Comment by viccis
>Nothing the government provides is free.
Yes it is. "Free" doesn't mean "has no cost paid by anyone" and never has in these discussions. It means "at no cost to the student".
Apologies if English isn't your first language.
>Nothing the government provides is free.
Yes it is. "Free" doesn't mean "has no cost paid by anyone" and never has in these discussions. It means "at no cost to the student".
Apologies if English isn't your first language.
>there are people (even college-educated people) who genuinely believe the government can just make something appear from nothing
Untrue.
>These kinds of quips are discouraged here.
"Free" has a specific meaning in English, and someone who doesn't speak it fluently might think that it means, for example, "appearing from nothing". Whereas a fluent English speaker of sound mind understands that "free" refers to the price in a transaction. No one thinks that the "free pizza" at an event was created at no cost to anyone in the supply chain that brought it there. They just understand that it means that they won't be charged for consuming it. But for some reason, I never hear people make a big deal about how "I can't believe you'd say free pizza when I know that your organization had to pay for it!" It's always when it comes to reactionary opposition to social services where this simple word immediately becomes so much more nuanced and impossible to comprehend for the layperson.
> Untrue.
You know these people exist. Try asking them where the money is going to come from to finance this education and see if more than 10% of them can explain it to you.
> "Free" has a specific meaning in English
You’ve made a few allusions to the idea that the people pushing back on this reading of the word “free” speak English as a second language when there’s been no indication that this is true; it’s just something you’re saying to imply that these people are less intelligent than you. I would again encourage you to read the site guidelines. Posting like this is contrary to the spirit of the forum.
> Whereas a fluent English speaker of sound mind understands that "free" refers to the price in a transaction.
The price for whom? If a parent pays for their child’s education, it would be very uncommon for the child to say that his education was “free.”
Similarly, state-funded education is free to the college student. It’s not free for taxpayers who don’t attend the college. They are a party to the transaction because they are the ones paying for it.
By this definition, nothing is "free"; there is always some cost, whether financial or otherwise. It's an absurd bit of pedantry that does nothing but derail discussion. Free tuition is free at the point of sale to the student, just like the interstate I drive on sometimes is free to use as compared to the toll roads, even though my taxes paid for both. It's not complicated terminology.
The student does not participate in a transaction that involves paying money in exchange for education. Taxes are collected and allocated as seen fit by the state. Students and others pay their taxes, but taxes are not directly transactional.
Apologies if English isn't your first language.
> "Free" doesn't mean "has no cost paid by anyone" and never has in these discussions.
Calling these programs “free” obfuscates the issue because there are people (even college-educated people) who genuinely believe the government can just make something appear from nothing; they genuinely don’t understand that the resources have to come from somewhere, which means someone else who does not necessarily benefit from the program pays for it now or those benefitting from the program have to pay for it later.
> Apologies if English isn't your first language.
I would encourage you to review the site guidelines. These kinds of quips are discouraged here.