money to invest further. This system is also redistributive, because people who have benefited from the public contributing to their education by earning a higher income pay more taxes. Thus it is a fairer system than the current one, because not all forms of education lead to the same financial benefit even though you have to pay the same tuition fee.
The redistributive aspect more or less killed the old system, since redistribution has gone out of political fashion, especially in Britain.
OriginalMandem@reddit
That was also partly down to the fact that it was perceived that you simply wouldn't get a 'good' job without a university degree. And practical/vocational courses were stigmatised as being for 'thickos'. Which in turn meant we had a severe shortage of skilled tradespeople. Which then led to the current paradigm where being a qualified tradesperson will often prove to be a more lucrative profession than a generic office job that requires a degree despite in not being particularly relevant to the job itself.
LordAnchemis@reddit
It used to be free
But university has been fee charging since 1997
David-Cassette-alt@reddit
deeply ingrained classism
Shaykh_Hadi@reddit
It cannot afford it. We are already overtaxed and in massive debt. It cannot afford free higher education.
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
The Netherlands has about a quarter of the people in the UK, but only has 17 unis and about 350k students, compared to about 160 unis and almost 3m students in the UK.
That needs to be paid for, and student loans don't even come close to covering the true cost
notacanuckskibum@reddit
Back when I went to university in the UK in the 80s tuition was paid and most students received a grant to live on. But only the smartest ~10% of children made it to university. So it’s clearly a choice the UK has made to widen the numbers attending university, which has made it too expensive to pay for them all.
wringtonpete@reddit
And now it's about 50%
In my opinion they should still fully fund the top 10%, partially fund another 10% and then let the other 30% pay for it with loans, like they do now.
They should also direct the funding to target learning in specific subjects.
notacanuckskibum@reddit
They must have dumbed down what it takes to get a degree too. Even with only the top 10% getting to university, we still had a 50% failure rate during the university course. The danger is that we have devalued the meaning of “I have a degree” to an employer.
Reasonable_Piglet370@reddit
This. When I went to uni in '97 I had to get 3 B's in real A-levels (Gen Studies didn't count) My niece went to Uni in 2019 with an unconditional offer so she didn't need to pass anything (and didn't btw)
She went to Northampton to study History. I went to York to study Politics.
I reviewed her dissertation and also some of her classes because she was staying with me during covid and I'm sorry, but there was a huge gulf in the teaching she was getting compared to me. They were in no way comparable.
Now she's a teaching assistant with an insane amount of debt she'll never pay back
JessickaRose@reddit
Quality and expectation has increased. In some ways it is easier, because quality of teaching, availability of materials, equipment and resources, support, both pastoral and technical, and experience across the board on the teaching aide has improved vastly.
In others it’s harder, because there’s an expectation you use all those resources and support, and those who’ve gone before you have raised standards and therefore expectations of what can be achieved, and provided a wealth of information and experience as to how. The bar has been raised significantly over the years.
pack_of_wolves@reddit
In my field within STEM, the people with BSc and (taught) MSc are not ready for employment in their field of study. Maybe they can do the dishes in a lab. They dont get enough practical experience to be a good technician but don't have enough theoretical knowledge to develop in a research scientist. There are exceptional students of course, but I always worry about what the rest is supposed to do career-wise.
wringtonpete@reddit
I was also at uni in the 1980s (81-84) and don't remember the failure rate being as high as 50% then. ChatGPT says it was 20-25% OTOH your overall point about dumbing down seems valid as it's now 6-10%.
And yeah I do a lot of interviewing and don't really look at the degree any more, unless they've done a STEM subject at a Russell Group uni.
notacanuckskibum@reddit
Mine was a STEM degree, I can really only speak for the STEM programs at my university.
Puzzleheaded-Fix8182@reddit
Humble brag 😌
ProfPathCambridge@reddit
I question your assumption that it was the smartest 10% of children that made it to university in the 80s. The 10% with richest parents would be closer to the mark.
notacanuckskibum@reddit
Hmm, I was there. The only requirement to get in was good A level results. It was with possible to live as a student on your grant, with no money from your parents, most students did. I got no money from my parents and graduated with a few hundred pounds in credit card debt.
I guess you could argue that kids with richer parents were more able to get A levels because they parents would support them staying in school till age 18. But I certainly met students from a wide range of backgrounds at university.
ciaodog@reddit
But the ratio of student to university is roughly the same in both countries then? Why can’t UK do it? Are there no economies of scale?
A11U45@reddit
It has a quarter of the population and a quarter of the taxpayers, your point doesn't make sense.
There are stronger arguments against free university, such as the idea that it benefits people who are likely to out earn those without degrees, but population has nothing to do with it.
Fast-Investigator-45@reddit
France is comparable to the UK. as an international student I studied there for a total of 0 Euros. While in England I spent 75 thousand Pounds for my degree. I’d say the British don’t have their priorities straight, even home students rely on loans.
hgk6393@reddit (OP)
Does the UK need that many college graduates? The Netherlands has a robust system of vocational education where you can get trained to become a highly skilled technician in automotive, aeronautical, or any other sector. If these guys were studying sociology at university, that would break our system.
(not saying sociology is bad, but if you don't have a guy to weld at the railway tracks, people don't get to work. If a sociologist falls ill, the world doesn't stop).
JessickaRose@reddit
Yes and no. Better education is always a good thing. Even STEM graduates (as I am) who are lauded as being a necessary backbone of the world, by and large, don’t end up in STEM as I did. I’m literally the only person I know who I went to school with who does anything remotely related to the qualifications I have.
In that respect I don’t think what you do at university matters at all unless it’s literally sector specific like medicine or other chartered professions. Getting a degree you’re actually interested in, and prepared to work, demonstrate it, and learn new skill sets for is what matters.
hgk6393@reddit (OP)
In Germany, it is very different. When you enroll in an educational program, you are specifically trained for a job. University and vocational training are both taken very seriously.
JessickaRose@reddit
Vocational training sadly isn’t taken as seriously as it should here, but University is, a lot of people go about it the wrong way though. The hyper focus on grades and topics at school spills through and into society at large.
This tends to lead to an unhealthy denigration of a lot of topics, especially in arts and humanities, and an obsession within programs by students on the degree level. Both of those things utterly miss the point.
AideNo9816@reddit
If you make kids go to university you can laden them with debt so they become docile, desperate service workers, whilst simultaneously destroying your manufacturing sector. A symptom of the hopeless financialization of this country.
TheHalfwayBeast@reddit
There's a threshold to paying the debt and they wipe it off after a few decades. I'm paying around £10 a month of my £31k combined loans, for a 4-year course. I'm never gonna pay it off at this rate, but nobody's asking me for more. It's not debt in any way that matters.
AideNo9816@reddit
Omg talk about Stockholm Syndrome! "I love my graduate tax which I'll pay for the best years of my working life!"
TheHalfwayBeast@reddit
Stockholm Syndrome is made up, as is whatever you're talking about.
TarcFalastur@reddit
I heard that the reason freshers are encouraged to get so wasted is because it gives the government the best opportunity to implant their mind control chips into us too, right?
Quiet-Sprinkles-445@reddit
The problem is a degree has become a sign of intelligence, with many degrees often being used to say "I could sit and study for three years". This applies to the more usually "worthwhile" courses like engineering, where many engineers go into banking and do well, because the employer knows they can do maths at a high level and problem solve.
However many jobs don't require specialist subject knowledge, but because the market is so saturated with degrees, you might as well have someone with a degree.
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
IT for a bank doesn't require degree level knowledge. Barely anything does tbh
TheHalfwayBeast@reddit
But I assume the ones studying Sociology don't want to weld railway tracks. If they did, they'd be studying welding.
All the vocational training in the world wouldn't have stopped me from going to University, because I don't want to do a trade or become a technician. I wanted to study the history of crime and write dissertations about bush meat smuggling in the Congo Basin.
AideNo9816@reddit
Maybe if you'd gone to vocational you'd have learnt not to sound like a douche.
TheHalfwayBeast@reddit
How do I sound like a douche? I'm just saying that people who want to weld railway tracks will go to welding school. Opening vocational schools will not persuade a student who wants to study early human evolution to take up oil rig engineering or what have you.
Exotic-Knowledge-243@reddit
Europeans get it free when they come here but not us.
Jemima_puddledook678@reddit
No, they don’t, that’s never been true. Europeans pay about £40k a year, no uni that I’m aware of offers it free to any country apart from Scottish unis and Scottish students.
