University Lecturers' Strike

[HighlandDougie]

Sometimes I wonder whether it's worth pointing out that students pay nothing; thereafter what they pay depends on what they earn, not on what they 'owe'. Two students having done the identical course, one chooses to work for a charity for peanuts and never pays a penny, another gets a job in the City and pays for the whole lot. It's how income tax works - the more you earn, the more you pay.

My apologies, FF, but your response strikes me as just a touch cynical, coming from someone whom I suspect never had to take out a student loan in her life. Are the majority of students so calculating that they think, "Ooh, I can take out all these student loans to cover my fee payments and living expenses but if I live in relative poverty for the next 25 years I don't need to repay a penny"? The current repayment threshold for student loans is £17,750 before tax, which is not a lot of money, even for someone working for a charitable organisation. If you choose to work for a charity/NGO in, say, Pakistan for the proverbial tuppence a week, the Student Loans Company will still come after you as they translate that UK/EU threshold into the Pakistani equivalent, i.e £3,565. Having to pay 9% of earnings over the threshold is a burden which I, for one, would not wish on any graduate who didn't have parents rich enough to pay their fees or subsidise them through university.

[french frank]

HIghland Dougie. I don't think your understanding of the system is correct. As it is, close on 80% of graduates will not pay back the full cost of their fees. They will pay a graduated graduate tax - a progressive income tax. The current repayment threshold is now £25,000* pa, not £17,750.

The reason why this system is regarded as 'unsustainable' is not because of the huge debts the graduates are burdened with but because the government has discovered it's paying such a fat chunk of it.

*As from April 2018 - the new threshold - previously it was £21,000. I think £17,750 was the threshold under the previous system, under the Blair government.

[Serial_Apologist]

Any university student, at least in the arts, should be able to survive two weeks without lectures etc. It isn’t school. They should just do their own research and organise their own discussions, very easy these days. It is probably more complicated for medics, though.

You mean by sourcing via that "impartial" source Google?

[Serial_Apologist]

HIghland Dougie. I don't think your understanding of the system is correct. As it is, close on 80% of graduates will not pay back the full cost of their fees. They will pay a graduated graduate tax - a progressive income tax. The current repayment threshold is now £25,000 pa, not £17,750.

The reason why this system is regarded as 'unsustainable' is not because of the huge debts the graduates are burdened with but because the government has discovered it's paying such a fat chunk of it.

Do the people who introduced the present university funding system really think it sustainable to budget long-term on the employment imponderables facing the future jobs market, when with ubiquitous automation nobody seems to know what education will have been for? The chunk to be paid for by government will end up being far higher, just as with the case of public/private funding initatives and privatised services in general as we see from Carillion and elsewhere, increasingly. I'm all for students not having to repay their loans until they arrive in the minimum required income bracket; but this really doesn't seem a very reliable way to fund HE, which we should care about, national reputation and all that.

[Old Grumpy]

Oh, I see. Not like the Teachers, Civil Service and NHS.

Are not teachers (at least historically - before academies and all that) part of the local government pension scheme? I was under the impression the local government scheme was funded too.

[french frank]

Do the people who introduced the present university funding system really think it sustainable to budget long-term on the employment imponderables facing the future jobs market, when with ubiquitous automation nobody seems to know what education will have been for?

I think it's all part of the same headache of 'balancing the books' - providing public services v. the revenue to pay for it.

University places have expanded, new universities have been created, more students - for whatever benefit there may be (and on average a degree means you earn more): what are acceptable ways of covering the higher costs? In the case of university education, there are two options: fewer university places (and which will be the students who no longer get the opportunities?) or cutting back on what universities receive. A report produced a couple of years back showed that that was how Germany afforded free university education: they then educated about 27% of eligible people, compared with 47% in the UK; and they spent 20% less per student than in the UK.

I don't think the current system can continue much longer, but that doesn't mean the consequences won't be worse - just in different ways.

If one gets away from the hysteria of talking about loans, debts and repayments, and talks instead about a graduate income tax (and effectively no tuition fees for students!), you have a more realistic picture of the situation as it is.

[HighlandDougie]

The current repayment threshold is now £25,000 pa, not £17,750.

Having been a member of various education department (in its different guises over the years - DfES, BIS etc) "task forces" etc on student funding, I think that I have some understanding of the system. £25,000 p.a. may have been one of La May's vote-catching announcements at last year's Tory Party Conference but it isn't actually at that level yet, at leat not according to the SLC. It's also rather more complicated for anyone who has an outstanding loan from pre-2012. I don't for a moment dispute that graduated payments mean that the full cost of the fees paid to universities by the Government may never be wholly recovered over the 30 year lifespan of loans, which is one of the reasons that they've been unable to flog it off at anything other than a loss. That doesn't take away from the fact that being saddled with up to £50,000 of debt post-graduation, should one happen not to have parents/others willing or able to help out, concentrates students' minds wonderfully these days. Like the fabled £350m a week savings from Brexit, it has become a shibboleth. Telling students that the repayment of that debt is likely not to be £50,000 over 30 years but, if they choose to live "modestly" by not seeking higher salaries over that period, only, say, £15,000 seems to me a bit like cold comfort.

As an addendum, having read FF's last post, I wholly agree that some form of graduate tax (with no upfront payment of fees) is preferable to the unsustainable mess that England is in at the moment. Just don't start me on the Teaching Excellence Framework!

[french frank]

Telling students that the repayment of that debt is likely not to be £50,000 over 30 years but, if they choose to live "modestly" by not seeking higher salaries over that period, only, say, £15,000 seems to me a bit like cold comfort.!

