The other day I was reading an article and someone referenced in a comment Max & Me, a book written by a former faculty member of Brevard Community College (BCC). The commenter used it to further explain a point about employee relations in academia, and since BCC is a short drive from where I live, I was interested to know more. Although the online version of the book I've linked is crappy (it's a backup from a Geocities page and the links are all broken, so you'll have to navigate through the work by changing the last part of the URL from `max3.htm' to `max4.htm', etc. up to `max42.htm'), it's a fascinating read.
In short, it's the tale of a professor at BCC who realizes the president, board of trustees, and some of the administration are corrupt and using the school as a cheap or free source of food, labor, materials, and in some cases money. It begins innocently enough, with the professor wanting to ensure that BCC delivers high quality education, and realizing that the administration is conspiring to make the college pass its accreditation audit without actually meeting the standards, he starts pushing for change at BCC to improve the quality of education. He is met with resistance by the administration, which leads him to push harder, and he ends up uncovering widespread corruption within BCC's administration. He is ultimately fired and at the time of publication (in 1993) had ongoing lawsuits against BCC.
The professor in question, Marion Brady, has also been active in curriculum design and teaching methods, and today regularly writes op-eds for newspapers. I can't, though, seem to find much followup on his situation with BCC. Google turns up a few court judgements which suggest his case was eventually allowed to be heard, but I couldn't find record of the case actually coming to trial, so it may have been settled out of court. Brady doesn't even list Max & Me as one of the books he's written on his website, and according to Amazon it seems to be out of print with just a few copies floating around.
But maybe most telling about the current situation at BCC is a review left on Glassdoor by a current employee essentially stating that not much has changed. Max King, the president when Marion Brady was at BCC, is gone, but much of the administration's attitude seems unchanged. I haven't heard anything about reform at BCC, and Max & Me is the only thing I've ever seen discussing the problems there, so it would seem that BCC continues to languish under bad administration. I'd like to be wrong, but I can believe it.
14 February 2012
03 January 2012
Vim title weirdness
I'm now using a setup with two external monitors at work and I'm using a Mac OS X utility called Stay to restore my window positions when I connect and disconnect the monitors. Stay depends on window titles, though, to figure out what should go where, and the only two applications I'm using on the external monitors, Vim and iTerm2, both have a tendency to change window titles. iTerm2 was relatively easy to fix: just turn off all the options to put stuff in the window title and all the windows just get titled "Shell". Vim, however, was trickier, since it also tends to mess with iTerm2's titles.
Vim normally puts the name of file in the active buffer in the window title, but this was easily overridden by adding the following to my .vimrc
This works fine for getting MacVim to leave the window title alone, but if you run Vim from the terminal, on exit it sets the window title to "Thanks for flying Vim". Annoying for me, since I now have iTerm2 set to just leave the window title alone. But there is an option in Vim where it sets the title on exit. The fix was to add the following to my .vimrc
Didn't take me too long to figure it out, but was more work than it should have been.
Vim normally puts the name of file in the active buffer in the window title, but this was easily overridden by adding the following to my .vimrc
set title titlestring=VIMThis works fine for getting MacVim to leave the window title alone, but if you run Vim from the terminal, on exit it sets the window title to "Thanks for flying Vim". Annoying for me, since I now have iTerm2 set to just leave the window title alone. But there is an option in Vim where it sets the title on exit. The fix was to add the following to my .vimrc
let &oldtitle=ShellDidn't take me too long to figure it out, but was more work than it should have been.
13 October 2011
Orlando-area hospital reviews
My wife and I have visited a lot of hospitals over the last few years for a variety of reasons. Talking to my coworkers the other day, I realized I should write a little review of what I think of all the hospitals we've been to since it might help someone. Without further ado, the reviews:
Starting in the north and working south, this is the hospital in Sanford. It feels a little small and old, but it's actually a great place. The wait at the Emergency Department (ED) is usually short, the food is remarkably good as hospitals go, and the staff, from nurses to custodial, are nice. Although they don't offer all hospital services you might need, they are by far one of my favorite Orlando-area hospitals. Be aware though that, because they are small, it can be harder to visit after hours than at larger hospitals and the only exterior part of the hospital that's accessible 24 hours is the ED.
Note that CFRH is not part of the Orlando Health system or the Florida Hospital system, making it one of the few remaining independent hospitals in the area.