EconomicsPotential84@reddit
The issue is we lack the robust vocational training, and the industries it feeds in to.
rising_then_falling@reddit
You've hit the nail on the head. We have to pay for uni because we decided half the population needed to go to uni. They don't.
gridlockmain1@reddit
So let’s force all the people that no longer get to go to uni to pay for it? Sounds fair
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
University should be reserved for those who have the capacity to create new knowledge, or those few areas where higher education is necessary for a career. Not for Tim nice but dim to have a subsidised piss up for three years
gridlockmain1@reddit
Happy to have a debate about the ideal amount of people who should go to university. But fuck forcing Tim to subsidise a three year piss up for a bunch of future bankers and lawyers.
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
You don't need a degree for either of those careers so they wouldn't be on my list tbh
gridlockmain1@reddit
You might want to let all the law firms and financial institutions know that
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
Funnily enough I am a lawyer who spends a lot of time on our apprentice recruitment so yes I will tell myself that
gridlockmain1@reddit
Would those happen to be Level 7 degree-level apprenticeships?
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
Yes
gridlockmain1@reddit
So becoming a lawyer is in fact one of “those few areas where higher education is necessary for a career”?
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
Don't need a degree
gridlockmain1@reddit
But you do need higher education, which somebody has to pay for, and employers don’t have a bottom less pit of training money.
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
Law firms have essentially a bottomless pit to pay for all the development they need. The apprentices have been a bit of a shock (it's a very new system that only opened up about ten years ago) that has surprised all the old guard, myself included. These young men and women come with zero baggage, more appetite, and once they are qualified solicitors have 6 years of post education experience compared to the 2 years via the traditional route. They are almost always the better option and once firms get started they quickly realise that the slightly greater initial cost is more than made up for by the talent you get in return
Rick_liner@reddit
The only part of this i disagree with is Tim nice but dim having a subsidised piss up.
in my experience (working in HE) Tim can't afford a piss up anymore. The real education he's getting is how to live in abject poverty. which if wage growth in the UK stays as it has been for the last 15 years is still a valuable education... but also a totally bullshit situation to put our future generations in.
LumpyTrifle5314@reddit
They fucked up and turned many vocational centres into unis, so you'd choose a trade but you'd not actually learn how to do it, you'd just write essays about it instead...
G30fff@reddit
probably not. There is a social mobility benefit to higher university attendance though. Before it was mostly middle class kids because of the competition for places favoured those with most resources. Now it is more democratised and anyone who wants a degree can get one...but the cost of that is as you say. And many of them would be better off with vocational training.
TheRemanence@reddit
This is the problem. I've written a break down of the timeline and what changed as its own comment
YchYFi@reddit
A degree is a path into many stepping stones and necessary to get on graduate programmes. Even ones you don't think are relevant.
Impossible_Theme_148@reddit
I don't know about the Netherlands but I have seen that in Germany the chances of being able to go to university are largely contingent on whether your parents did - not whether you're smart enough for it
That used to be the case in the UK as well - that swung drastically to the opposite problem - now basically everyone is encouraged to go to university whether it's appropriate for them or not.
The ideal scenario is probably closer to the European model rather than the current UK model - but a middle ground where people go into trades because it's the best choice for them rather than because it's what their parents did would still be better than university not really ever being an option for a considerable number of students
WeDoingThisAgainRWe@reddit
No. Blame Blair for this to an extent as he played that game of wanting to look good by massively upping the number of young people going to university. Since then it’s become destructive, with everything supposedly needing a degree and people massively in debt to start where they should be starting without a degree. This system has created a supply and demand fuck up, where everyone has a degree so employers can ask for more and pay less. It needs people to stop supporting this nonsense. Not everything needs a fucking degree.
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
No, not really. The system in much of Europe is much superior
Crabbies92@reddit
No, and we didn't used to, but Blair made sending more people to university a priority of his administration, and thus we end up here.
Zestyclose-Carry-171@reddit
Yeah but that is a false analisis. In France we have about 2,97 millions of students, 3500 different kind of schools (of which 100 universities), and most of them are free/you pay little (around 300€-400€/year, free if your parents are poor, you will also receive financial help depending on the revenues of your parents). The rest is paid for by the State.
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
Yea and France is bankrupt lol
Zestyclose-Carry-171@reddit
We do have a debt problem, but we are not bankrupt. Meanwhile, our debt cost us1 60,3 billions euros per year, while the UK debt costs you 104,9 billions pounds per year, with a lower debt ratio (95% of debt compared to GDP, with a 113% debt to GDP for France). So I guess you should have followed the French example a little more.
pack_of_wolves@reddit
The Netherlands also has the Hogeschool. The distinction between University and hogeschool does not exist in the UK. It would be better to compare the NL.number if students of joined universities and hogeschool with the UK numbers.
Fuzzy_Cry_1031@reddit
nah that's just because there's no distinction between HBO and uni in UK. If you count HBO students you'll see the Netherlands has a similar number of students per capita
ConsciousFeeling1977@reddit
36 HBOs with around 450k students as far as I could find. That would mean that the Netherlands have slightly more ‘university’ students than the UK has, relatively speaking.
Fuzzy_Cry_1031@reddit
exactly, so the argument above to which I commented does not hold
ThisBiss@reddit
Thus makes no sense because then that means we're bringing in 4 times the funds to pay for it. And some of the UK does have free uni. So at some point you gotta accept its about what your country chooses to prioritise
Impressive_Rent_8162@reddit
4 times the funds but 9 times the students, would seem to be the point theyre making.
atheist-bum-clapper@reddit
The funds nowhere near covers the cost. Medical school costs somewhere between 200-300k per student per year for the University to provide, so just adding more numbers means adding more shortfall.
ThisBiss@reddit
You gotta understand uk is 4 countries. Scotland does have free education.
coomzee@reddit
Welsh students get part of their fees paid for by the Welsh government. Depending on the students parents income
AlternativePack7239@reddit
they will pay your full tuition for certain (healthcare) courses. i’m english, starting diagnostic radiography at a welsh uni in september, and nhs wales cover your tuition if you commit to working in wales for 2 years after graduation
scrandymurray@reddit
It’s basically the same for English students as well. I think it’s an average of £1,000-£2,000 per student and it’s not means tested at all.
That’s also before considering how student loans work, which are given by the government and paid back through what is essentially a tax on future earnings. Most student debt isn’t paid back before it’s cancelled.
Sock_spray123@reddit
No, only English students with household income of under £25000 get any kind of additional bursary. Everything else either needs to be taken out in loans or paid by parents.
coomzee@reddit
Mine was half the fees paid for by the Welsh government. About 2500 maintenance grant per year
Dry_Big3880@reddit
I don’t think you understand what a country is.
ThisBiss@reddit
Oh did you not know Scotland was a country? I'm glad I've helped you.
Dry_Big3880@reddit
It should be. But it isn’t.
Upbeat_Magician6231@reddit
Scotland is a country. It’s just not a state as such
Dry_Big3880@reddit
No it isn’t. That’s internal UK bullshit to fudge the issue and not hit people’s pride. The UK is the only country.
Basteir@reddit
Nope.
osberton77@reddit
England and Scotland were countries, Wales is a principality and Northern Ireland is a province.
Basteir@reddit
Right.
QZRChedders@reddit
You’re full of shit
Janjannaj@reddit
It’s not free, it just funded in a different way.
SairYin@reddit
Saor Alba
Kolo_ToureHH@reddit
FTFY.
University education is free in Scotland/
nickgardia@reddit
It used to be heavily grant-funded but the Tories put a stop to that in the late 80s
t_beermonster@reddit
Because Tony Blair got his university education free and decided to pull the ladder up after him when the opportunity presented itself.
bree_dev@reddit
As a 90s teenager, this remains the biggest betrayal in my lifetime.
18 years of Conservative rule and students still had free education. Labour get in and within the year they'd abolished it. Blair then went on to lie to get us into an illegal war, and now in 2025 is taking Saudi oil money to campaign against net zero targets.
Tony Blair is easily in the top 5 most evil cunts in modern Western history.
jordancr1@reddit
Studying in Scotland as an English Student:
Undergraduate course (Bachelors with Honours) was £3,200 / year for 4 Years.
Postgraduate cource (Masters) was £5,400 for 1 Year.
so Overall I was £18,000 all-in for Tuiton Fees.
Fees are now capped by law at £9,535 / year in UK so for some universities this is party subsidised by the government, if the UK went carte-blanche like the USA it would probably be 50k / year to study at Oxford.
