The UK is a wealthy country that is innovative and punches above its weight in so many ways; we can afford a socially fair society, we are choosing not to.
Our guest writer is Ranjit Sidhu, founder of Statistics into Decisions
The United Kingdom has the 6th biggest economy of the 195 countries of the world. With about 5 per cent of the population of China it has an economy more than half its size. Although investing far less as a percentage of its GDP on research than comparable countries in Europe it is only behind the USA in the number of world class universities and number of Nobel prize winners.
With the national depression growing with every new day it is important to step back and gain some prospective before we sacrifice all and sundry to the bonfire of public services that is proposed by the coalition government:
• Shouldn’t we rather be asking whether the sixth biggest economy in the world needs to have in place measures to help those at the bottom of its social structure rather than castigate the poor for having chidren they can’t afford?
• Or, that a country that is second in the world for producing original thinkers and world-class academics has an affordable education for all its citizens and well funded universities?
• Or perhaps that a country whose individual citizens’ wealth is measured as 14th highest in the world, above Germany, France and Japan, by the World Bank, has the ability to make sure everyone upon retirement has enough allowance to stay warm and is entitled to a respectable pension?
So let’s remember the UK is a wealthy country that is innovative and punches above its weight in so many ways and look at the bigger picture than the parochial bias of the current short term spending reviews; this morning’s release of the Browne review on higher education was a clear example.
The issues of graduate tax or a tuition fees raise simply a short term smoke screen. As a country we can afford an extra £1 billion for university funding if we look at the bigger picture, that this investment will bring $2.5 billion back into the economy, coupled with the fact that this country is spending far lower than any other OECD country and actually half that of the USA on education.
Let’s get some prospective back – we can afford a socially fair society, we are choosing not to.
53 Responses to “We can afford to fund our universities, the fact is we choose not to”
Heskin Radiophonic
"We can afford a socially fair society, we are choosing not to." – http://is.gd/fZWfZ
Ranjit Sidhu
Thank you all for your time in leaving comments:
Robert: Aan interesting point is that none of this fees will actually increase spending to universities, it will simply be putting funding cost on the student rather than society.
Anon E Mouse: Thank you for your comment. I think you touch on the heart of this debate from another angle: It was a long standard tradition that the sons and daughters of your bin men or postman would have the same chance to go to university as the sons and daughters of bankers and lawyers. This is what is being threatened here. I myself am a son of a fork-lift driver from south london and was able through society helping my parents to go to university. If I was deciding now I doubt I would have been able to go to univesity as the cost would have been far too high
Anthony: A percentage of GDP is not dependent on population. Anyway, I believe we both can agree that we are choosing to not fund universities rather than not being able to fund them which is the main thrust of the piece.
Tim: Thank you , i will have a read of your article
Michael: Thank you, it is my belief that this short term view on such things as education is the most upsetting part of this governmentspolicies. The dumbing down of policy to “we can’t afford it” when it is clear that this investment will more than pay for itself is criminal, in my view.
Guido Fawkes: Please see my point to Anon
Jeff MArks: I strongly disagree with your view and your grouping of people
Thanks again
Ranjit
Maureen Czarnecki
RT @leftfootfwd: We can afford to fund our universities, the fact is we choose not to http://bit.ly/cOtj3M
Luis Enrique
Guido, others of same ilk.
If you don’t want to see the poor bear the burden of educating the rich, what you need is highly progressive taxation, to ensure that the rich put in more than they take out, and vice versa for the poor. I look forward to you arguing for higher taxes on the rich.
Which is perhaps one reason why I’m more supportive of a Graduate Tax than this author appears to be: either was tax all high earners more, to fund more spending on universities, or we tax just those high earners who went to university. There’s probably surprisingly little practical difference between the two, which makes it strange for people to be arguing so vehemently against one and for the other.
Greg Sheppard
https://www.leftfootforward.org/2010/10/we-can-afford-to-fund-our-universities-the-fact-is-we-choose-not-to/