In Longwood, the South Seminole branch of the Orlando Health hospital network has always been hit or miss for us. Sometimes the ED is good with a short wait, but other times the wait can exceed 8 hours. The hospital also feels a little worn down, probably because it sees so many patients. They also have a lot of security theater here, so expect to have your bags searched and to empty your pockets so you can be wanded for metal.
I've also been displeased over the years with some of the doctors in the ED. Those doctors we've had problems with aren't still there as far as I know, but we have had encounters with a disproportionately large number of doctors at the South Seminole ED that were bad listeners, eager to lecture, and sometimes, in my opinion, unwilling to do everything they could have to help us.
Thanks to a relatively recent expansion, this is the second prettiest hospital on the list with an enclosed courtyard featuring a fountain and reflecting pool, not to mention to clean, modern-feeling interiors. The ED here is generally pretty fast to get you through triage and then back to a room where, you might have to wait a while, but at least you can wait in relative conform and peace. Upstairs, the admitted patient rooms are all private and spacious in the recently added wings, and in the old wings the rooms are at least private if small.
There are no set visiting hours at FH Altamonte as far as I know, although late at night through early morning you have to obtain a badge when entering. The staff has no problem with a family member staying overnight with the patient, and they provide visitors with a comfy chair in patient rooms that fully reclines to act like a bed.
Also, this being the first Florida Hospital location on the list, let me warn you: there are no pig products in any of the food they serve, so that means no ham, no pork, and, worst of all, no bacon. Oh, they do have turkey ham (turkey with dies and some smoke flavor to make it look and taste sort of like ham) and turkey bacon (no comment), but just don't be fooled.
Until recently Winter Park Memorial Hospital was independent, but now they are part of Florida Hospital, which is great, because when they were independent they didn't take some major insurance plans. Now anyone can go there. Unfortunately, Winter Park Memorial is the smallest hospital on the list and you can feel it. I've only ever visited the ED here, and while the care was fine, it's lacking a lot of the improvements in patient and guest comfort that neighboring hospitals offer.
Florida Hospital's main campus sits between Downtown Orlando and Winter Park and, thanks to a recent remodel, features beautiful grounds and nice interiors. Construction is ongoing as of this writing and is expected to continue for a few more years, but when complete it should be the largest, most comprehensive medical campus in the Orlando area.
The rooms and wings are a mix of old and new, with some private rooms and some semi-private multiple occupancy rooms. Whether you get a good room or not seems to depend a lot on luck.
You may not like the ED, though. I like it, but some people really don't. Rather than the standard triage to waiting room to patient room where doctors come to you, they triage, then you wait, then you go to a room where the doctor sees you, then you go to a room where the nurse treats you, then you go to a room for observation, then you go back to a room later to see the doctor again before you leave (or to start the process over if you need to do something else). The whole process is more efficient and better documented than at most EDs, but you can end up feeling like you're on an assembly line, so be ready to be shuffled around.
I've only ever been to the ED here, but FL East seems average in just about every way. Nothing to really complain about, but nothing to make it stand out.
This is Orlando Health's main campus and consists of multiple hospitals spread out over multiple blocks. There's the main hospital, the women and babies hospital, the children's hospital, and the secondary hospital a couple blocks down. Because of its location on the south side of Orlando, the ED has fairly strict security, but the patient rooms and the variety of services are great. There's even a special ED for gynecological and obstetrical emergent care.
The food here is also generally good because, unlike Florida Hospital, you are offered more options than just what the hospital considers healthy, and they serve pig products. So you can get real bacon and a cheeseburger if you want, but they also have healthy options matching various dietary needs.
Like South Seminole the security theater here is excessive and mostly pointless, but it's otherwise a good hospital in the Orlando Health system. I've only been to the ED and outpatient services here on a few occasions, but from what I've seen it's a decent hospital for the area.
Built to serve Celebration, and some of the surrounding area because it's unavoidable, this hospital also has a gym/spa, doctor's offices inside, and a consumer pharmacy. The rooms are nice, the ED was recently rebuilt (literally, they built a new ED next to the old one and are converting the old ED into other stuff), and it's to my mind the prettiest hospital in Orlando.
Unfortunately, it's also one of the least practical. In what I assume is an effort to make it feel less like a hospital because of the other facilities it contains, most of the places you want to go when you actually want to visit the hospital services feel hidden and difficult to find. You can easily miss your destination multiple times because it's tucked down a hallway behind an unmarked door.
These are, of course, based just on my personal experiences, and I have a lot more experience with some of the hospitals than I do with others. As always, if you have a medical emergency, you should probably just call 911 or at least go to the nearest hospital, but if you have a choice, I hope this information will help you make a more informed decision.
Central Florida Regional Hospital
Starting in the north and working south, this is the hospital in Sanford. It feels a little small and old, but it's actually a great place. The wait at the Emergency Department (ED) is usually short, the food is remarkably good as hospitals go, and the staff, from nurses to custodial, are nice. Although they don't offer all hospital services you might need, they are by far one of my favorite Orlando-area hospitals. Be aware though that, because they are small, it can be harder to visit after hours than at larger hospitals and the only exterior part of the hospital that's accessible 24 hours is the ED.
Note that CFRH is not part of the Orlando Health system or the Florida Hospital system, making it one of the few remaining independent hospitals in the area.
Orlando Health - South Seminole
In Longwood, the South Seminole branch of the Orlando Health hospital network has always been hit or miss for us. Sometimes the ED is good with a short wait, but other times the wait can exceed 8 hours. The hospital also feels a little worn down, probably because it sees so many patients. They also have a lot of security theater here, so expect to have your bags searched and to empty your pockets so you can be wanded for metal.
I've also been displeased over the years with some of the doctors in the ED. Those doctors we've had problems with aren't still there as far as I know, but we have had encounters with a disproportionately large number of doctors at the South Seminole ED that were bad listeners, eager to lecture, and sometimes, in my opinion, unwilling to do everything they could have to help us.
Florida Hospital - Altamonte Springs
Thanks to a relatively recent expansion, this is the second prettiest hospital on the list with an enclosed courtyard featuring a fountain and reflecting pool, not to mention to clean, modern-feeling interiors. The ED here is generally pretty fast to get you through triage and then back to a room where, you might have to wait a while, but at least you can wait in relative conform and peace. Upstairs, the admitted patient rooms are all private and spacious in the recently added wings, and in the old wings the rooms are at least private if small.
There are no set visiting hours at FH Altamonte as far as I know, although late at night through early morning you have to obtain a badge when entering. The staff has no problem with a family member staying overnight with the patient, and they provide visitors with a comfy chair in patient rooms that fully reclines to act like a bed.
Also, this being the first Florida Hospital location on the list, let me warn you: there are no pig products in any of the food they serve, so that means no ham, no pork, and, worst of all, no bacon. Oh, they do have turkey ham (turkey with dies and some smoke flavor to make it look and taste sort of like ham) and turkey bacon (no comment), but just don't be fooled.
Winter Park Memorial Hospital
Until recently Winter Park Memorial Hospital was independent, but now they are part of Florida Hospital, which is great, because when they were independent they didn't take some major insurance plans. Now anyone can go there. Unfortunately, Winter Park Memorial is the smallest hospital on the list and you can feel it. I've only ever visited the ED here, and while the care was fine, it's lacking a lot of the improvements in patient and guest comfort that neighboring hospitals offer.
Florida Hospital - Orlando
Florida Hospital's main campus sits between Downtown Orlando and Winter Park and, thanks to a recent remodel, features beautiful grounds and nice interiors. Construction is ongoing as of this writing and is expected to continue for a few more years, but when complete it should be the largest, most comprehensive medical campus in the Orlando area.
The rooms and wings are a mix of old and new, with some private rooms and some semi-private multiple occupancy rooms. Whether you get a good room or not seems to depend a lot on luck.
You may not like the ED, though. I like it, but some people really don't. Rather than the standard triage to waiting room to patient room where doctors come to you, they triage, then you wait, then you go to a room where the doctor sees you, then you go to a room where the nurse treats you, then you go to a room for observation, then you go back to a room later to see the doctor again before you leave (or to start the process over if you need to do something else). The whole process is more efficient and better documented than at most EDs, but you can end up feeling like you're on an assembly line, so be ready to be shuffled around.
Florida Hospital - East Orlando
I've only ever been to the ED here, but FL East seems average in just about every way. Nothing to really complain about, but nothing to make it stand out.
Orlando Regional Medical Center
This is Orlando Health's main campus and consists of multiple hospitals spread out over multiple blocks. There's the main hospital, the women and babies hospital, the children's hospital, and the secondary hospital a couple blocks down. Because of its location on the south side of Orlando, the ED has fairly strict security, but the patient rooms and the variety of services are great. There's even a special ED for gynecological and obstetrical emergent care.
