I think the corollary is about taxpayer accountability.

It's easy to make the argument:

"If we invest $1M in education, we will have $10M in additional future economic output, $4M in future taxes, and $20M less in law enforcement / criminal prosecution / jail fees. It improves global competitiveness."

That's a no-brainer. Education is a very high ROI investment for a country. Like infrastructure spending or industrial policy, it's about cold, hard economics.

One step more complex -- but equally high ROI -- is towards having a functioning democracy. That's economics, but a bit more squishy.

Investing in the arts, humanities, and music is a good thing as well. However, that's a very different bucket of money. I wouldn't lump it in with the former two.

▲

collinmcnulty 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

You don’t think investing in arts, humanities, and music contributes to a functioning democracy?

▲

strken 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I believe the argument was that they do contribute to a functioning democracy, as opposed to investment in training nurses and carpenters, who are being trained for economic reasons. The argument was that the two goals are so different that they should be funded differently.

▲

red_admiral 3 hours ago | parent [-]

In what way do nurses and carpenters not contribute to a functioning democracy?

▲

strken an hour ago | parent | next [-]

Their direct work output contributes to a functioning democracy, but does so indirectly by providing material goods and services, which I refer to by the shorthand "economic reasons". We don't train nurses and carpenters because their training directly supports democracy; we train them because we want to live inside and be cared for when needed, and these things are incidentally good for any society, democratic or otherwise.

They may of course contribute as individuals, too, but their training is not required for them to do so.

▲

hahahaa 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The things thay directly help democracy are well considered viewpoints, humanities research, journalism, law etc. Stuff that influences decision makers including voters hopefully roughly for a greater good although we all may disagree exactly what that means.

Nurses and carpenters help society and functioning civilization.

	▲	AnthonyMouse 33 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		For that to work, what you need is for the nurses and carpenters to be well versed in basic economics and how pundits lie with statistics etc. for when they go to the polls, rather than to have an oversupply of English majors who go on to have careers as a Walmart greeter or become structurally unemployed. In other words, we need more people with a minor in the humanities and fewer people with a major in it.

▲

BoingBoomTschak an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Not at all, most of these are obviously "symptoms" of a well functioning society (not just democracy), not its cause.

▲

fragmede 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Last time someone got rejected from art school, there was a bit of a fascism that happened, so investing in arts totally contributes to functioning democracy!

▲

phantomathkg 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Here we have an example of someone who see college/university as a vocational training center for worker, instead of seeing it as higher education that inspire civilized thinker.

▲

TheAceOfHearts 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

A lot of people severely underestimate the value and impact of the arts because they don't produce immediately visible results. But artistic works are often a massive source of inspiration and they help people through dark times.

	▲	aaron695 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		[dead]

▲

4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[deleted]

▲

eastbound 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> It's easy to make the argument:

And it is false. Those are truthisms, except at one point, college can destroy people’s lives. College can teach people wrong things. College can misdirect people from being about to contribute to the economy and redirect them towards the political goals of the teachers, especially when those don’t derive revenue from their contribution to the economy. College can also misdirect people who would have been happier and more useful with immediate work.

There goes my demonstration: College can be harmful to society, it’s subjective to judge when the threshold was crossed. For my opinion, it was crossed in 2013 through politicization.