I do agree we shouldn't be putting young people into debt like this, at a minimum high value-add courses should be completely tuiton free. Or a very low nominal fee so people have some skin in the game.
lucylucylane@reddit
It does in Scotland
VexedRacoon@reddit
What are entry requirements like in Europe university? The ones in uk, well anything less than top ten seem to take anyone. I've seen so many 'graduates' that don't have a good command of the English language. Many universities here are an immigration route, people come to study but then over stay or can get a 2 year extension on their visa to work any job i believe so yeah... foreign students pay more so universities aren't going to turn them down.
To be honest I think the reason government funding was removed was because many people went to uni and never used the degree and it wasn't contributing to the economy, but also it's been so implanted in the minds of people that you need to go so they pay anyway.
Capital-Wolverine532@reddit
It used to be free to study at university. Then they decided that it wasn't fair for those not attending to subsidise those that were.
Ok-Dress-341@reddit
It's not a debt you have to pay. More a deferred tax charge. Most will be written off.
nonsequitur__@reddit
Tories
Character_Mention327@reddit
How do you have so many upvotes for a factually incorrect response? It was Labour that introduced tuition fees.
Butagirl@reddit
It was, but the Tories started the decline by withdrawing the student grant scheme and replacing it with student loans. I got a grant when I first started university in 1989, but I couldn’t get one in the early 1990s, only a loan.
WeDoingThisAgainRWe@reddit
Blair started the downward spiral from this. (With his ego driven idea to have the most university students in Europe or whatever nonsense he thought he was playing at). Although you could still say Tory in answer to that. And Labour won’t be getting rid of it because unpicking this mess will cost a fortune they’re not going to spend on it.
presterjohn7171@reddit
Everything used to be free now a full university degree costs about £30k if you travel from home to class. Double that if you live at or near your university. You only have to pay it back when you get a job though and can do that over many years.
Balseraph666@reddit
College largely is, although support for housing and food etc is needed. But as most are still living at home from 16 onwards that is less of an issue. University is different, and that largely boils down to Tony Blair's New Labour and the Tory/Lib Dem coalition and "austerity". Before Blair most people went to uni on grants, no debt except maybe an overdraft at the bank by the end of it. Then Tony Blair changed the grants to loans that needed repaying if someone earned a certain level of income, with the debt erased after a fixed period, or after death. One of the few debts no passed on to next of kin, thankfully there. And instituted tuition fees as well.
Then, despite promising to reduce or remove the loans and reinstate in part or full the old grant system, the Lib Dems and Tories increased tuition fees, increased loan caps and shut down government funding for several key and important course, such as social work extra funding, not a loan, for anyone already studying a related field, like sociology or psychology, in 2010.
This leads to today with 28 years of debt for student. Not as bad as the US, where student debt is never wiped out by time, and can pass on to next of kin, but not far off either, because sometimes, fuck this country and its governments obsession with making us like the US at times.
Ok-Ambassador4679@reddit
Britain is plagued with free market ideology. Nothing for the average Joe should be free or covered by taxes, because cutting it gives rich cunts tax cuts. Fuck people and prospects, it's all about enslaving the population and making rich people more money.
Potential-Click-2994@reddit
Based
Rendogog@reddit
One day bunch of privileged MPs decided that the free education they got shouldn't be maintained for people who came after them as it was an easy way for the government to save money, so they introduced fees. Later on, more privileged MPs who had also done it for free decided to up the fees some more as well, including (shock) a whole party of them who promised they would never do it before they got in a coalition govmt.
SlinkyBits@reddit
i didnt pay to go to college, and went for 4 years. i did not go to university so dont personally have experiance with costs there. but college was free.
Basteir@reddit
We do have free university education in Britain.
Nearby-Flight5110@reddit
Because why should people who don’t go to university pay for those who do?
Also if it’s free, a lot more people will go. Therefore it soon becomes the case that the minimum requirement for a lot more jobs is a degree.
This then means many people who would be excellent for the job aren’t even interviewed.
Apprenticeships are the way In my opinion.
AngloKartveliGod@reddit
You’ve got to look at how NL is to the UK. Nearly every town or city here has a university, some more than 1 Uni. We also have a much higher population
purple_sun_@reddit
It used to be. My university education was free. I’m still salty about it
Interesting_Loss_541@reddit
Scotland has (almost) free education. Britain is made up of more than just England...
BlackCatLuna@reddit
Let me express this in reference to Harry Potter since it was a worldwide phenomenon for millennials.
Colleges in the UK start at the equivalent of Hogwarts's sixth year. They allow you to resit GCSEs (equivalent to OWLs) take A levels (equivalent to NEWTs) or take vocational equivalents, such as the B-TEC.
These institutions are free for students agreed 16 to 19, but older people have to pay.
University, including former polytechnic universities, offer degrees. These are the expensive ones.
As for why, I would like to think it helps fund research but I cannot speak for the bureaucracy involved.
PM_ME_VAPORWAVE@reddit
Too many people going to higher education
Universities operating like a business, almost for profit despite being government funded
Students feel like they have go because they don’t know what else to do or because it will guarantee them a decent job after university (it will not)
Sweet_Focus6377@reddit
We did before Thatcher.
It was one of the many ways she screwed over the British working class.
Peelie5@reddit
Don't think irel does either. Technically
Ewendmc@reddit
Britain has different education systems. In Scotland it is free for eligible students.
baldeagle1991@reddit
It's more a graduate tax than a student loan.
At least that was how it was intended when the Lib Dems increased fee's.
The only reason it wasn't tax was due to how we don't have a mechanism to tax British citizens overseas earnings if they emigrate overseas, which graduates are far more likely to do than the rest of the population.
reverse_mango@reddit
Yeah, as bad as the system is, it’s actually not that bad. I ask the government to pay my fees, then eventually when I start earning enough a small amount will be removed from my account, same as any other tax.
hgk6393@reddit (OP)
You wrote fee's instead of fees. Ben je nederlands?
Neither-Stage-238@reddit
elderly population hate the young
pc_kant@reddit
The government should fund the top 10 per cent of domestic students in terms of achievement and make it free for the top 20 per cent of domestic students. Then, stabilise the university sector by capping student numbers at current levels per university so UCL no longer threatens the existence of dozens of mid-ranked universities with their permanent expansion strategy. Then, think about how to reduce the student numbers outside the top 20 per cent. Perhaps by letting them pay the full bill for the good students or capping the numbers more strictly or incentivising alternative career options such as vocational training. We really need those skilled graduates, but degrees have been devalued, and everybody suffers as a consequence. This is the way to reverse it.
the_speeding_train@reddit
Tony Blair is the reason.
TeddersTedderson@reddit
"Education Education Education", said Tony Blair.
"Let's open up university education to the working classes, by introducing fees and lending them the money to pay for it. Their high powered graduate jobs will help them pay it off in no time!"
"Excellent!", said the universities. We'll let anyone in, and turn the campus into a money making machine!
"Sounds great!", said the Student Loans Company
A few years later, a surprise hung election! The Lib Dems, who campaigned on keeping tuition fees low have a chance to share power. They see their chance, and after a wild night bumping uglies with the enemy, they sell their souls and announce a new love affair with the Conservatives. Their new flagship policy "Let's add a couple of zeros to those tuition fees!"
That's how I remember it at least.
DizzyAlly@reddit
It used to be free. That was changed by a Conservative government in the mid 1990s against great opposition. Subsequent governments have just continued.
Mandala1069@reddit
Blair, not the Conservatives.
probablyaythrowaway@reddit
And all the bastards involved got their education for free.
wringtonpete@reddit
Worse, they were actually paid to go to University, with everyone - rich or poor - getting fully funded grants which covered accommodation and living expenses.
Dic_Penderyn@reddit
Yup. I went yo University in Cardiff in 1978, straight from school. All fees were paid in full by my county council and I also had a grant check every term which was more than enough to pay for my accommodationand food with enough left over to go out every weekend on the piss.
Raining_Lobsters@reddit
They were going to be introduced whoever was in power. They were signed off under Major, one of the last acts of his government IIRC, and Blair chose to go ahead with them anyway.
shrewpygmy@reddit
Blair could have stopped it. He didn’t.
Raining_Lobsters@reddit
Yes.
Far-Crow-7195@reddit
It was Labour.
WeDoingThisAgainRWe@reddit
You might want to check that rather than just assuming it’s true. (Clue for you - it’s not true).
EUskeptik@reddit
Because politicians decided on a huge expansion of university education with the target of 50% of young people going to university. They decided it should be paid for by the students themselves by taking out loans to pay for fees and accommodation.
Almost overnight, polytechnics and colleges of further education were redefined as universities. Huge numbers of low quality courses were offered so these places of learning could make money by vacuuming up gullible students.