I think that's standing the argument on its head. I don't really think anyone calculates how much they would ideally want to earn in order to pay less tax. If people can choose between being in the highest 20% of earners and therefore paying off the entire cost, or living modestly and not paying it all off, I think most would, other things being equal, choose to pay the whole lot off and be a high earner. Otherwise you might argue that no one really wants to earn a lot of money because they'll have to pay more tax …

As an addendum, having read FF's last post, I wholly agree that some form of graduate tax (with no upfront payment of fees) is preferable to the unsustainable mess that England is in at the moment.

I don't quite follow that: 'some form of graduate tax (with no upfront payment of fees)' is exactly what we have, isn't it? In point of fact, it could be said that tuition fees were abolished and replaced by a relatively benign graduate tax (benign in that graduate taxes are more often payable during the whole working life, not stopped after 30 years, and you may may end up paying more than the cost of your course).

In fact there were other advantages that the 2010 changes had over the previous system: more scholarships and bursaries for less advantaged students, upfront fees for part-time students, as well as the rise in the payment threshold. For most students/graduates it made no difference to them when the tuition fee cap was subsequently raised to £9,250 instead of £9,000 because it didn't mean they had to pay any more: it meant the universities received more from the government.

[Bryn]

Unlike us, today's students are paying fees. 2 weeks is about £600 worth of service they'll be denied, even though they must pay for it.

Are students being denied access to University facilities such as libraries, ICT systems, etc.? If not, the lack of direct teaching for a couple of weeks is an opportunity to be grasped, rather then carped over. I very much concur with Mary Chamber's view on this one.

[HighlandDougie]

I think that's standing the argument on its head. I don't really think anyone calculates how much they would ideally want to earn in order to pay less tax. If people can choose between being in the highest 20% of earners and therefore paying off the entire cost, or living modestly and not paying it all off, I think most would, other things being equal, choose to pay the whole lot off and be a high earner. Otherwise you might argue that no one really wants to earn a lot of money because they'll have to pay more tax …

I don't quite follow that: 'some form of graduate tax (with no upfront payment of fees)' is exactly what we have, isn't it? In point of fact, it could be said that tuition fees were abolished and replaced by a relatively benign graduate tax (benign in that graduate taxes are more often payable during the whole working life, not stopped after 30 years, and you may may end up paying more than the cost of your course).

In fact there were other advantages that the 2010 changes had over the previous system: more scholarships and bursaries for less advantaged students, upfront fees for part-time students, as well as the rise in the payment threshold. For most students/graduates it made no difference to them when the tuition fee cap was subsequently raised to £9,250 instead of £9,000 because it didn't mean they had to pay any more: it meant the universities received more from the government.

OK, I give up. Sophistry never was my strong point so I'll know not to stray into posts under this general heading in future. I'll stick to music.

[Beef Oven!]

Are students being denied access to University facilities such as libraries, ICT systems, etc.? If not, the lack of direct teaching for a couple of weeks is an opportunity to be grasped, rather then carped over. I very much concur with Mary Chamber's view on this one.

You think it's ok that students are denied tutorials, lectures, seminars, classes, personal tutor support for two weeks? When it costs them £300 per week? You are a very harsh man Bryn - what d you dislike about university students?

[subcontrabass]

Are not teachers (at least historically - before academies and all that) part of the local government pension scheme? I was under the impression the local government scheme was funded too.

Teachers in state schools, lecturers in FE colleges and in the "post 1992" universities (i.e. former polytechnics and colleges of higher education) are in the (unfunded) Teachers Pension Scheme. Local government staff (and non-teaching staff in schools plus Environment Agency staff) are in the (funded) Local Government Pension Scheme (which is an umbrella for 89 local pension funds, with total funds in excess of £200Bn - see https://www.unison.org.uk/get-help/k...eme/#heading-7 for more details).

[Bryn]

You think it's ok that students are denied tutorials, lectures, seminars, classes, personal tutor support for two weeks? When it costs them £300 per week? You are a very harsh man Bryn - what d you dislike about university students?

More to the point, why do you regard them with such disdain? I would fully expect that even first year students 'paying' this nominal £300 a week would have developed study skills they would grasp the opportunity of applying on their own initiative during this period. Those, that is who are not busy joining thieir tutors on the picket lines.

[Dave2002]

This sentence ...

to a defined contribution scheme, where their pensions would be subject to changes in the stock market.

from the link provided in msg 1 strikes fear into me - or it would do if it directly affected me. I do know something about university pensions, and also a bit about the stock market. The changes in stock market valuations over recent days have knocked £000s off some people's savings, and although it's hard to see how pension funds can be managed in such a way as to actually isolate pensioners from such fluctuations, it is a matter of considerable concern.

[ardcarp]

I don't quite follow that: 'some form of graduate tax (with no upfront payment of fees)' is exactly what we have, isn't it?

It would be a whole lot less opaque if it were called a graduate tax and was operated directly by government. As it is, it's a loan operated by The Student Loans Company and the thing which strikes fear into all those who have/will have a debt in the region of £60,000 is that there is nothing to stop the rules being changed. The interest rate has already been raised to above what was promised; and what is to stop them reducing the salary level at which it must be re-payed?

As it is a debt, it will become increasingly difficult for young graduates to be considered for a mortgage.

I've gone off topic slightly, but current students (unlike those of us who inhabited Hallowed Portals in civilised times) do see university education as more of a market place, and they do expect to get their money's worth. Can we blame them?