Posted On: Thursday - June 18th 2026 8:44AM MST
In Topics: University Economics
It's not a Peak Stupidity thing to present a big treatise with tables, numbers, and graphs on sociological phenomena. They can be helpful, but they're only as good as the polling methods (ugghhh!) and non-math-based theories are... i.e. not so helpful, IMO.
We have the graph above at least. I didn't spend much time searching, so I offer Peak Stupidity's sincerest apologies for the y-axis, which should start at 0 if not made by anyone pushing an agenda with his data* and those who use graphing programs lazily, accepting any axes provided by the software. Graphs like this have a good use, but, when axes are set to encompass the whole range of the dependent variable, they purposely make changes look drastic for the innumerate. Rant over. We have highly numerate readers here, I'm sure, but for the record, that's a 13% drop (16.2 - 14.1 million) in college enrollment over the decade ending 3 years ago.
BTW, that graph comes from an article in My Learning World with the title College Enrollment Decline Over Last Decade Could Lead to $2 Trillion Less Lifetime Income for Students Skipping Out. Thanks for the numbers, MyLearningWorld people, but your article is completely contradictory to my opinion here.
Other than that, the only number I'll mention is the 1,200 bedrooms in 2 new apartment buildings designed for yet more enrollment at the nearby university - see University Bubble Housing from a year ago. We operate often in the Edie Brickell I know what I know, if you know what I mean mode. What can't go on, won't go on.
In the case of the University Bubble, that means, parents and some (few?) wise kids will, and are starting to, realize that 4 years of tedious studying, indoctrination, and yes, lots of fun with friends of both sexes might not be worth a small mortgage sized debt at the end. For engineering, the hard sciences, and only possibly computer science, college may still be well worth it. It's not 1980 anymore, and any old major is no longer a ticket to what's left of any white-collar careers. Demographics are a factor too, as the number of 18 y/o Americans period is mildly declining. That's only part of why the U's keep importing foreigners, both as undergrad and mostly grad students. Well, they try - see 17 percent drop in new foreign students exposes universities’ reliance on their tuition, expert says.
Glenn Reynolds, the famous Instapundit and U. of Tennessee Law Professor, has been in a good position to keep up with the University Bubble for many years. He's linked to a handful of examples of the deflation of the bubble recently - all I could find in my browser tabs just now was this one Syracuse University issues financial warning as admissions slump: We’re in the red. Other articles were on smaller colleges completely closing down.
Peak Stupidity does not shy away from blaming the large US Feral Gov't on a whole lot of ills. We've noted the moral hazard inherent in the guaranteeing, and worse, downright issuance, of big money to students by
Additionally, there have been sociological factors too. Everyone is supposed to be able to get through college, and it's been a 4 year inflation in credentialism. Then, that women must do the same and now are a significant majority of university students is part of it.
We'll concentrate on the economic moral hazard here. It has more effects than just on the finances of the poor graduates. Flush with money over at least this century, universities have gone on big building sprees that I'm amazed by - at least that's real - along with "building" up big departments and rosters of employees for the Woke indoctrination of all sorts. They will find it very difficult to ramp down from the latter.
I read these articles, and the plans for cutting costs do not include wiping out whole D.I.E. style departments or cutting half the administration. Those people will fight tooth and nail to stay at their highly remunerated, worthless, nay, counterproductive positions, even if the whole shebang has to slowly go under. As with cadet Mayo in An Officer and a Gentlemen, they "got nowhere else to go!" I don't foresee sane White men fairly implementing a cost-cutting program to get the U's weened off of that student loan gravy train.
I mentioned in The biggest possible University Bubble pin prick last year that State government higher education funding has dropped 40% over the period 1980 to 2011, a huge drop if that is, what I assume, in nominal dollars. Those State legislators back in the day had some say-so about whether there was going to be a 100 employee D.I.E. office. It was a different world.
