Not getting away with it at Catallaxy Files

Not getting away with it

One of the features of the left is that they think nobody is ever going to question what they say or even check up. Perhaps they honestly think everyone else is as stupid as they imagine. Here is Simon Marginson making a strident attack on some analysis contained in the recent Grattan Institute report that argued that education had mostly private benefits and few public good characteristics. The critique is quite damning, except …

Here is the Khaki Economist – who did the underlying analysis – responding. His reply is devastating – so devastating that The Australian will have to cover the reply next week in the Higher Ed section.

Written by Sinclair Davidson

October 3rd, 2012 at 6:18 pm

Posted in Uncategorized

19 Responses to 'Not getting away with it'

Subscribe to comments with RSS or TrackBack to 'Not getting away with it'.

Statistics at ten paces!

Helen Armstrong

3 Oct 12 at 6:49 pm
Our taxes at work? A nice piece on research grants in the humanities in the current Quadrant (on line sub required).

Imagine a world in which humanities and arts academics were given credit not for winning enormous grants, but for their ability to function without them. What if academic excellence was measured by who could produce the most for the lowest cost? What if we had a university system that positively rewarded low-cost self-funded research in the arts and humanities (and even in other fields), seeing it as a practical way of finding equally low-cost solutions to all kinds of problems?

Two things inspired this radical train of thought. The first was a comment by Dr James Allan in 2011:

Getting someone to give you money to do research to write a paper is an input. It is not an output. It is plain-out bizarre to count success in grant-getting as anything at all, though of course we know that the universities are desperate for this money and the ARC loves to be the ones giving the grants and then saying that getting them means you’re a better researcher.[1]

The second was watching Ron Howard’s movie Apollo 13. In the movie, NASA technicians have to design a functioning air-processing unit solely from items that the stranded astronauts have with them on board. Eventually they do this with a plastic bag and a sock. I think that this would be impossible today, not just because of the incredible sophistication of the equipment on board, but because those involved would be unable to carry out this task without grants funding, and Apollo 13 would have become a very shiny orbiting tomb.

Rafe

3 Oct 12 at 7:19 pm
burn, baby, burn.

so devastating that The Australian will have to cover the reply next week in the Higher Ed section.

we’ll see. This will be an interesting integrity test for them.

by the way, the Khaki economist needs to change the template for his blog and particularly the colour scheme. It’s very hard on the eyes.

dd

3 Oct 12 at 9:40 pm
Marginson was a leader of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), a radical leftist group, at the same time I studied at Melbourne Uni. Al Capp satirised SDS as Students Wildly Indignant about Nearly Everything (SWINE), as they were always opposing things but never bothered to inform themselves particularly well.

Sounds like not much has changed.

DavidLeyonhjelm

3 Oct 12 at 10:04 pm
Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), a radical leftist group

The stupid – it burns!

wreckage

3 Oct 12 at 10:48 pm
“it’s like the difference between religious dogma and the enlightenment”

My side can do no wrong, your side can do no right!

Yeah, right!

John A

3 Oct 12 at 11:01 pm
the ARC loves to be the ones giving the grants and then saying that getting them means you’re a better researcher

That is the weirdest part of science grants in Australia (from the government). Getting a previous grant is considered evidence that you’re a good scientist, and therefore is taken into consideration when you apply again.

dd

3 Oct 12 at 11:05 pm
The danger suggested by the OECD’s data is this: if public funding is cut, the content of curriculums will shrink towards work skills and nothing else.

Good grief! We couldn’t have a vocationally oriented curriculum, now, could we? That would be just so…

so…bourgeois!

John A

3 Oct 12 at 11:13 pm
dd,

That is also how the DEST point system worked. Probably the worst thing Howard ever did.

Sure they evaluated you personally. Then your school was ranked on…gross output. FFS. Tell that to a bunch of economics and accounting professors.

.

3 Oct 12 at 11:20 pm
The danger suggested by the OECD’s data is this: if public funding is cut, the content of curriculums will shrink towards work skills and nothing else.

The ultimate in bullshitectomy. Bring it on.

perturbed

3 Oct 12 at 11:22 pm
And as the Khaki Economist alluded to correlation does not equal causation.

Surely the only way to measure if attending university has these effects is to measure the subjects before they attend university and again afterwards?

Personally I’d say the most of those graduates that are showing as more likely to volunteer would have been that way before they attended University.

CraigS

4 Oct 12 at 6:42 am
CraigS – Jim found that social background is indeed important to volunteering.

Andrew Norton

4 Oct 12 at 7:19 am
by the way, the Khaki economist needs to change the template for his blog and particularly the colour scheme. It’s very hard on the eyes.

dd, get this to make the page readable:

http://www.readability.com/

Dangph

4 Oct 12 at 7:27 am
Sinclair– thanks for the link!

dd– I agree, the background is awful. I’ll change it.

Craig– it’s funny, but even measuring someone before and after university, it’s tough to work out the causal effect. Most people go to university in their late teens and early twenties. A lot else is happening at this time that causes them to to become more socialised people; they grow up!

You’re right about background. In the ABS’s General Social Survey, they include a series of questions about the respondent’s childhood. Things like “did you go to scouts/cadets?”, “did you play organised team sports?” etc. These serve as pretty good proxies for “my parents cared”, and including them in the regression reduces the “effect” of university.

Jim S

4 Oct 12 at 7:32 am
Surely the only way to measure if attending university has these effects is to measure the subjects before they attend university and again afterwards?

That won’t work because you have developmental effects associated with maturing, getting older, and so on.
Longitudinal research is very powerful but it’s not the only way to find out what’s going on.

dd

4 Oct 12 at 8:05 am
dd, get this to make the page readable:

thanks. (although I shouldn’t have to do that)

dd

4 Oct 12 at 8:06 am
The danger suggested by the OECD’s data is this: if public funding is cut, the content of curriculums will shrink towards work skills and nothing else.

So exactly the fuck what?

wreckage

4 Oct 12 at 7:01 pm
The Khaki Economist article seems to have disappeared! Does anyone have a link?

James In Footscray

5 Oct 12 at 7:42 am
It appears to have vanished, James. Very strange.

On the plus side, he’s changed the template and the site looks much nicer.

dd

5 Oct 12 at 8:06 am

Catallaxy Files