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Comment by xyzzyz | Hacker News Reader

European countries with free public universities also usually have private, paid colleges. In practice, those are where you really coast through.

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Which doesn't really address Walter's point that, in practice, people who have to pay from their own wallet (not their parents) for an education at a non-prestigious school do tend to work hard.

In my observation those who do not engage with the material are more like to just drop out, rather than waste their money.

Why would you pay $$$ just to coast? Just go rent a resort on the Mediterranean if that's what you want to do.

For one of the same reasons wealthy families send children to "elite" prep schools. Some are worth it, many just social filters that introduce you to the people who will be making laws, decisions, policies, and purchases. From what I often see, that gets people further than just working hard and trying to work their way up the ladder.

To get a piece of paper saying “bachelor” on it. Some people think it’s useful, and for some, it might even be.

Because you need that word for the next steps: words like "master" and "doctor" or even "engineer" that have real dollar values.

With the wealth of knowledge available, and the slow improvement of online learning, I hope we stop treating college as the place to discover things and improve our knowledge. It’s sometimes an okay way to do it, but is generally one of the least efficient ways in the modern world.

With a basic foundation in a topic, Wikipedia and open journals are much more valuable learning places than a lecture hall or study group. Those basic foundations should be built much earlier in primary education.

Do they though? In most parts of the world academics are not well paid relative to what they can get in the private sector. Even for most liberal arts subjects you can get paid more to produce good entertainment or good books than you'd get in the academy.

You can become a master programmer with no degree at all. Look at all the successful CEOs who dropped out.

"There are dozens of us, dozens!" Bill Gates.

One my best friend used to run a top architecture firm and he himself was highschool dropout, he had team of architects and engineers to get his wildest imaginations passed by government's approval.

Case in point, being if you've real value to offer. Absence of that degree or paper will never come in your way.

I expect word will get around about the "coasting", making it worthless.

I paid some $$$ and kind of coasted doing my Masters in Investment Fund Management. I thought the qualification would look good but the actual course content was a bit too rubbish to get very enthusiastic about it. All academic math silliness from teachers who'd never got anywhere near managing actual investment funds.

My earlier free of charge degree I worked hardish and it was taught at a much higher level.

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