To be consistent here, I should say that this situation of "the flow of the money" we have now should be a welcome change from the State funding, the worst example being the Federal Income tax, as we've bemoaned. Now, the students and parents are deciding how to spend "their" money. Is it theirs though? That's only the case if the Feds do hold the line and don't bribe voters with loan forgiveness.
If that were to be widely implemented, it would be yet one more way irresponsibility is rewarded in this country. Right now, parents and students don't have to sign on to this increasingly bad deal of 4 years of university "study" in return for a big debt. There are other options. Decide wisely, parents. The Fed Gov has caused the rot in higher Ed, but it's still up to you to participate or not.
* I make exceptions to this rule for additional close-up graphs and also for values/units that don't start at any meaningful 0, such as Temperature in F or C.
**************************
[UPDATED: 6/18 afternoon] Added proper archived link to article on Syracuse U's woes and a link to the College Fix about dependency on foreign students tuition. Thanks yet again, Adam.
**************************
Comments:
Ganderson
Sunday - June 21st 2026 5:10AM MST
PS Thanks Thanks for the sentiments, but miraculous recovery doesn’t seem likely. At least I have you all and the folks over rotten chestnuts to keep me amused. That’s reunions , Since my college graduating class had somewhere in the neighborhood of 6000 people I do not attend. I have, however, regularly gone to my high school reunions – or like the people I went to high school with and enjoy seeing them again even if there are people that I don’t see regularly. Hope all of you are well.
Adam Smith
Saturday - June 20th 2026 7:23AM MST
PS: Good morning, everyone!
𝐻𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟, 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑑𝑜𝑒𝑠𝑛'𝑡 𝑒𝑥𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑖𝑛 𝑤ℎ𝑦, 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝐼 𝑝𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑈𝑅𝐿 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑊𝑒𝑏 𝑎𝑟𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑊𝑎𝑦𝑏𝑎𝑐𝑘 𝑀𝑎𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑒* 𝐼 𝑔𝑜𝑡 𝑛𝑜 𝑙𝑢𝑐𝑘, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑌𝑂𝑈 𝑑𝑖𝑑!
Well, no. I suppose it doesn't. (Truth be told, I had no luck with the Wayback Machine either.)
𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑎𝑛𝑐𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝐺𝑒𝑜𝑟𝑔𝑖𝑎𝑛 𝑠𝑒𝑐𝑟𝑒𝑡?
https://archive.ph/
There are ways to customize your OSx if you want to. (Some from within the system settings and such and some that involve third party apps.) I'd imagine there are some pretty good youtube videos that would help you figure that out as well as random web pages on sites that cater to techies. Kinda off topic, but, I bought one of these for a customer not too long ago...
https://www.ebay.com/itm/354290227940
It's pretty nice. The last of the Intel based macs. I thought the touch bar was interesting. Unfortunately, Apple left it up to software developers to write code for the thing, and apparently (because this is the only machine that features this piece of hardware) not many companies bothered to do so. The touch bar was unceremoniously dropped from subsequent macbooks.
If I were in the market for a macbook I think I'd buy one of these...
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Apple-15-3-MacBook-Air-Apple-M4-Chip-10-Core-CPU-10-Core-GPU-16GB-RAM-256GB-SSD-Early-2025-Midnight/20309369155
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑃𝑜𝑝 𝐶𝑢𝑙𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒 𝑂𝑟𝑖𝑔𝑖𝑛 (𝑅𝑜𝑐𝑘𝑦 & 𝐵𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑘𝑙𝑒)
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑛𝑒𝑡 𝑡𝑜𝑜𝑙 𝑔𝑒𝑡𝑠 𝑖𝑡𝑠 𝑛𝑎𝑚𝑒 𝑑𝑖𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑙𝑦 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑝𝑜𝑝 𝑐𝑢𝑙𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒. 𝐼𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑎 𝑛𝑜𝑑 𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 "𝑊𝐴𝐵𝐴𝐶 𝑚𝑎𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑒" (𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑛𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑐𝑒𝑑 𝑤𝑎𝑦-𝑏𝑎𝑐𝑘), 𝑎 𝑓𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑎𝑙 𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒-𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑣𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑑𝑒𝑣𝑖𝑐𝑒 𝑓𝑒𝑎𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 1960𝑠 𝑐𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑜𝑜𝑛 𝑠𝑒𝑔𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑃𝑒𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑑𝑦'𝑠 𝐼𝑚𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑏𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝐻𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑦 (𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐴𝑑𝑣𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑅𝑜𝑐𝑘𝑦 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐵𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑘𝑙𝑒).
