I agree with the sentiment though, that (in general) an Arts degree (or whatever) alone it's not enough to sustain a career.
I just think it's an important part of a balanced education, and that overall society is better off having more engagement with the arts, language, history, philosophy, cosmology, theoretical physics, category theory, linguistics, anthropology, etc.
As I said elsewhere, prioritising vocational education is fine to some extent, but to do so by crippling participation in the Arts by making those qualifications prohibitively expensive (by not providing loans) is a mistake.
It is a luxury of sorts, but not in the frivolous sense. As I see it, it's not so much a problem of optimising higher education for career payoff, but restructuring/regulating education to make it more accessible (both to encourage participation in a wider range of subjects, and to facilitate career change).
> I never said arts/humanities are useless.
>> inability to pick a useless major
Note that I said the major was useless, not the area of study. Out of all the career areas in the world right now, the one that cares least about credentials seem to be the humanities, unless you want to go into academia (which is a whole new can of worms.)
> but to do so by crippling participation in the Arts by making those qualifications prohibitively expensive (by not providing loans) is a mistake.
No, the point is that these qualifications a) aren't inherently prohibitively expensive (a library card and or a paint set doesn't cost 30k a year) and b) make it easy for you to take out crippling amounts of loans you have very little chance of paying back. Nobody needs these qualifications you speak of.
>> inability to pick a useless major
I agree with the sentiment though, that (in general) an Arts degree (or whatever) alone it's not enough to sustain a career.
I just think it's an important part of a balanced education, and that overall society is better off having more engagement with the arts, language, history, philosophy, cosmology, theoretical physics, category theory, linguistics, anthropology, etc.
As I said elsewhere, prioritising vocational education is fine to some extent, but to do so by crippling participation in the Arts by making those qualifications prohibitively expensive (by not providing loans) is a mistake.
It is a luxury of sorts, but not in the frivolous sense. As I see it, it's not so much a problem of optimising higher education for career payoff, but restructuring/regulating education to make it more accessible (both to encourage participation in a wider range of subjects, and to facilitate career change).