The result is millions of young people with useless “degrees” and massive debts they will never pay off while flipping burgers or delivering fast food on scooters. .
Veronica_Cooper@reddit
We did, Labour removed it in 1998 with Blair. I remember their slogan for the election “Education, Education, Education”.
It was £1,000 to start off with but it has been going up slowly.
Before then you could even get a grant through means tested.
DistinctHunt4646@reddit
Context - I went to Middle School in Copenhagen and Senior School ('Sixth Form' / 'College') in the UK before doing university in the UK.
For starters I think there are just some inherently important differences. E.g. Denmark has a much smaller population to support, particularly locals. There are simply also fewer schools which tend to be bigger/more open - whereas in the UK you have a couple of hundred universities with varying degrees of competitiveness and scale. The Danish state also taxed more and spent more efficiently, whereas tax in the UK tax is still very high yet spending is an absolute total shitshow. Same could be said for the other Nordic countries with similar education policies.
Also the UK is a much more devolved, granular system. There are \~70mm people across 4 countries, with varying policies - e.g. Scotland does have free university education, whereas England doesn't (but is capped at fairly low fees). In Denmark we had more pigs than people and it was pretty easy to run a single, simple, highly supportive system for everyone. A relatively small and wealthy population has a lot more to go around for everyone than whatever the UK's economy can be described as these days.
I would also note it probably doesn't make sense to make one argument for all universities across the UK. There are some institutions that are just comically unserious and should probably be consolidated, leaving a few more basic universities that could probably be subsidised/made free to provide access to basic tertiary education. However, then there are also the better-known, world-leading universities like Oxford, LSE, Imperial, etc. where they do get a lot of funding for their research, activities, etc. but there are arguments to be made that their tuition should remain paid (as is the same with competitors around the world like Harvard, MIT, Singapore, Melbourne, etc.).
Finally, I would also just note some important demographic considerations. Again referencing my experience in Denmark - at the time the population was <6 million, people were generally wealthy and comfortable, and although Copenhagen was the most prosperous, regional disparities weren't too severe. So if you have a fairly prosperous country with a population smaller than London coupled with very little immigration or external factors to take care of, it is much more straight-forward to focus on your own citizens. The same is (was) true for many Northern European countries. In contrast, the UK is effectively a very wealthy city with a poor country attached to it - per this lovely FT graphic showing that without London the average UK GDP per capita would be on par with the US' poorest state, Mississippi - which is further complicated by extremely mixed demographic, displeasure with existing taxing and spending, exodus of wealth, economic uncertainty, poor/unstable leadership, and a plethora of other factors. So free university for all may seem like some utopia the UK should strive for, but it's just not realistic under current circumstances and potentially not even a net benefit.
hgk6393@reddit (OP)
Fair points. Do you think the number of universities, the number of programs, the type of programs, and most importantly the intake into each program should be heavily regulated?
If the government thinks electrical engineers are in demand, increase the intake size of electrical engineering programs by 25%. If enough psychologists are not finding jobs, reduce the intake of psychology programs or shut some of them down altogether. That way there is some financial accountability in the system.
DistinctHunt4646@reddit
I agree there is definitely some merit to that. I haven't studied in Australia (where I'm technically from) but the system there has "Commonwealth Supported Places" which are a very specific measure for subsidising specific courses at select universities to varying extents, sometimes even down to a per-module basis. So that way they can heavily incentivise/support people going into STEM, compsci, economics/finance, etc.
IMO the immediate issue with the UK higher education system is it is just not starting from a serious place. Of the 160 universities in the UK, there are maybe a maximum of 30 that are credible. There are too many institutions that are just not run professionally/seriously and are a total joke, while some more reputable institutions are on the verge of bankruptcy. There are also many universities that basically just exist as a technicality for international students to get a visa and enter the country while effectively just buying a degree with little to no academic rigour. We simply do not need 160 universities in the UK - I think it would be a good starting point to heavily consolidate that, introduce strong standards and incentives for remaining universities, and then proceed from there. If the government just started throwing money at any/every university/student in our current situation then frankly it would just be a net waste imo.
Tale-Scribe@reddit
I see this question asked a lot about the cost of higher education in the US, as well. Yet they are filled with students from all over the world, many of which turn down the free education in their country to pay for an education in the US. I now, historically Britain has been the same -- people from all over the world flock there for their higher education.
I've had foreign students tell me it is the quality of education. Or maybe the way it's taught. I'm not even sure.
famousbrouse@reddit
University education isn't free because the UK cannot afford it.
We prefer to spend our money on old peoples pensions, and people not from this country.
Dominico10@reddit
University shouldn't be free.
Its become a business and too many people go to uni. Its sub par courses, most of it pushing false history narratives etc.
Uni should cost and should be the best of the best going.
The gov (in other words me and you) should not be paying for everyone to go do sub par courses.
The reason for the cost being high is the above. Its a business now with bloated courses and bloated amount of teachers and hangers on.
So no, free or cheap uni in the uk would not work and is a horrific idea. It used to be free when it was hard to get in. Now it would cost a fortune.
And don't even get me started on people scamming the system for free loans. Imagine how bad that would get if it was free free....
Proof-Bar-5284@reddit
Dutch person here. OP; you are painting the situation in the Netherlands as much more rose coloured than it is. Plenty of people are in debt because of their studies, and it can easily go into tens of thousands of more. The several overhauls of the education and government stipends/scholarships system have not made it much easier. Buying a house is really difficult for most of the population, even if there were enough houses in our current housing crisis.
azlan121@reddit
We used to, tuition fees (and maintenance loans) are a political choice, they were introduced in the 00's, with "top up fees", but over the years, the burden has shifted so that the tution fees are the main source of funding for undergraduate education.
Student loan debt in practice works a bit like a "graduate tax", in that many/most graduates will never actually repay their loan (partly due to the interest rates), and will make payments for their whole working life. Repayment as a percentage of income also makes it feel more like a tax than a traditional loan, and it's not generally factored in when credit checks are done.
The flip side of this shift however, is that the system has come with a huge increase in the number of available places at university. In 1980, about 15% of the population went to university, these days it's around 50%.
Personally, I feel like tuition fees should be scrapped, and instead be funded out of general taxation (and ideally existing loans should be cancelled, though it may be complicated and expensive to do so equitably). Maintenance is a little bit trickier, and I'm not entirely sure what the best solution is there, it might be changing the UC eligibility rules so full time students qualify for UC, but with the DWP being the way it is, that may prove to be a bit useless. Another option would be grants administered and remitted by the universities.
elrip161@reddit
Believe it or not but not only did we used to have completely free university education, but students used to be given money (grants, not loans) to go. But only <10% of young people used to qualify to do a degree.
In the late 1990s the British government announced it wanted 50% of all high school leavers to go to university. Because that figure would be unaffordable without raising taxes beyond what voters would stomach, they had to find an alternative funding model.
Unfortunately they chose the US one, where a bachelor’s degree is now basically a very expensive certificate of attendance rather than a certificate of achievement, and any skilled job now requires a master’s too to cut the wheat from the chaff. We’re heading that way too.
I come from a working class area and was the first (and, 20 years later, still the only) kid on my street to go to university. There is zero interest there in paying more tax to pay for predominantly middle class kids to get free university education. Similarly, I expect, there is little interest amongst wealthier people in paying more tax to pay for it too.
So that’s where we are. We’ve got a system built on turning higher education into a consumer product. That was never going to end well.
Lucky_Throat_7362@reddit
The UK economic system is designed around preventing movement up through class structure. Everything from Inheritance tax to tuition fees and house prices ensure this. Wealth is designed to be removed from you generationally to ensure the small upper echelon stays small.
InstanceSmooth3885@reddit
Thank Tony Blair.
AdAggressive9224@reddit
1) You essentially do, you pay what amounts to a 'graduate tax' when you start working, we call it a loan, but functionally speaking it's no different from a tax. I.e. it's just bad politics, the government should probably re-brand student loans as a tax.
2) A very high proportion of the population go to university here, around 50pc from the state schools. It was a big push in the noughties. That has inevitably resulted in an increase the amount the graduate is expected to pay.
3) We have an ageing population, so that naturally results in the interests of the old being prioritised over the interests of the young. University education gets put on the back burner in favour of things that benefit older voters, although that is changing now.