It's good to hear from you Mr. Ganderson. I hope you're well.
(Still praying for your miraculous recovery. The kind that baffles all the doctors and so-called experts.)
Happy Saturday! ☮️
𝐻𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟, 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑑𝑜𝑒𝑠𝑛'𝑡 𝑒𝑥𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑖𝑛 𝑤ℎ𝑦, 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝐼 𝑝𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑈𝑅𝐿 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑊𝑒𝑏 𝑎𝑟𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑊𝑎𝑦𝑏𝑎𝑐𝑘 𝑀𝑎𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑒* 𝐼 𝑔𝑜𝑡 𝑛𝑜 𝑙𝑢𝑐𝑘, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑌𝑂𝑈 𝑑𝑖𝑑!
Well, no. I suppose it doesn't. (Truth be told, I had no luck with the Wayback Machine either.)
𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑎𝑛𝑐𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝐺𝑒𝑜𝑟𝑔𝑖𝑎𝑛 𝑠𝑒𝑐𝑟𝑒𝑡?
https://archive.ph/
There are ways to customize your OSx if you want to. (Some from within the system settings and such and some that involve third party apps.) I'd imagine there are some pretty good youtube videos that would help you figure that out as well as random web pages on sites that cater to techies. Kinda off topic, but, I bought one of these for a customer not too long ago...
https://www.ebay.com/itm/354290227940
It's pretty nice. The last of the Intel based macs. I thought the touch bar was interesting. Unfortunately, Apple left it up to software developers to write code for the thing, and apparently (because this is the only machine that features this piece of hardware) not many companies bothered to do so. The touch bar was unceremoniously dropped from subsequent macbooks.
If I were in the market for a macbook I think I'd buy one of these...
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Apple-15-3-MacBook-Air-Apple-M4-Chip-10-Core-CPU-10-Core-GPU-16GB-RAM-256GB-SSD-Early-2025-Midnight/20309369155
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑃𝑜𝑝 𝐶𝑢𝑙𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒 𝑂𝑟𝑖𝑔𝑖𝑛 (𝑅𝑜𝑐𝑘𝑦 & 𝐵𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑘𝑙𝑒)
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑛𝑒𝑡 𝑡𝑜𝑜𝑙 𝑔𝑒𝑡𝑠 𝑖𝑡𝑠 𝑛𝑎𝑚𝑒 𝑑𝑖𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑙𝑦 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑝𝑜𝑝 𝑐𝑢𝑙𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒. 𝐼𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑎 𝑛𝑜𝑑 𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 "𝑊𝐴𝐵𝐴𝐶 𝑚𝑎𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑒" (𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑛𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑐𝑒𝑑 𝑤𝑎𝑦-𝑏𝑎𝑐𝑘), 𝑎 𝑓𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑎𝑙 𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒-𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑣𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑑𝑒𝑣𝑖𝑐𝑒 𝑓𝑒𝑎𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 1960𝑠 𝑐𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑜𝑜𝑛 𝑠𝑒𝑔𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑃𝑒𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑑𝑦'𝑠 𝐼𝑚𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑏𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝐻𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑦 (𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐴𝑑𝑣𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑅𝑜𝑐𝑘𝑦 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐵𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑘𝑙𝑒).
It's good to hear from you Mr. Ganderson. I hope you're well.
(Still praying for your miraculous recovery. The kind that baffles all the doctors and so-called experts.)
Happy Saturday! ☮️
Moderator
Saturday - June 20th 2026 5:54AM MST
PS: Yes, Alarmist, Coffee & a Mic, with the guy named Mike. I've seen Lydia Brimelow on his show before. I clean forgot to watch last night - I ended up listening to Jared Taylor and Paul Kersey's latest podcast. The did get into the story of the Obama MegaPotty.