The food here is also generally good because, unlike Florida Hospital, you are offered more options than just what the hospital considers healthy, and they serve pig products. So you can get real bacon and a cheeseburger if you want, but they also have healthy options matching various dietary needs.
Orlando Health - Dr. Phillips
Like South Seminole the security theater here is excessive and mostly pointless, but it's otherwise a good hospital in the Orlando Health system. I've only been to the ED and outpatient services here on a few occasions, but from what I've seen it's a decent hospital for the area.
Florida Hospital - Celebration
Built to serve Celebration, and some of the surrounding area because it's unavoidable, this hospital also has a gym/spa, doctor's offices inside, and a consumer pharmacy. The rooms are nice, the ED was recently rebuilt (literally, they built a new ED next to the old one and are converting the old ED into other stuff), and it's to my mind the prettiest hospital in Orlando.
Unfortunately, it's also one of the least practical. In what I assume is an effort to make it feel less like a hospital because of the other facilities it contains, most of the places you want to go when you actually want to visit the hospital services feel hidden and difficult to find. You can easily miss your destination multiple times because it's tucked down a hallway behind an unmarked door.
Conclusions
These are, of course, based just on my personal experiences, and I have a lot more experience with some of the hospitals than I do with others. As always, if you have a medical emergency, you should probably just call 911 or at least go to the nearest hospital, but if you have a choice, I hope this information will help you make a more informed decision.
29 September 2011
Flexeril and kidney/bladder stones
Flexeril (brand name for Cyclobenzaprine) is a muscle relaxing drug used to relieve pain associated with muscle injuries. It's normally prescribed to help with pain after something like a fall or a car accident, however it is also used in the treatment of fibromyalgia. A patient typically only takes Flexeril for a few days to a couple weeks at most, but on rare occasion some patients, like those with fibromyalgia, take it for longer periods of time. It's based on these few patients that we have some limited information about uncommon side effects of taking Flexeril.
All of this information is a prelude to a recent discovery my wife and I made. She has produced many kidney stones over the last few years, normally with months between each one, but a couple weeks ago she started producing a stone every one or two days. At first we thought they were regular stones, but after the third one in as many days we knew something was not right. After many long nights and lots of pain (for her), an ER doc suggested that it might not be kidney stones but some other type of bladder debris since nothing was showing up on imaging studies. This lead me to do some searching and, by chance, stumbling across an online forum where a fibromyalgia patient complained about bladder stones from taking cyclobenzaprine (a.k.a. Flexeril). Aha!
Just before the stones started, my wife fell in the bathroom and got a concussion. In treating her, since she had some pain and bruising from the fall, the doctor prescribed her Flexeril. Shortly after the stones started. At first we thought the Flexeril was helping her pass stones sooner than she might have by relaxing muscles, but it turns out Flexeril increases the levels of phosphorous that pass through the kidneys, and this quickly combined with other trace minerals in her urine to produce fast growing, small stones in the bladder. She stopped taking the Flexeril and the stones have gone away.
I tell you all this just in case this rare situation afflicts another person. I had a hard time finding any information, so maybe this will help someone in the future who faces similar circumstances.
All of this information is a prelude to a recent discovery my wife and I made. She has produced many kidney stones over the last few years, normally with months between each one, but a couple weeks ago she started producing a stone every one or two days. At first we thought they were regular stones, but after the third one in as many days we knew something was not right. After many long nights and lots of pain (for her), an ER doc suggested that it might not be kidney stones but some other type of bladder debris since nothing was showing up on imaging studies. This lead me to do some searching and, by chance, stumbling across an online forum where a fibromyalgia patient complained about bladder stones from taking cyclobenzaprine (a.k.a. Flexeril). Aha!
Just before the stones started, my wife fell in the bathroom and got a concussion. In treating her, since she had some pain and bruising from the fall, the doctor prescribed her Flexeril. Shortly after the stones started. At first we thought the Flexeril was helping her pass stones sooner than she might have by relaxing muscles, but it turns out Flexeril increases the levels of phosphorous that pass through the kidneys, and this quickly combined with other trace minerals in her urine to produce fast growing, small stones in the bladder. She stopped taking the Flexeril and the stones have gone away.
I tell you all this just in case this rare situation afflicts another person. I had a hard time finding any information, so maybe this will help someone in the future who faces similar circumstances.
