Dancing with the Devil raised several macroeconomic issues. It reminds me to never judge a book by its cover, or title for that matter. I was able to make connections between comments in the book to events and people I have watched on CSPAN. Many people have a hard time believing anyone would ever watch CSPAN. While I admit CSPAN often has dry, local events broadcasting in a loop, Alan Greenspan's testimonies are broadcast on the network. I recall Mr. Greenspan commenting on more than one occasion about how government spending "is on an unsustainable path", often in reference to the new Medicare plan approved by congress. My light background in economics has caused me to never expect to receive Social Security in my retirement. I believe the government commitments to citizen "entitlements" will, over decades, cause a reduction in discretionary expenditures affecting education funding from public university system budgets to grants and loan subsidies for students. Universities will have to restructure and students will have different demands on the education system.
Changes in the higher education system resulting from changes in finances made me think about the trinity of professor expectations: research, teaching, and service. I think professors still expect a majority of their doctoral students to pursue higher education, professor-type careers. I can speak for myself and about another half dozen Ph.D. students who are not interested in becoming a professor after graduation. Major universities seem to give the impression of a relatively static environment, with independent or isolated research, and a complex "good ol' boy network" of tenure, approvals, and review. The current university research position doesn’t give the impression it would be the place to start a career of innovation, especially when, as students, we have been taught to work heavily in teams. For this reason, I believe the common, terminal, research degree is becoming obsolete, much like my wife’s MBA. Rarely does anyone make something successful by themselves and even rarer is an expert’s knowledge useful without combining it with another expert's knowledge or experience. Google became a profitable internet company in a sea of internet company failures, not because of one person, but a team. Perhaps someday I could help pioneer a new type of terminal degree for group work. The phrasing of "terminal degree for group work" sounds almost completely illegitimate, so developing the idea would take a good amount of work.
Government has often, in the past, thrown money at its problems. If the theory is correct for spending to decrease over time for public education, perhaps now is a good time for the pay structure of faculty and staff in public education to model university endowed chairs. A one-time, $1 million investment could create an unending position in public education. In theory, the investment could earn 5% per year, pay the faculty member 3/5 of the interest, and the investment could grow on compound interest to make salary raises, ancillary budget income, and with enough compound interest, a completely new endowment. I think the time is already here for universities to think more like a business in certain aspects of operation.
On a slightly different topic, the book discusses the issues around online education facilities like University of Phoenix replacing traditional classroom education. I think in many cases, undergraduate students do not have a clear career path. Attending a traditional, residential university gives those students an atmosphere in which to mature past the cliques in high school, enhance their metacognative skills, and get a better idea of what they want to do for their career.
References
Katz, R. (1999). Dancing with the Devil. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass