Bribes for college admissions

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scipioafricanus
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by scipioafricanus »

Being from the Ivy League doesn't mean you are smart anymore. It just means you have money and/or connections.
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Termite
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by Termite »

Only if they are truly private. I think there are only a handful of evangelical colleges that still "opt out" of us.gov funding programs so they are free to "discriminate" against LGBTQRSTUVWXYZ.issions spots. Not with my tax dollars.
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Vonz90
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by Vonz90 »

scipioafricanus wrote: Mon Mar 18, 2019 12:09 am Being from the Ivy League doesn't mean you are smart anymore. It just means you have money and/or connections.
I am sorry, but did it ever mean more than that?

The purpose of schools like that is to get the young kids of the leadership class together to make contacts and learn the codes, and sprinkle enough genuinely brilliant students around to lift the overall average.

That said, for all the complaining about “legacy” admissions, the data says they are above average as a group.
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D5CAV
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by D5CAV »

Vonz90 wrote: Sat Mar 16, 2019 8:02 pm 1. Why do you assume that markets work everywhere else they operate but not here? Schools will still have to balance vs what it does to their reputation with their potential student body make up. Well they will have direct market feedback if they screw that up.
2. The idea that college admissions to these types of schools should be granted by blind meritocracy is relatively recent (post WW1). I think we did alright then, better than now actually.
3. If you think the princelings of all the party officials in China are competing for university spots on merit, I have a bridge to sell you.
1. True, but everyone should know the score, otherwise our "market" economy is the "Sopranos" market economy, where you think you are getting the best price for garbage collection, but someone gave someone else an offer they couldn't refuse. If everyone knows that a Stanford degree is open to the highest bidder, but a Tsinghua degree is only through the most stringent meritocracy, are you going to hire the Tsinghua grad or the Stanford grad? What happens to the value of a Stanford degree vs. a Tsinghua degree in that free market? Free market requires full disclosure and full information, not under the table bribes, where we can all pretend it is only the best and brightest (except for affirmative action).

2. Yes and no. Prior to WW2, Ivy league was more of a club for rich kids. Schools like MIT, Georgia Tech, or Purdue, were always meritocracies because they didn't put out a lot of English majors or confer a generic "degree" to someone who sometimes showed up for classes, like FDR at Harvard. If you didn't have the IQ points, you flunked out of Freshman Calculus and wasted everyone's time, as well as taking the place of someone more deserving.

3. Not true. Why do you think all the "princelings" go to Harvard, Stanford, Oxford, or University of Minnesota? Because those schools have "foreign student" slots for "diversity", at 2x the full price tuition for a "citizen" (See your No. 1 point). Remember some party official who got in trouble a few years ago because his son wrecked his Ferrari while a student at Boston University? That was because his test scores could only get him into Yichang Normal school.
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HTRN
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by HTRN »

It more than 2x, I think it's something like 4x. Also, they pay cash up front, no headaches with government loans or grants, or dealing with scholarship bullshit.
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Vonz90
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by Vonz90 »

D5CAV wrote: Mon Mar 18, 2019 7:44 pm
Vonz90 wrote: Sat Mar 16, 2019 8:02 pm 1. Why do you assume that markets work everywhere else they operate but not here? Schools will still have to balance vs what it does to their reputation with their potential student body make up. Well they will have direct market feedback if they screw that up.
2. The idea that college admissions to these types of schools should be granted by blind meritocracy is relatively recent (post WW1). I think we did alright then, better than now actually.
3. If you think the princelings of all the party officials in China are competing for university spots on merit, I have a bridge to sell you.
1. True, but everyone should know the score, otherwise our "market" economy is the "Sopranos" market economy, where you think you are getting the best price for garbage collection, but someone gave someone else an offer they couldn't refuse. If everyone knows that a Stanford degree is open to the highest bidder, but a Tsinghua degree is only through the most stringent meritocracy, are you going to hire the Tsinghua grad or the Stanford grad? What happens to the value of a Stanford degree vs. a Tsinghua degree in that free market? Free market requires full disclosure and full information, not under the table bribes, where we can all pretend it is only the best and brightest (except for affirmative action).

2. Yes and no. Prior to WW2, Ivy league was more of a club for rich kids. Schools like MIT, Georgia Tech, or Purdue, were always meritocracies because they didn't put out a lot of English majors or confer a generic "degree" to someone who sometimes showed up for classes, like FDR at Harvard. If you didn't have the IQ points, you flunked out of Freshman Calculus and wasted everyone's time, as well as taking the place of someone more deserving.

3. Not true. Why do you think all the "princelings" go to Harvard, Stanford, Oxford, or University of Minnesota? Because those schools have "foreign student" slots for "diversity", at 2x the full price tuition for a "citizen" (See your No. 1 point). Remember some party official who got in trouble a few years ago because his son wrecked his Ferrari while a student at Boston University? That was because his test scores could only get him into Yichang Normal school.
1. Your analogy does not make sense. There are lots if markets that work with a combination of fixed prices and auction on one level or another and are above board. From real estate to sports ticket secondary markets, it is an efficient way to get to an equitable price, particularly for goods where demand > supply.
2. Looks like we are in broad agreement.
3. If they are over here, it is usually because they were not getting a spot in the prestigious places there, that is where the connected party kids go to set them up the power climb in government and government connected enterprise. That leaves lots of rich (and upper middle class) kids out which is why the demand over there.
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D5CAV
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by D5CAV »

Vonz90 wrote: Tue Mar 19, 2019 7:57 am 1. Your analogy does not make sense. There are lots if markets that work with a combination of fixed prices and auction on one level or another and are above board. From real estate to sports ticket secondary markets, it is an efficient way to get to an equitable price, particularly for goods where demand > supply.
The key phrase you use is "above board".

This was not "above board". Bribes were paid to enable students to fake sufficient test scores and achievements to meet admission criteria.

In my definition of free market that is called "Fraud".

If your definition of free market includes bribery and fraud, I've got a bridge to sell you ... cheap, but cash only.

This is the best summary of the college admissions scandal I've seen. Long, but worth it: https://www.unz.com/runz/the-myth-of-am ... ritocracy/

Cliff notes version: If we actually had a meritocracy, the winners at top US universities would be (in order):
white Christian men
Asian men

You read that right, white Christian men have, on average, higher test scores than Asian men. Statistics that show Asian men having higher scores than white men arise from putting white Christian men in the same pool as white Jewish men. There is no us.gov minority set-aside for Jews, so not sure why that is.

The losers would be (in order of biggest losers to smallest losers):
blacks
hispanics
white women
white Jewish men

However, everyone knows about "affirmative action". That stigma unfairly taints qualified minorities and women. Qualified minorities and women will be winners in the long run in a true meritocracy (keep dreaming).

Thomas Sowell said, "The idea that men should be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin got me labeled a radical in my youth, a progressive in my middle years, and a racist in my old age."

https://www.nationalreview.com/2013/08/ ... #pq=PKnYWG

50 years later, that remains a dream.
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Vonz90
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by Vonz90 »

D5CAV wrote: Wed Mar 20, 2019 12:23 am
Vonz90 wrote: Tue Mar 19, 2019 7:57 am 1. Your analogy does not make sense. There are lots if markets that work with a combination of fixed prices and auction on one level or another and are above board. From real estate to sports ticket secondary markets, it is an efficient way to get to an equitable price, particularly for goods where demand > supply.
The key phrase you use is "above board".

This was not "above board". Bribes were paid to enable students to fake sufficient test scores and achievements to meet admission criteria.

In my definition of free market that is called "Fraud".

If your definition of free market includes bribery and fraud, I've got a bridge to sell you ... cheap, but cash only.

This is the best summary of the college admissions scandal I've seen. Long, but worth it: https://www.unz.com/runz/the-myth-of-am ... ritocracy/

Cliff notes version: If we actually had a meritocracy, the winners at top US universities would be (in order):
white Christian men
Asian men

You read that right, white Christian men have, on average, higher test scores than Asian men. Statistics that show Asian men having higher scores than white men arise from putting white Christian men in the same pool as white Jewish men. There is no us.gov minority set-aside for Jews, so not sure why that is.

The losers would be (in order of biggest losers to smallest losers):
blacks
hispanics
white women
white Jewish men

However, everyone knows about "affirmative action". That stigma unfairly taints qualified minorities and women. Qualified minorities and women will be winners in the long run in a true meritocracy (keep dreaming).

Thomas Sowell said, "The idea that men should be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin got me labeled a radical in my youth, a progressive in my middle years, and a racist in my old age."

https://www.nationalreview.com/2013/08/ ... #pq=PKnYWG

50 years later, that remains a dream.
I see you are missing a significant point of what I am saying and replacing it with something I am not saying. I am not say that bribery and fraud are okay, or that these people should not be prosecuted.

I am saying that this scandle suggests that a market is under served and it would be useful if these universities perhaps took a portion of their slots and auctioned them, probably only to those who met some minimum requirements. If you want an egalitarian angle to it, all of the excess funds could be given as direct subsidy to lower income students or something.

AKA - move it above board
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D5CAV
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

Post by D5CAV »

OK. I get it now. Affirmative action set-asides for stupid rich kids.

They kind-of already do this with rich kids from foreign countries ("foreign diversity" set-asides) at extortionate tuition rates, so sure, why not?

We can be assured none of these stupid rich kids will darken the door of any calculus or electrical engineering class at Berkeley or Stanford. They will graduate with some generic "humanities studies" degree, so we won't have to worry about them doing any medical procedures on us or designing any aircraft control systems.

I already give more credibility to potential hires from Tsinghua, or IIT Mumbai than Stanford or Berkeley (even those with STEM degrees). This will just further devalue those degrees, so in a true "above board" market economy, those extortionate tuition rates will go down.

As you said, if it's "above board" then we, as hiring managers, know what we're getting, and can bid for those graduates appropriately. Caveat Emptor.

However, I still say "No" until there is no more us.gov funding of these schools, either explicit or implicit. Even for us.gov contracts going for science and technology research, there better be very strict accountability that none of the funds go to "overhead" to support the "Gender Studies" department or the "Business School".

I'm with you on free market, brother, but free market has to mean free market, not welfare and subsidies from my tax dollars going to stupid rich kids.
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Re: Bribes for college admissions

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