Moderator
Saturday - June 20th 2026 5:52AM MST
PS: Hello, Mr. Ganderson. I'm so sorry for your health troubles. I can get your meaning just find. (I assume the "would" should be "wouldn't".) I've been doing some text messaging using the phone microphone and its voice recognition - not too bad. It's hard to did in and make corrections, so I'll just leave it. This is why "Johnny can't read", haha!
Well, I never went to any reunion, HS or college.
Well, I never went to any reunion, HS or college.
Moderator
Saturday - June 20th 2026 5:50AM MST
PS: "So, apparently, syracuse.com uses cookies (or something) to determine how many pages you have visited and activates the paywall after it lets you read a few articles for free."
Right. In the Windows world, I'd have no problem dealing with this. I don't like the apple OS very much, at least when it comes to my being able to change things, so I don't know how to get around this... BUT...
"Too lazy to bother because I just don't care that much about the info at syracuse.com, I guess." Agreed completely!
However, that doesn't explain why, when I pasted the URL into the Web archive Wayback Machine* I got no luck, but YOU did! What is your ancient Georgian secret?
* Anyone else here know where that term comes from in popular culture?
Right. In the Windows world, I'd have no problem dealing with this. I don't like the apple OS very much, at least when it comes to my being able to change things, so I don't know how to get around this... BUT...
"Too lazy to bother because I just don't care that much about the info at syracuse.com, I guess." Agreed completely!
However, that doesn't explain why, when I pasted the URL into the Web archive Wayback Machine* I got no luck, but YOU did! What is your ancient Georgian secret?
* Anyone else here know where that term comes from in popular culture?
Ganderson
Saturday - June 20th 2026 5:12AM MST
PS
Apologies for the crappy syntax and grammar; Parkinson’s makes it hard to type, My voice software doesn’t really match up with my idiosyncratic in English.
Apologies for the crappy syntax and grammar; Parkinson’s makes it hard to type, My voice software doesn’t really match up with my idiosyncratic in English.
Ganderson
Saturday - June 20th 2026 5:09AM MST
PS
My oldest boy went to a Midwestern Jesuit university; it’s still in pretty good shape. As for the other two they went to Midwestern SPLACS I tell them jokingly not really. They would have to worry about going to the 2 20th reunions, Cause their colleges will be closed by then.
My oldest boy went to a Midwestern Jesuit university; it’s still in pretty good shape. As for the other two they went to Midwestern SPLACS I tell them jokingly not really. They would have to worry about going to the 2 20th reunions, Cause their colleges will be closed by then.
The Alarmist
Friday - June 19th 2026 1:47PM MST
PS
Evening all.
It’s the Coffee and a Mike channel on youtube, if the link doesn’t work.
🕉
Evening all.
It’s the Coffee and a Mike channel on youtube, if the link doesn’t work.
🕉
Adam Smith
Friday - June 19th 2026 10:40AM MST
PS: Good afternoon, y'all...
𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝐼 𝑝𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑒𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑢𝑝 𝑎 𝑓𝑒𝑤 𝑑𝑎𝑦𝑠 𝑎𝑔𝑜, 𝐼 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑑 𝑖𝑡 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒ℎ𝑜𝑤...
I pulled up the syracuse.com link in a new (clean) browser and I too could read the article. (No paywall.) So, apparently, syracuse.com uses cookies (or something) to determine how many pages you have visited and activates the paywall after it lets you read a few articles for free. (Or something like that. I suppose they could base their count on ip address but I didn't get into their code or anything like that. Too lazy to bother because I just don't care that much about the info at syracuse.com, I guess.)
Thanks for the Lydia link, Alarmist.
I'll check it out later.
Happy Friday! ☮️
𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝐼 𝑝𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑒𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑢𝑝 𝑎 𝑓𝑒𝑤 𝑑𝑎𝑦𝑠 𝑎𝑔𝑜, 𝐼 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑑 𝑖𝑡 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒ℎ𝑜𝑤...
