[mbaytas]

One thing that strikes me from this article is a vast bureaucracy, regulation, credentialing structures, accounting, etc. that the story revolves around.

In Sweden, where I live, there are plenty of educational opportunities available to people completely free of charge. Entirely subsidized by the government. Instead of assembling elaborate bureaucratic structures, the state spends its money paying school admin and teachers.

While these are not universities per se, the opportunities they open up to students are top notch. You don't need an entire college education to "set graduates on a path towards breaking the cycle of poverty", which according to the article is what work colleges aspire to achieve.

This vocational education is also much more economically efficient than universities in the same country, mainly due to losing the weight of bureaucracy and credentialing structures. Teachers are well-paid, ops run smoothly with few personnel, and students get access to many new job opportunities completely free of charge.

[BoardsOfCanada]

When I went to university (in Sweden), a lot of people were just pottering around, taking additional courses to delay having to get a real job, so I suppose that should be factored in when comparing efficiency between different systems as well.

[ajsnigrutin]

I live in slovenia (also taxpayer paid colleges), and the situation here is the same.

First issue is, that basically everyone wants to study and actually goes to study, even if it's underwater basket weaving, and they already know that there are zero job prospects even at the time they are filling out the forms to go to college (~middle of the fourth year of high school).

The second is, that college gives you some benefits (almost free college dorms, food coupons, due to student-status, you can work student-type of jobs with some tax benefits, etc.), even people who wouldn't otherwise study, enroll just to get the "status", and people who want to study eg. english literature, but are not accepted for that programme, enroll to eg. electrical engineering, that they have no interest in, but it's easier to get in, and they still get the "student status".

The third is, similar to the second, even when they should finish their college (hopefully graduate,... or quit), they try to prolong the studying process, to keep the "student status" longer.

And the fourth, when they actually finish college, especially the ones with "useless degrees" (the ones, that there are no market needs for) have issues getting a job, since a lot of employers for "shitty jobs" (baristas, etc.) prefer hiring people with student status, due to much simpler hiring and firing process, much simpler bureaucracy and a bit better taxes.

So yeah... we (the taxpayers) pay a lot of money for a lot of students who either intentionally study stuff that we don't actually need (and the added value of that education in the later job (eg. barista with a masters in ancient greek) is basically zero), and for students who just abuse the student status for all the benefits and student work, making job-seeking harder for graduates.

There is also an additional problem of people studying something that the job market needs (medicine, engineering, CS,...), and then leaving the country the moment they graduate and never paying back their studies (because they never pay taxes in our country).

There are many alternative systems, that I'm not 100% they'd work better, by eg. colleges charging some tuition, and then graduates having to stay in the country and work in the field that they studied for X years (so their degree gives them some added value in their paychecks and then taxes that would bay their tuition back passively), or paying back their tuition directly if they want to leave or do some other, unrelated work.

[madsbuch]

I was surprised to discover the same thing i Australia, where people pay tuition. I think we should be critical for this as an argument for tuition.