4) We predominantly take non-vocational degrees, which are naturally of less economic value. It's much easier to justify paying to train a new doctor than it is for someone to go and do a degree in contemporary dance. This one is probably being driven by the fact a lot of people feel obligated to go to university, so they might pick a course that's a passion and an interest moreso than a potential job opportunity.
nezar19@reddit
Just to back point 4: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/graduate-outcomes-by-degree-subject-and-university
nezar19@reddit
Different tax system, different population size, you exploit your petrol and invested in the economy, we do not as much, and government’s priorities are different, like tax breaks for the rich, and foreign aid, instead of investing it local economy and education
ScreamOfVengeance@reddit
There are 2 different ways of thinking. (1) Is collective or socialist. This is helping everyone especially the poorer people to improve society. Here you try to get everyone trained and educated as much as they want.
(2) Individualist and elitist. GB has historically been very elitist and the class system is very important. You only care about yourself and your family, and then your tribe (your social class). You try to keep others down and 'in their place'. Here good education is only for the few.
1945 to 1980's was socialist and the NHS, new universities, Grammar schools were built. But now we are going back to the good old days. The thinking is that there is too much education that does not pay. The ruling class all send their kids to private school so they don't want to fund education for the lower classes.
ninjomat@reddit
Britain definitely (at least since the 80s) is not quite as large government friendly as Germany or Scandinavia - and has leaned more towards the American model since then - smaller state, lower taxes, bigger market involvement.
What I would say though is the way we pay for higher education is terribly labelled. It’s not really debt it’s far more like a graduate tax in practice. You don’t have to pay until you hit a certain earnings threshold and from then on the payments increase commensurate with salary increases just like any other progressive tax, you pay no interest, and if you fail to pay it all back within 30 years of graduating it whatever remains gets written off entirely.
I assume in the Netherlands you pay through general taxation so the differences are less significant than what is implied by saying I’m 50 thousand in debt, as opposed to I will pay 50 thousand in additional taxes over the next 30 years with payments tapered to my income.
Present_Program6554@reddit
The American model for loan repayment is very different and involves much higher amounts.
ninjomat@reddit
I meant in terms of our approach to government in general. We veer closer to the American view that people should find their own way without an excessive safety net or legal protections, while government should remain out of the way to reduce taxes
Present_Program6554@reddit
I would disagree. Thatchersim was an attempt to copy America but led to a backlash. Conservatives have continued to try but Britain hasn't gone far down that road at all.
opaqueentity@reddit
Numbers
Flat-Pomegranate-328@reddit
The Labour Party under Tony Blair introduced tuition fees for going to university in 1998.
Ambitious5uppository@reddit
The debt sounds like debt, but it's not really. You only pay it back when you're earning, at a low rate, and for the vast majority it's eventually clearered at the age cutoff.
It just discourages people going who aren't actually serious about going.
IfBob@reddit
I think the system is fair enough. A "graduate tax" which if you're smart and doing a useful degree will still be incredibly worthwhile. I don't think it's fair for people who work from 16+ (18 these days) to have to pay tax on a usually small wage job whilst graduates enjoy 7 extra years of study paid for by the state.
And the debt isn't designed to cripple you, i wish the loans I've taken since uni were as generous
Decalvare_Scriptor@reddit
Just highlights the demographics of Reddit that you're about the only person making this point.
IfBob@reddit
Oh yea the drug fuelled generation of 'my parents paid 20 pound for a house' are rampant here. Always seeing injustice and never issues with themselves
SocialMThrow@reddit
In a free or subsidised system you get abuse of the system. People going for the sake of going, people with no goals, no planning.
There aren't enough jobs thatrequire or pay well enough for everyone utilise a college or university degree.
The majority of degrees are worthless unless they are tailored or specialised to a specific industry.
Go to uni to get a biology degree to become a lab technician where the job is essentially an overqualified factory worker.
laughingsquirrel1@reddit
I agree with what you’re saying. People have a tendency to not value the things they get for free with low effort. Scholarships are different because they’re competitive and you really need to have something to show for. Can’t get it just by existing.
I see way too many graduates blaming everything else but themselves for not having a good job or not being able to find work related to their major. They went in without thinking ahead what they can do with it. And if it doesn’t work out well and they do poorly enough after graduation, the tax man leaves them alone or charge only a portion of what they owe making it free/ subsidized for some.
Loans that aren’t paid in full will be written off and treated as expenditures to the government and paid by tax payers who don’t even benefit from the loans. It’s a waste of money funding education of people who’re low performers.
bofh000@reddit
This just shows you don’t know how the free higher education systems work. They are VERY competitive. Nobody abuses the system by going because you can, because it’s VERY hard to get in. The entry exams can be brutal and actually graduating is just as difficult.
SocialMThrow@reddit
So the system isn't free it's a means tested scholarship.
bofh000@reddit
If you don’t succeed you don’t get in. If you really want to study you go to a private University, where you have to pay. Some of those can be competitive, too. So most people don’t just go because they can, because the majority can’t.
Hazeygazey@reddit
Because British people are class ridden, cap doffing, gullible cowards?
FewAnybody2739@reddit
You're often paying for prestige in the UK, more so than employable skills. And if the country's trying to send everyone to university, universities can cash in on that.
It's also worth noting that the way student debt works won't financially cripple you like it does in the USA. If your repayments are putting you in poverty, then it'll be a national problem with lots of non-graduates also struggling on the same salary.
Miserable-March-1398@reddit
Only two pay rises ago uni was cheaper than council tax. In 1992 it was free.
veryblocky@reddit
The debt is sort of not real, making university effectively free for most people.
It’s more like a graduate tax than like normal debt
ConstantReader666@reddit
Tories.
They upped university fees 300% when they got in power.
Stopped my daughter getting her Masters degree.
SilverellaUK@reddit
Tony Blair was the PM in 1998 when higher education stopped being completely free.
It was a slippery slope that each government after that has accelerated down.
ConstantReader666@reddit
My daughter was in university when the LibDems went into coalition with the Cons and tripled the fees. Luckily she was in her last year to get her BSc. But it scuppered the Masters. David Cameron was PM.
Blair is a closet Tory like Starmer.
Trude-s@reddit
Tony Blair followed by the Con-Lib coalition. It was the start of kids paying for the country's future. All downhill from there.
MartyTax@reddit
A good proportion take on the cost but never have to repay it. Those that come out of Uni and get an excellent job pay it back quite quickly.
If the higher education (beyond 18) has the aim goal of higher wages then paying for it seems reasonable. I don’t get a super friendly loan to start a business for instance. Someone setting up as a joiner doesn’t get £50k of soft loan to get a van and tools.
Now it’s different if we’re talking about degrees for things that are in shortage like doctors. I’d write off their loan over say 20 years of NHS service for instance with no need to pay back.
joined_under_duress@reddit
Neoliberalism, mainly.
Few-Might2630@reddit
Colonizer white man monarchs
SecretxThinker@reddit
Britain, under Blair, disastrously expanded the University education system (to reduce the unemployment figures) making a standard degree practically worthless (it even became a requirement for the police at one point, that's how bad it got) thinking it would make everyone cleverer. Now it's just an unaffordable watered down nightmare.
Sailing-Mad-Girl@reddit
Because the Lib Dems sold us out so that they could be included in a coalition government.
Hot_Wing5772@reddit
Because we can't afford it.
MrLubricator@reddit
It's not real debt. Never affects your life. Think of it as a tax on the future rich and ignore it.
_romsini_@reddit
Not sure why you only mention Western Europe and Scandinavia. Uni is free/has minimal fees in pretty much all of Europe.
drenreeb@reddit
University tuition is subsidised by the government.
The debt we take, on the rest of the fee's, ensures we can have an education at the point that we want it.
I would argue the debt isn't a real debt though. You are not obliged to pay it all back unless you have benefitted from the degree. The amount you pay back monthly depends on what you earn.
For example, I've been out of university for 11 years and I've only paid back £6 of my university debt. After 25 years the debt will disappear. Furthermore the debt has no influence on any other borrowing.
Turnip-for-the-books@reddit
Correct answer. Unfortunately capitalism sees education as a profit making opportunity (like it sees everything) rather than the investment in the nation that it actually is
Ok_Adhesiveness3950@reddit
In the UK you have 20% basic rate income tax + 9% student loan repayments.
Would it be functionally much different to have 25% income tax and 'free' university. Perhaps with more generous apprenticeships for those who didn't go.
Probably that would be a better system but we are where we are....
Gorbachev86@reddit
Neoliberal shits and rentiers who want to monetise everything and then force you to go into debt to try and pay it off
monkeyhorse11@reddit
Because the UK is spending all its money on refugees and wind turbines
frankensteinsmaster@reddit
I assume you’re being sarcastic?
frankensteinsmaster@reddit
It’s free in Scotland for Scottish students
Undefined92@reddit
But it is pretty much 'free', you just have to pay a slightly higher tax rate if you earn enough for a limited period. Most people will never pay it all back. It's called a loan but nobody is burdened with debt after they graduate.