I pulled up the syracuse.com link in a new (clean) browser and I too could read the article. (No paywall.) So, apparently, syracuse.com uses cookies (or something) to determine how many pages you have visited and activates the paywall after it lets you read a few articles for free. (Or something like that. I suppose they could base their count on ip address but I didn't get into their code or anything like that. Too lazy to bother because I just don't care that much about the info at syracuse.com, I guess.)
Thanks for the Lydia link, Alarmist.
I'll check it out later.
Happy Friday! ☮️
Moderator
Friday - June 19th 2026 6:28AM MST
PS: Thanks for the heads-up, Alarmist. I'll watch it tonight probably.
The Alarmist
Friday - June 19th 2026 6:22AM MST
PS
O/T, but you might be intersted … Lydia Brimelow discusses SPLC
https://youtu.be/QcTV2NQiW7s
🕉
O/T, but you might be intersted … Lydia Brimelow discusses SPLC
https://youtu.be/QcTV2NQiW7s
🕉
Moderator
Thursday - June 18th 2026 12:13PM MST
PS: "Admissions ALWAYS go up. You can't lose!"
To the moon, Alice... indeed.
To the moon, Alice... indeed.
The Alarmist
Thursday - June 18th 2026 11:49AM MST
PS
I saw a slide from BlackRock today talking about the interest rate sensitivity of demand of various things in the US, and tuition was shown as rising in cost and considered to not be sensitive to interest rate rises.
Reminds me of housing in 2006… or people borrowing to buy Bitcoin.
To the Moon.
🕉
I saw a slide from BlackRock today talking about the interest rate sensitivity of demand of various things in the US, and tuition was shown as rising in cost and considered to not be sensitive to interest rate rises.
Reminds me of housing in 2006… or people borrowing to buy Bitcoin.
To the Moon.
🕉
Moderator
Thursday - June 18th 2026 11:16AM MST
PS: Yes, I saw the subscribe suggestions at the top, but when I pulled this one up a few days ago, I was able to read it somehow, if only for a while...
Thanks for this one. I'll stick it into the post in a minute.
Thanks for this one. I'll stick it into the post in a minute.
Adam Smith
Thursday - June 18th 2026 10:53AM MST
PS: Good afternoon, Mr. Moderator!
𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑠, 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑆𝑦𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑏𝑙𝑢𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑛𝑜𝑤...
Yeah, that's because you have to 𝑠𝑢𝑏𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑏𝑒 if you want to read that...
Just kidding...
https://archive.ph/gsnb7
So... I didn't really read this one yet. I just noticed your ** Message and figured I'd get you that link. I'll be back in a bit. After I read your post.
One quick thing... (From a couple posts back.)
𝑊𝐴𝑆 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐴𝐼?
Yes. That was all AI. I didn't even have to do any weird prompt injection hacks or use any of my so-called cheatcodes to coax it into generating that response. (When it said harvest, this is because one of the themes of the discussion was parasitic statism. (Or something like that.)
Cheers! ☮️
𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑠, 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑆𝑦𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑏𝑙𝑢𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑛𝑜𝑤...
Yeah, that's because you have to 𝑠𝑢𝑏𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑏𝑒 if you want to read that...
Just kidding...
https://archive.ph/gsnb7
So... I didn't really read this one yet. I just noticed your ** Message and figured I'd get you that link. I'll be back in a bit. After I read your post.
One quick thing... (From a couple posts back.)
𝑊𝐴𝑆 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐴𝐼?
Yes. That was all AI. I didn't even have to do any weird prompt injection hacks or use any of my so-called cheatcodes to coax it into generating that response. (When it said harvest, this is because one of the themes of the discussion was parasitic statism. (Or something like that.)
Cheers! ☮️
“ PS: "So, apparently, syracuse.com uses cookies (or something) to determine how many pages you have visited and activates the paywall after it lets you read a few articles for free."
Liberal use of browsers in incognito or private mode usually solves this problem. When it indicates you’ve read the maximum number of views, close the browser and open a new incognito window.