25 August 2011
Dreams coming to reality
Several iterations of this blog back, I wrote a post laying out where I wanted to see personal computing go. In short, I wanted a small device that could be used as a PDA/cell phone but that contained everything I would need to plug in to an ecosystem of larger devices to expand my computing options. Need a bigger screen? Plug into a tablet. Need a keyboard? Plug into a laptop. Need more computing power? Plug into a desktop. The core of your personal computing experience is always with you and when you need more juice you just plug in to it. I've not done anything to make this dream a reality, but Always Innovating is making some great headway.
Their system has as its smallest unit a PDA-sized device called the MiniBook that contains the processor and memory. It has a touch screen, microphone, and camera; it can run Skype; the only thing keeping it from being a cell phone is the lack of a cellular radio. You can then plug in the MiniBook to a tablet that has a much bigger screen and a bigger battery, although all the processing and memory is still on the MiniBook. And if you need a keyboard and more battery, you can plug into a keyboard, effectively creating a netbook, all still running from the MiniBook.
To make things better, it runs a variety of operating systems. You have Android and ChromeOS for ease of use, but also have access to two Linux distros to let you take full control of the device to do whatever you want. This is one of the things about what Always Innovating is doing that really gets me excited: I just can't make economic sense of buying a tablet if I'm not going to be able to do some real programming on it.
About the only thing missing to make this a perfect product is a cell radio, but I'm sure that's a feature that's being worked on.
Now I just have to save up some money to buy one.
Their system has as its smallest unit a PDA-sized device called the MiniBook that contains the processor and memory. It has a touch screen, microphone, and camera; it can run Skype; the only thing keeping it from being a cell phone is the lack of a cellular radio. You can then plug in the MiniBook to a tablet that has a much bigger screen and a bigger battery, although all the processing and memory is still on the MiniBook. And if you need a keyboard and more battery, you can plug into a keyboard, effectively creating a netbook, all still running from the MiniBook.
To make things better, it runs a variety of operating systems. You have Android and ChromeOS for ease of use, but also have access to two Linux distros to let you take full control of the device to do whatever you want. This is one of the things about what Always Innovating is doing that really gets me excited: I just can't make economic sense of buying a tablet if I'm not going to be able to do some real programming on it.
About the only thing missing to make this a perfect product is a cell radio, but I'm sure that's a feature that's being worked on.
Now I just have to save up some money to buy one.
21 June 2011
Overvaluing education in America
There is a potential financial crisis in American higher education. I've seen it coming for a while, and recently people in the press have been noticing the coming issue, too, thanks to issues with loans at private colleges. It's probably still a few years off from coming to a head, and maybe there's still a way to avoid it, but right now the problem is there and growing. Let's take a look.
At American universities, most students take out low interest, government backed loans to pay the costs of tuition, room, and board. Over the corse of an undergraduate education, students accumulate tens of thousdands of dollars in debt, and graduate students often build up over $100,000 in debt. In theory, the government offers these loans as a way of making education possible to those who could otherwise not afford it, and they can offer low interest rates because education is supposed to be a sure bet to higher earnings. But as so often happens, government subsidization of the education market has changed the game in unexpected ways that will likely lead to an economic fallout.
The theory of student loans is pretty straightforward: a student borrows against future earnings to pay for the cost of education today. Both parties win in the deal: lenders have an opportunity to make money and borrowers can earn more money than they would have without the education the loan financed even after paying off the loan. Principle, interest rate, and repayment terms should depend on several things, including the expected lifetime earnings of the student and the likelihood that the student will default for any of many reasons (drop out, bad market, student becomes unemployable, etc.).
Unfortunately, student loans don't work like this. Instead, student loans are government backed and given to anyone who has been accepted by a college or university, regardless of credit history or expected future earnings (based on degree program, for example). In fact, the only way in which the loans are differentiated is to subsidize the interest on loans to students who have the least ability to pay their education costs without financial assistance. The result is that students can take out loans they are very unlikely to be able to repay while government bears the risk.
Someone must have noticed this, because in 2005 Congress passed a law exempting student loan debt from bankruptcy, making student loan debt almost impossible to escape. Just a few years later, Congress went back and made the US Government the sole provider of government-backed student loans, probably having realized they'd just given banks access to free money while assuming all the risk themselves.
