Over at The Simple Dollar, Trent is kicking himself for what he calls “Seven Huge Financial Mistakes” he made while he was in college. Most of these, such as “Going into College without a Clue,” “Not Taking My Classes with Enough Seriousness,” and “Signing Up for a Credit Card—Then Using It with Reckless Abandon,” are functions of youth. No one should be surprised when a young person does exactly these things and all the other alleged missteps Trent describes.
Youth, after all, is wasted on the young.
As a veteran of 15 years of university teaching, I’d like to trot out a radical idea that has silently lurked inside my mind for a long time:
Students should not be allowed to go directly from their senior year in high school to their freshman year in college without passing “Go.” Given the staggering cost of a college or university education, its importance to a young person’s future, and the number of financial predators waiting to prey on the kids the instant they’re set loose with no real responsibilities and no parents to watch over them, America should make it an expectation that everyone will work or do paid community service for two years before enrolling in any form of higher education.
We should set up a national service program for young people, one that could send high school graduates anywhere in the U.S. and to parts of the world that are relatively safe for Americans to live and work. This program should provide jobs that pay more than minimum wage (possibly through a matching tuition savings plan) and build real-world, salable skills.
Then we should give high-school graduates three options:
a. join the military;
b. sign up for a national service program; or
c. get a job in the real world.
In addition to paying young people a salary, the national service program could provide something like a 401(k) for prospective college students, into which pre-tax dollars could be contributed—and employers would match this—to build a fund to help pay college tuition. Actually, for people under, say, 26 years of age, all private, municipal, and state employers could offer a 401(k)-style college tuition fund, with matching contributions. Since soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen risk their lives in the service of their country, the military should provide a benefit like the GI Bill with more generous provisions than the proposed tuition fund. The latter would apply only to the national service program and to real-world employment.
This scheme would have a number of advantages.
First, it would expose kids to a period of responsibility at a time when they need to build maturity…and at a time when, as Trent’s post so accurately reveals, many young people are simply not ready for college.
Second, it would allow the students themselves to earn a portion of their college tuition, even it it’s only a small portion. This would help them to appreciate what is entailed in earning the amount a university education costsbefore they rack up a lifetime of student debt, take some of the burden off parents’ shoulders, and give students time to learn responsible financial habits.
Third, it would get kids out of an environment where they can easily be exploited by credit-card mongers and others who make a business of ripping off college students. By the time the young people return to campus life, they will be two years older, more mature, and smarter. The difference between a 19-year-old and a 21-year-old is significant, particularly if that 21-year-old has been earning a living for a while.
Is a national service program socialism?
Yup. So are public universities and community colleges. So is federal support of research at private universities such as Harvard and Princeton. So are city roads, state routes, and interstate highways.
We work together to make life better.
It should be so. There’s nothing wrong with creating a program to employ young people productively and give them time to grow up before completing the final part of their education, when it ultimately will repay us all with a better-educated, wiser, and smarter workforce.
