Can we stop calling it "free"? It is never free unless everyone is doing the work for $0. If people are still being paid, then someone is paying. I'm fine with the idea of socially investing in future generations, but it's an investment, not "free stuff."
It's called free because it's "given without charge". Nothing would be free under "had no costs involved in production" (not even a smile!).
It's free in the same way a Christmas gift is free; but with giving education we're also guaranteed a return in an improved society with people capable of performing roles we have need of.
Better to give education than to structure society around greed and demanding a profit in return for education?
I don't think it's a guarantee. In the UK (where tuition is capped at £9k($12k)/year), a whole heap of majors were shown to reduce lifetime earnings vs not going to university.
The difficulty is that you are going to earn a lot less while you are at university, so if you spend 3 years there earning $0, it really drags down lifetime earnings unless the degree adds a somewhat decent %age above baseline in terms of earning power.
> The difficulty is that you are going to earn a lot less while you are at university, so if you spend 3 years there earning $0, it really drags down lifetime earnings unless the degree adds a somewhat decent %age above baseline in terms of earning power.
You'd have to have a less than 7% earning power increase, and I wouldn't even call that a decent percentage for one year of dedicated self-funded training.
>It's called free because it's "given without charge"
It's not given without charge, because the taxpayer was charged. If my friend buys my lunch because I left my wallet at home, or it was more expensive than I thought, I don't say "oh wow, free lunch!" I acknowledge that the lunch was paid for by someone else. I certainly wouldn't go around telling people I got free lunch that day. That's a surefire way to make sure nobody helps me out again.
Borrowing from the labeling for health care, Universal Public Education might make sense. Of course, then you'd have to contend with all the people rabidly against Universal Health Care, by association.