Hutcho12@reddit
Because the UK prides itself on having the worst parts of Europe (low wages, low social mobility) combined with the worst of America (low social protections, expensive education, low vacation days, high homeless/violence in cities). It’s a great place.
kilgore_trout1@reddit
The reality is that we can’t afford it. It was brought in a couple of years after the credit crunch and was incredibly unpopular at the time. Since then there have been several new governments and not one of them has talked about reinstating free university in England and Wales. The fact is, the UK at the moment just doesn’t have the funds. Politicians won’t have an honest conversation with people to say that if they want Scandinavian services, they need to pay Scandinavian taxes.
Cuntinghell@reddit
When my wife graduated, she had £18k of student debt. Now, 16ish years later, she owes £16k after paying about £7k.
About 13 years ago we had enough money to fully pay off the student loan but were advised against it due to the interest being negligible (practically 0%). However, we've since learned the interest was changed at some point to 4.3%. She honestly didn't know so it was very disappointing to learn (last week) that after paying off £7k (ish) it's barely made a dent. I have asked how and when they communicated the change in interest but she doesn't know.
paper_zoe@reddit
I've been paying mine off for nearly 14 years now. I still owe more than I started with due to the interest. I'm just thankful that it'll get wiped in 11 years and I'll be free.
Cuntinghell@reddit
My wife's is one that gets wiped at 65, we thought she was part of the 20/25 year rule but she isn't.
kilgore_trout1@reddit
That is actually outrageous. Sorry to hear that happened, especially after taking advice to not pay it off.
TheRemanence@reddit
It was brought in c2002 but very low. It increased later and switched to a graduate tax at that point
SingularLattice@reddit
Slightly off-topic, but I wanted to pull you up on:
My understanding is that the Netherlands has a housing shitshow comparable to, and even exceeding the situation in the UK, similarly driven by shortages. Also the CoL is somewhat higher.
I only mention this as I think it’s unfair to create the impression that Dutch graduates are walking into property ownership. This definitely isn’t the impression I get from my Dutch friends and colleagues!
hgk6393@reddit (OP)
It isn't. But I also know plenty of Dutch people younger than 30 who bought houses outside the large metro areas.
I don't live in the Randstad region. Property ownership is still a possibility where I live.
spicyzsurviving@reddit
Britain does things in different ways depending where you’re from.
In Scottish, and about to graduate from law school, which was free (4 years).
barnaclebear@reddit
Well technically some parts of Britain do. Scotland does. It’s just England that doesn’t.
paper_zoe@reddit
Ideological reasons, our governments for the last 40 years believe that the free market is the way to run everything. It doesn't matter if it's our transport, our energy, our education, even our own water supply. It doesnt matter that it's been an enormous failure on every level, the students are trapped in debt for decades, the universities are on the brink of bankruptcy. We're still completely tied to this belief that the free market is king and it doesn't matter how much evidence there is to disprove this or whether it's Labour or the Tories in government, we will not budge in our belief.
Electrical_Fan3344@reddit
Some people a bit too happy to talk about why our university is so expensive. My cousin from Germany said his whole prestigious degree in engineering cost less than €1000…oh well lol
kerplunkerfish@reddit
The Tories.
Tank-o-grad@reddit
Nope, was put in place by the Labour government under their policy of, "Education, education education."
kerplunkerfish@reddit
I may be wrong but last time I checked it wasn't labour who tripled tuition fees for 2012 onwards...
Tank-o-grad@reddit
This doesn't change the fact that it was Labour who introduced fees in the first place...
kerplunkerfish@reddit
It changes how much I pay, actually.
Tank-o-grad@reddit
Indeed, but it doesn't change who brought in fees in the beginning.
kerplunkerfish@reddit
Go back to sucking Kemi Badenoch's dick why don't you
IntrepidTension2330@reddit
Scotland here we have free university/college for citizens or anyone who has made Scotland there home for 3 years or more
Codeworks@reddit
The British government really hates the brits.
coachhunter2@reddit
If you are Scottish you don’t pay University tuition fees in Scotland
Character_Mention327@reddit
The Labour party (yes, the so-called left-leaning party) introduced tuition fees soon after gaining power in 1997. At first they were low, but they kept increasing and the student loans provisions became increasingly expensive.
Left_Set_5916@reddit
Neo liberalism
Simmo2222@reddit
Tories. From both parties.
fords42@reddit
Scottish students still have their fees paid by the gov.
a-new-year-a-new-ac@reddit
It is free in Scotland although I’m not sure it would last long now
Magical_Harold@reddit
We pay higher income tax, so might last for a while yet.
Throwaway72667@reddit
This is true, with English student loans eating into our wages and higher income tax eating into yours, the crossover point is about £53k. Meaning if two people are earning below that, the one with no student loans is taking home more.
Clear-Rhubarb@reddit
FWIW £53k is approximately the 77-80th income percentile in Scotland
Trivius@reddit
It depends where you are, in Scotland it still is.
swagchan69@reddit
College is free in Britain. If you are talking about university, it's free for Scottish people in Scotland, but the rest of Britain doesn't have free uni.
navs2002@reddit
I’m more angered at the fact that Arubans get an EU passport AND free Dutch university education despite being an independent nation simply by having once been owned by the Dutch. As a Brit who has none of these advantages thanks to a really stupid vote we once had, I am very jealous of the Caribbean nation that is better off than us.
hgk6393@reddit (OP)
AND they get to live in a sunny place!
navs2002@reddit
To be fair, their career choices on a tiny Caribbean island are limited so they can live in a sunny place, but not if they want to do anything that isn’t accounting, law, hospitality, or medicine. But that’s why I’m envious of their choice! Don’t like what you can drive to? Change country for your education and choose from 26 other countries to work in!
Whereas Brits… yeah no one needs you and apparently you don’t want us, so… best of luck.
kurashima@reddit
Reaganomics and Thatchers "Free Market Economy"
Until the mid 80's what you mention existed. Tuition was subsidised, bursaries were given for study materials, and people were encouraged to continue with education.
Free Market economics was introduced to Education in the late 80's / early 90's and from there on it, it was a race to get as far away from government funding of further education as possible in the quickest possible time.
Derries_bluestack@reddit
The UK has free education until 18. I think the assumption is that most people should be out and working from 18.
It used to be common for people to leave school at 16 and get a job. At my school, only around 50% stayed for sixth form or college..
ChrisGunner@reddit
Why doesn't Britain have a bike-friendly infrastructure like Denmark?
Why doesn't Britain have a bullet train like Japan?
Why doesn't Britain have better weather like the Mediterranean?
Why doesn't Britain have tastier food like the rest of the world?
So why are you comparing? It's Britain, that's why.
Also, we have free university for Bachelors.
Inner_Farmer_4554@reddit
Politicians...
Step 1: Massage unemployment figures by encouraging 18 yr olds to go to university. Change Polytechnic FE institutions to Universities. Allow unis to expand the courses they offer (including the introduction of degrees in Travel and Tourism - and other fields that never needed a degree before). Wipes a significant number of 18-21 from unemployment stats.
Step 2: Realise that you can't pay course fees or grants to so many students, paying unemployment benefits would be cheaper! But not good optics.
Step 3: Introduce student loans to help pay living expenses while cutting grants.
Step 4: Wait till it's normalised that students will support themselves with a loan over 3 years.
Step 5: Suggest students should pay course fees. Use the right wing media to whip up a frenzy about tax payers funding 'Noddy courses' like travel and tourism...
Step 6: Rely on a certain demographic of voters... This includes the lucky ones who got their education paid for, but resent paying for others, and people who never got the opportunity (because Unis were elitist in their day) and are resentful.
Step 7: Win an election and implement course fees...
I've been to Uni 4 times and every way I managed to afford it has been stripped away by these selfish bastards!
BSc Chemistry - course fees and subsistence grant paid by Local Education Authority.
PGSE science (teaching qualification) - paid as above.
MSc software development - course fees and bursary paid by EU as an attempt to get more women coding (thanks, you Brexit voting morons!)
BSc diagnostic radiography - course fees and bursary paid by the NHS. Not any more...