So to summarize, student loans could be a beautiful solution to funding education for those unable to pay for it in full by themselves, but instead we have student loans that are backed by the government, in no way sized to the expected ability of the student to repay, and unescapable in the event that students cannot repay them.
To me the nature and high probability of a student loan crisis seems obvious, but since we have yet to have a panic let me explain. Since students are able to get educational loans without regard to expected ability to repay, we first have the problem of students taking on debt to earn degrees that are highly unlikely to lead them to careers where they can repay the loans. This has the effect of creating money today, but when this money is destroyed through loan repayment and interest, the money supply ultimately increases less than it would have otherwise, and in the event that the student is never able to repay all of the loan, the money supply shrinks.
Of course, degree is not everything: some humanities majors will go on to earn huge sums and will easily pay off their loans, but most will not, and if those students borrowed at the maximum level then they will have excess debt that will burden them for the rest of their lives. Even for students who earned degrees in engineering or law where they are much more likely to be able to repay their loans, they may be taking on excess burden, which will ultimately suck money out of the economy to pay outstanding debts. At all levels we are paying a cost for inefficient student loans.
The crisis will come, I believe, because over the pool of all student loans there will not be enough money coming in to cover the debts, and eventually investors will notice this, panic, and sell off their investments in student loans. Now, this is where things get really interesting.
Since student loans in the US are backed by the government, and private lenders no longer make government backed student loans and in many cases are selling off those debts to the US government, the primary way of betting on the future value of student loans is US Treasury Bonds. With the exception of private, non-government-backed student loans offered by some financial institutions such as Sallie Mae, there is no other way to get in on the game of investing in student loans. So, depending on what student loans do, this could either avert the crisis or magnify it.
No matter what, government-backed student loans are going to lose money. The trick is how the accounting is done. By eliminating the ability to escape student loans in bankruptcy, insolvency will not risk wiping out the money generated by those debts in the short term. Instead, even if a person is never able to pay the debts or has their wages garnished to little effect, the debt won't have to be eaten until the person dies. As a result, that student loan debt sits unnoticed for decades until the debtor dies and their estate either pays off some or none of it. But by that time, thanks to inflation and increases in the money supply, that write-off will be a drop in the bucket. And since government is the one doing the write-off, it will be lost among all the other expenses of government.
Unfortunately, this sort of waiting game to let the student loans take care of themselves has a negative effect on the economy for decades by preventing the creation of money and adding financial friction to people's lives. But unless that effect becomes large enough, which I seriously doubt it will since, although education is expensive, it's nothing compared to the costs of healthcare, this situation will never lead to a crisis. At absolute worst, it might be enough to cause economic stagnation.
The other possibility, though, is that investors in US Treasury Bonds will get worried about the scenario I describe above to the point that they panic and the price of Treasury Bonds falls. If big enough, it could pull everything down with it, like a small tear allowing a gaping hole to be ripped open. As is so often the case, we're safe only so long as everyone remains confident that they have nothing to gain by selling off low.
In the mean time, politics and laws can change, and that will have unexpected consequences on student loans. Let's just hope the changes are lucky ones that improve the situation rather than make it worse.
At American universities, most students take out low interest, government backed loans to pay the costs of tuition, room, and board. Over the corse of an undergraduate education, students accumulate tens of thousdands of dollars in debt, and graduate students often build up over $100,000 in debt. In theory, the government offers these loans as a way of making education possible to those who could otherwise not afford it, and they can offer low interest rates because education is supposed to be a sure bet to higher earnings. But as so often happens, government subsidization of the education market has changed the game in unexpected ways that will likely lead to an economic fallout.
Nature of Student Loans
The theory of student loans is pretty straightforward: a student borrows against future earnings to pay for the cost of education today. Both parties win in the deal: lenders have an opportunity to make money and borrowers can earn more money than they would have without the education the loan financed even after paying off the loan. Principle, interest rate, and repayment terms should depend on several things, including the expected lifetime earnings of the student and the likelihood that the student will default for any of many reasons (drop out, bad market, student becomes unemployable, etc.).
Unfortunately, student loans don't work like this. Instead, student loans are government backed and given to anyone who has been accepted by a college or university, regardless of credit history or expected future earnings (based on degree program, for example). In fact, the only way in which the loans are differentiated is to subsidize the interest on loans to students who have the least ability to pay their education costs without financial assistance. The result is that students can take out loans they are very unlikely to be able to repay while government bears the risk.