Believe me when I say I totally check my privilege! A lot of my friends are 10-20 years younger than me... And I wouldn't swap my aging, creaking body for their flexibility if it meant taking on their student debt... I got really lucky being Gen X before the boomers truly got their hands on power...
apeel09@reddit
Because a Degree is pretty useless they’re ten a penny
Nosferatatron@reddit
Because we give out so much in welfare that there isn't enough left for free university for all
Impossible_Head_9797@reddit
Tony Blair said he wouldn't, then after he became PM he introduced tuition fees. Not the worst thing he did by a country mile though
pjs-1987@reddit
It should be paid for through general taxation, but students don't vote in anything like the numbers boomers do, so we don't get nice things
shrewpygmy@reddit
The government states and data shows (and always has in some form) that people with degrees earn circa £10,000 a year on average more than those without, and enjoy higher employment rates.
Over an average working life of 40 years, that’s an average of £400,000 of additional income and better employability.
Please explain why the general population and general taxation should cover the cost of your choice to go get university degree, in order you can statistically earn more over your career, to a level that far exceeds what you’d have to pay under today’s costs.
Please pay for me to go to university for free so I can have better opportunities and earn significantly more than my peers who didn’t?
pjs-1987@reddit
So graduates are, according to your own statistics, more productive and contribute more in tax? Sounds like something we should be doing everything we can to encourage.
shrewpygmy@reddit
Because having large swathes of a population with degrees solves all the problems, and doesn’t introduce any new ones.
It’s not like graduates today aren’t already starting to see the emergence of issues relating to record numbers of university placements, from what’s clearly a highly accessible university system.
When we following your brainwave of an idea to conclusion, all of a sudden that advantage disappears, doesn’t it.
I’ll reiterate my point though, expecting other adults to pay for you to have better prospects is perhaps the epitome of entitlement and a weird echo of a bygone era.
pjs-1987@reddit
And what could possibly be the solution to "privately ran profit driven universities"?
Besides, you can't have it both ways. Either degrees provide significant lifetime value or they're overvalued and useless to employers. If it's the former, let's make it as accessible as possible. If it's the latter, why are 18-year olds required to take out the equivalent of a small mortgages to attend and then asked to pay marginal tax rates in excess of 60% if they're moderately successful?
shrewpygmy@reddit
You want everyone to have a degree and you want to nationalise universities? Do you want unicorns driving the trains or perhaps you can ask the elves to gather the money from the money tree.
You aren’t real! 😂
MBay96GeoPhys@reddit
Our loan system is basically like signing up to an additional tax. It’s not a real debt as they will never chase for it and it disappears when you turn 50. I’d rather have that system which then frees up government money for other things
Timely_Egg_6827@reddit
We used to until they needed to bail out the banks. It's the one thing I wish they'd bring back as investing in the future of the country. However it does probably need to be combined with improving status of apprenticeships and trade qualitifications.
Funding was deemed possible when 10% of the population going to uni. Nearer 50% was the strain. But there should be a way of funding a range and variety of tertiary education routes.
TheRemanence@reddit
It used to be free when fewer people went.
Back in the 60s when my dad went, he not only didn't pay but he got a stipend to live off as an undergraduate. He was richer as an undergraduate than in his first grad job. c5-10% went to university.
Back in the 90s my sister paid no fees but had the option to take out a very low interest loan to cover living expenses. At the time more people were going and is was about the time more polytechnic were being turned into universities and things that weren't full degrees previously were being upgraded.
In the 00s labour set the target of c50% of people getting a degree. By this point you needed a full BA degree to be a nurse rather than a mix of other qualifications from a technical college. They brought in fees to cover it. Initially c£1k.
In the 2010s fees started going up but still capped. Increasingly graduates were building debt but not getting paid much more as graduates.
There's an argument to say too many people go to uni now, particularly for arts degrees that won't make them more employable. However some universities rely on these (and international students) because they are profitable. Our fees don't actually cover the cost of an engineering or science degree.
You could also say that ideally everyone gets to do further study and it benefits society but we don't necessarily have enough money to fund that.
This_Charmless_Man@reddit
I think this really can't be overstated. When I was in uni, me and some friends were talking about the fees (mix of English, science and engineering undergrads) and this exact thing came up. While the engineering department brought in a boat load of cash from industrial research, our machines cost millions in some cases. The English department on the other hand had basically no overheads in comparison. Us BEng's and BSc's basically thanked the BA's for paying for our kit.
corpboy@reddit
Scotland does. But only if you are a settled national and have been liveing in Scotland for 3+ years.
Johnny_Vernacular@reddit
As others have said it was free until a generation ago. The catch was only a tiny percentage of people were able to go to university, the rest were simply excluded. What this meant in effect was that higher education was almost exclusively the preserve of upper-middle class, white boys. The number of women and ethnic minorities, not to mention working class kids, who went to university was vanishingly small. This was obviously untenable but doing something about it was going to be extremely expensive (not to mention it would take decades and decades of societal change.) So the government at the time took the easier option and simply opened up higher education to anyone who wanted to take on the debt to pay for it.
Institutions which had previously been vocational colleges or technical academies were allowed to call themselves universities and award degrees. Jobs that previously didn't require degrees (nursing, for example) suddenly became graduate jobs as nursing training colleges became decree awarding bodies etc etc.
The expansion of the sector was enormous. In 1950 only about 3.5% of kids went to university. Currently the figure is about 36%.
The biggest 'winners' of this expansion were women. As recently as the seventies and eighties degree level occupations were completely out of reach of the majority of women, something that would be unthinkable today.
The debate about whether this was the correct way to fund this huge expansion remains and many think a graduate tax would have been the better option. But few (apart from some traditional cranks and usual suspects) think the expansion wasn't broadly for the best.
wringtonpete@reddit
I went in the 1980s when you still got fully funded grants, and around 15% of kids went to uni. There was a big expansion in the 1960s when the "red brick" uni's were built. Now I believe it's around 50%, not 36% ?
Johnny_Vernacular@reddit
Halcyon days. The Government has figures on 'higher education' (not specifically undergraduate degree): The higher education entry rate among UK 18-year-olds increased from 24.7% in 2006 to 30.7% in 2015 and peaked at 38.2% in 2021. It fell back to 36.4% in 2024. 49% of state school pupils from England had started higher education by age 25 in 2022/23.
TheHalfwayBeast@reddit
My mum went to university for free in the early 90s.
Johnny_Vernacular@reddit
Yes, that was the sweet spot. Getting in right at the start of the massive expansion but before the bill became due.
O_D84@reddit
Although I agree uni resort education should be free for certain degrees . There isn’t anywhere in Europe or the world that per capita has as many top class unis as us (idak I’m just guessing ) . And how you pay back those loans is pretty fair imo .
Accurate_Grocery8213@reddit
No such thing as free you either pay for it privately, its taxpayer funded, or you take out student loans which is another variation of taxpayer funding it
MinimumGarbage9354@reddit
The working class and middle class were sold a dream that by getting a degree any degree they would get a well paid job and progress. Reality is many have a useless degree and do unrelated work with a debt that kicks in if they earn too much.
Marvinleadshot@reddit
That was after the introduction of student loans and Blairs push for more uni students, that dream was sold the Tories never tried to push people into Uni
Goldf_sh4@reddit
We used to. They ended it in the late 90s.
toodog@reddit
it depends where you live in britain
ignatiusjreillyXM@reddit
We used to, but it was highly selective. Successive governments in the 1990s had a policy of getting as much as one half of the age cohort to go to university (while abolishing the, useful, distinction that previously existed between polytechnics, universities and other higher education institutions), meaning that paying for it via taxation was no longer feasible , and for good measure a lot of the courses now on offer were of low quality and from poorly regarded institutions, churning our half-educated semi-intelligent people who are fit only for meaningless and unnecessary bureaucratic jobs in either the public sector or in large corporations, all of which serve to undermine productivity and make work less pleasant for everyone else.
Basically to summarize (perhaps a little too much) we used to have it right. But then we fucked it up. Not totally, as we still have a few of the best universities in the world. But we did fuck it up
healeyd@reddit
Didn't polytechnic courses cost money too? I'm not convince that Blair's 50% fully answers this question.
ignatiusjreillyXM@reddit
Polytechnics essentially renamed themselves universities from I think 1994 onwards. They were funded via different mechanisms from universities, but students didn't pay for the courses generally.
By the time tuition fees came in the polytechnics no longer existed as such.
healeyd@reddit
Yes that's as I remember it - 1992 wasn't it? My point is that blaming 'Blair's degrees' doesn't tell the whole story. Even the vocational side would always have needed to be funded somehow.
BrillsonHawk@reddit
Britain does have free college. University is what costs money.
You can thank Thatcher as to why we have to pay for University though. We've had a succession of governments - both Labour and Tory that were inspired by her and they have tried to simultaneously sell all the family silver and reduce the size of the states expenditure. We end up with the worst of all worlds.
However the university debt doesn't stop anyone from buying a home - it's not like American debt - most people barely pay anything and a lot will never pay it off at all. It makes no difference to most people with the latest terms - i'm paying £300 pm, but thats because I earn a lot and I have one of the older loans that have a lower repayment threshold. The high house prices in London are what stop people buying homes - no amount of smart decisions will allow you to buy a home in most cases in London unless you are extremely good at investment
Alyssa9876@reddit
Tbf it’s not really debt in the way say college education costs are in the US or a loan from a bank etc. yes there is some interest but it’s pretty low. You don’t make any payments until you earn above a certain threshold (think it’s now around 30k) and you pay back pretty small sums each month. Plus if you get to 30 years after graduation anything left is written off. It’s much more a graduate tax and actually should have been worded as such.
NewVentures66@reddit
We are the 61st state of the USA, so whatever they do, we must follow..... 🤮
Glittering_Chain8985@reddit
"Large government that looks after everyone"
Our Socialist movement simply failed harder than Scandinavia et al, coupled with a sense of internalized classism ('we' seemingly supplicate ourselves to ancestry, 'royalty', those of an aristocratic Eton bent etc.).
I can't speak too much for Europe but I blame NeoLiberalism, we're just so self-flagellatory and frankly too stubborn to accept the fact that we have been played. Our unions crumbled, our communities crumbled, our social mobility crumbled and we blithely accepted the idea that this was all simply "common sense".
I can sort of empathize with people in the North (of England) who were denied this and who were hit hardest by Thatcherism, but the rest of us Southerners seem like a bunch of pansy ass champagne socialists (liberals) gleefully rubbing shoulders with the sneering imperialists of the Conservatives, all the while ignoring the fact that we're so far down this rabbit whole of capitalist realism that we're all sneering imperialists.
A mind that's weak and a back that's strong.
Nicktrains22@reddit
Free university education was unofficially a benefit given to the middle class, since when university was free it was a lot less common for the average person to get a degree, let alone a masters. In the 90s the amount of people getting a degree skyrocketed, to the point the government didn't want to foot the entire bill, so the student loan was introduced. This was relatively low. In 2010, when the conservative liberal alliance took power, fees were tripled, reflecting demands from universities that the capped fees meant that they made a loss on domestic students, and only profited from international students, whose fees were uncapped
DizzyMine4964@reddit
We used to.
ResolutionSlight4030@reddit
We had free tuition until the 1990s.
I was among that generation who still got it, still could get a reasonable living grant and only needed small loans to top up. And yes, I did and still do oppose tuition fees and massive loans.
The problem is two-fold. We could easily afford it before the expansion of post-18 education that happened from the 80s to the 00s, but a larger cohort needed more funding from somewhere.
But increasing general taxation to do it is unpopular, especially with the people who didn't go to university (and of course the pull-up-the-ladderists who forget they benefited from free tuition).
As a result, education became less about how we benefit the nation by having an educated society and skilled workforce, and more transactional and what it can do for individuals.
Which is a shame, because we all need doctors and engineers and all sorts of qualified and educated people.
Mediocre_Profile5576@reddit
It’s free in Scotland, but Government funding hasn’t risen in line with the costs of educating domestic students.
Previously, this wasn’t an issue because the universities clawed it back from the tuition fees charged to overseas students, but a combination of Brexit and economic conditions facing a lot of key student sources (mainly Africa and Asia) means that the number of overseas students has dropped significantly causing big holes in university finances and exposing mismanagement of finances.
Dundee University has been a high profile example of this recently. https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/25020787.university-dundee-questioned-financial-mismanagement/
LogicalReasoning1@reddit
Brexit surely isn’t a factor given EU students were treated the same as Scottish students?
LogicalReasoning1@reddit
Number of students and the fact the public don’t fancy the extra taxes to properly subsidise education so it can be cheaper/free
AddictedToRugs@reddit
It's not really debt. It's basically a small graduate tax.
FrauAmarylis@reddit
In the US, some states have it. In the state of Georgia it’s funded by the Lottery and called the Hope Scholarship. It’s open to all Georgia residents who graduated high school.
weedywet@reddit
So every Georgian gets free college?
FrauAmarylis@reddit
At a local college, yeah. Not at any university across the world.
Pleasant-chamoix-653@reddit
Our leaders don't like us
resting_up@reddit
It has free college but expensive university.
OriginalMandem@reddit
We used to but our lovely Tories and Labour both saw fit to end it in the mid 90s. And now the overall intelligence of the population appears to have declined considerably
Crivens999@reddit
They did. I went to the Uni in the early 90s, on almost a full government grant. I didn’t have to pay for anything except rent and food really, which the grant covered. If it wasn’t for some impulse buys (hifi etc) then I would come out in profit after 3 years. I didn’t skimp on going out (far from it), and didn’t have a job at all (22 for my first ever job, which I still have), or an additional student loan.
Not sure what happened exactly, but no way I would have been able to do it nowadays. Or I’d end up with tonnes of debt
StillJustJones@reddit
It was a political decision as a way to keep people in a state of servitude by a succession of utter shitebags.
InsecureInscapist@reddit
UK student debt isn't really real debt. It gets written off after a few decades, and is only payable by those earning over a certain threshold, and payments are scaled to earnings. It is essentially a graduate tax, that only poor people pay because rich people just pay it off.
kararmightbehere@reddit
Tony Blair
ParmesanBologna@reddit
England is where the US originally got its shitty idea from, so if you're looking for the source of the bullshittery...
Present_Program6554@reddit
You have that back to front.
NotABrummie@reddit
It's expensive in theory, but not so much in practice. With student loans, we have to pay 7% of earnings over 27K for 30 years after graduating, which means it's more of a graduate tax than an up-front fee. It's still not great, and a bit of a pain compared to other countries, as well as incentivising universities to be profit-motivated rather than focusing on providing the country with skills and educated workers. Plus, it's a massive kick in the teeth that Scottish students don't have to pay, while the offices in charge of everything are in Edinburgh.
hgk6393@reddit (OP)
Why don't the other 2 - Northern Ireland and Wales - protest and demand the same privilege as the Scots?
Present_Program6554@reddit
It's not a privilege. We Scots pay higher taxes to pay for our choice.
NotABrummie@reddit
A couple of reasons. 1) The other three don't keep threatening to leave the Union. 2) Blair's government relied on a stronghold of Scottish seats in parliament, so a deal was struck to bring in the higher fees on the agreement the Scots would never have to pay.
TheRemanence@reddit
And Scotland pay higher taxes And Scotland have more devolved power
Fantastic_Deer_3772@reddit
Bad political choices. Scottish students get it for free. The rest used to.
Present_Program6554@reddit
Scotland does.
New_Line4049@reddit
Colleage is free over here too, unless you come back later in life to do additional colleage courses. As far as university fees.... someone's gotta pay for it. The country is already financially on its knees, most of our public services are badly under funded. Simply put there isn't the money to put everyone through university for free, and university degrees are often unneccesary/unused. If you choose to go to university anyway that's on you. If you get a job with a company and they then decide to develop in the roll you need to have taken a degree you can often get said company to pay for the course.
PoigMoThon@reddit
Scotland is free, to citizens.
TimeNew2108@reddit
We used to. You had to meet a high standard to get in though. Now we charge a fortune, half the degrees are worthless and you spend the next 30 years paying for it. Better to do a trade qualification instead
generichandel@reddit
It's fine. If you think your degree is worthwhile, and will provide you with a good job and income, then it is on you to make the choice as to whether or not it is worth getting into debt to pay off. If you study surf science and then wonder why you're not able to pay back the debt you chose to take on, then that's on you too.
TheHalfwayBeast@reddit
You don't pay anything until you earn above a threshold.
Ashiroth87@reddit
College is free until 19 years old. For most jobs, a college education is enough.
University costs money but can be funded by a government loan that doesn't need repayment until the person earns over a certain amount of money a year. If the person never gets paid enough to reach the threshold, they don't pay anything.
So you could argue that university is still free, but is partially funded by an income tax when graduates reach a threshold.
Realistic-River-1941@reddit
Education is seen as Hard Working Families(tm) subsidising the middle class.
poundstorekronk@reddit
Still free in Scotland.
WeDoingThisAgainRWe@reddit
Cost. Also the current practice is not a bad policy in itself. Basically saying if you get rich off the back of this education you pay back into the system so it remains potentially available for all. The issues are around the implementation.
Complex_Work7880@reddit
We used to but then some people realised they could use education to make money out of people instead
qualityvote2@reddit
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