Someone must have noticed this, because in 2005 Congress passed a law exempting student loan debt from bankruptcy, making student loan debt almost impossible to escape. Just a few years later, Congress went back and made the US Government the sole provider of government-backed student loans, probably having realized they'd just given banks access to free money while assuming all the risk themselves.
So to summarize, student loans could be a beautiful solution to funding education for those unable to pay for it in full by themselves, but instead we have student loans that are backed by the government, in no way sized to the expected ability of the student to repay, and unescapable in the event that students cannot repay them.
The Student Loan Crisis
To me the nature and high probability of a student loan crisis seems obvious, but since we have yet to have a panic let me explain. Since students are able to get educational loans without regard to expected ability to repay, we first have the problem of students taking on debt to earn degrees that are highly unlikely to lead them to careers where they can repay the loans. This has the effect of creating money today, but when this money is destroyed through loan repayment and interest, the money supply ultimately increases less than it would have otherwise, and in the event that the student is never able to repay all of the loan, the money supply shrinks.
Of course, degree is not everything: some humanities majors will go on to earn huge sums and will easily pay off their loans, but most will not, and if those students borrowed at the maximum level then they will have excess debt that will burden them for the rest of their lives. Even for students who earned degrees in engineering or law where they are much more likely to be able to repay their loans, they may be taking on excess burden, which will ultimately suck money out of the economy to pay outstanding debts. At all levels we are paying a cost for inefficient student loans.
The crisis will come, I believe, because over the pool of all student loans there will not be enough money coming in to cover the debts, and eventually investors will notice this, panic, and sell off their investments in student loans. Now, this is where things get really interesting.
Since student loans in the US are backed by the government, and private lenders no longer make government backed student loans and in many cases are selling off those debts to the US government, the primary way of betting on the future value of student loans is US Treasury Bonds. With the exception of private, non-government-backed student loans offered by some financial institutions such as Sallie Mae, there is no other way to get in on the game of investing in student loans. So, depending on what student loans do, this could either avert the crisis or magnify it.
No matter what, government-backed student loans are going to lose money. The trick is how the accounting is done. By eliminating the ability to escape student loans in bankruptcy, insolvency will not risk wiping out the money generated by those debts in the short term. Instead, even if a person is never able to pay the debts or has their wages garnished to little effect, the debt won't have to be eaten until the person dies. As a result, that student loan debt sits unnoticed for decades until the debtor dies and their estate either pays off some or none of it. But by that time, thanks to inflation and increases in the money supply, that write-off will be a drop in the bucket. And since government is the one doing the write-off, it will be lost among all the other expenses of government.
Unfortunately, this sort of waiting game to let the student loans take care of themselves has a negative effect on the economy for decades by preventing the creation of money and adding financial friction to people's lives. But unless that effect becomes large enough, which I seriously doubt it will since, although education is expensive, it's nothing compared to the costs of healthcare, this situation will never lead to a crisis. At absolute worst, it might be enough to cause economic stagnation.
The other possibility, though, is that investors in US Treasury Bonds will get worried about the scenario I describe above to the point that they panic and the price of Treasury Bonds falls. If big enough, it could pull everything down with it, like a small tear allowing a gaping hole to be ripped open. As is so often the case, we're safe only so long as everyone remains confident that they have nothing to gain by selling off low.
In the mean time, politics and laws can change, and that will have unexpected consequences on student loans. Let's just hope the changes are lucky ones that improve the situation rather than make it worse.
26 May 2011
Mapping Control-Space to Escape in Vim
In Vim I like to have Control-Space mapped to Escape since this allows me to hit Escape as often as I want without moving my hands off the home row. And I have had it working perfectly in gvim but running through the terminal Control-Space doesn't always Escape as expected. From my old .vimrc:
I finally got fed up with it because the keyboard I'm working on has Escape in an annoyingly hard spot to hit, so I did a search and found a solution. My .vimrc now contains:
noremap <C-Space> <Esc>
inoremap <C-Space> <Esc>
cnoremap <C-Space> <C-c>I finally got fed up with it because the keyboard I'm working on has Escape in an annoyingly hard spot to hit, so I did a search and found a solution. My .vimrc now contains:
noremap <Nul> <Esc>
inoremap <Nul> <Esc>
cnoremap <Nul> <C-c>
noremap <C-Space> <Esc>
inoremap <C-Space> <Esc>
cnoremap <C-Space> <C-c>
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