Comments on: Would more student income support improve academic results?

By: Andrew Norton » Blog Archive » Reforming Youth Allowance

Andrew Norton » Blog Archive » Reforming Youth Allowance — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 02:12:05 +0000

[...] are perfectly capable of working, and the benefits system should assume that they do. There is no convincing evidence that current average student working hours are causing too many academic [...]

By: Andrew Norton

Andrew Norton — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 20:32:13 +0000

Mitch – Can you explain what aspect of the application process is ‘horrendous’? Are you having to provide information on what your parents earn?

By: Mitch

Mitch — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 16:40:41 +0000

Also, the whole reason for that post (which I incidentally left out) is because I’m interested in other peoples opinions on the application process for Youth Allowance (and I presume other welfare payments). It really is quite horrendouse. I’m still up in the air about whether to actually get rid of it on the grounds that if I do need it in the future it’s just too much trouble (for both me and my parents) to go through all that again when I don’t have to if I keep it.

By: Mitch

Mitch — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 16:37:16 +0000

I’m on Youth Allowance at the moment and have recently changed (for financial reasons) from averaging about 5 hours per week on one job to about 15+ hours per week on two. Having never worked two jobs before, I was a bit pessimistic about the idea, indeed believing that my academic performance would suffer because of it. Quite the opposite though.

There’s certainly a lot of benefits. For most of this year I’ve been almost entirely dependent on my parents (and the government) for the things I want. This has left me feeling like I was living from paycheck to paycheck (as many people describe their own situation) and building up too much debt (to my parents, though there’s been no obligation to pay them back). So one of the most obvious benefits is the independence and that it gives me.

There’s also the fact that my parents have more money to spend on other things, and I just happen to find mindless repetitive tasks as relieving of stress. And, of course, it gives me extra experience and an extra referee for my resume and any future job opportunities.

I can’t imagine what anyone has to gain from living off the earnings of others (like I was off my parents) when they don’t have to.

By: Russell

Russell — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 00:07:02 +0000

Yobbo – have you ever heard the expression that what you get out of something depends on what you put into it ?
.
(Accounting is probably the exception that proves the rule.)

By: Yobbo

Yobbo — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 19:43:42 +0000

My contact hours when I studied Accounting were 12 hours per week.

On top of that I did about an extra 10 hours of study in my own time in the entire semester and got high distinctions for every subject.

Although I have to admit I did buy another student’s assignment off him and handed it in, best $30 I ever spent.

I usually completed my assigned tutorial work in the 10 minutes or so that the tutor prattled on at the beginning of every session.

So yeah, I can see how big a hassle it would have been to work at the same time, not that I bothered.

Maybe the people who need 20 hours of time a week to study in order to pass shouldn’t be there in the first place. Just sayin’.

By: derrida derider

derrida derider — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 02:30:55 +0000

True, Conrad, you can think of other possible selection mechanisms here and some of them might even work in the opposite direction to the one I’ve highlighted. But my error, if error it was, was not in logic but in ignoring the possibility of these other mechanisms.

Anyway it doesn’t change my bottom line one whit. Where there is a serious possibility of selection bias simply looking at how marks correlate with hours worked tells us absolutely nothing about whether hours worked raises or lowers marks for individuals. You need to either remove the selection biases with a well-controlled experiment or use some statistical technique (eg instrumental variables) that can identify and properly account for them before you can draw such conclusions.

It’s the sort of problem that makes good social science so difficult.

By: backroom girl

backroom girl — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 23:06:56 +0000

Russell – if your Marcuse quote is representative of his writings, all I can say is I have absolutely no desire ever to read him. That kind of mind improvement, I’m sure I can do without.

By: conrad

conrad — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 20:18:40 +0000

I think you logic is wrong DD (although I agree about drawing the causal inference). Based on your logic:
1) Those that work substantial hours and study are highly motivated
2) Those that work substantial hours but are not motivated don’t study
3) Those that don’t work substantial hours may or may not study.
I wouldn’t neccesarily believe (1). We have lots of students that work reasonable hours that are not especially motivated. Often its because they just want to finish their degree, doing it because they feel they need a degree etc. . We also have motivated students in group (3), especially in 3rd year (there’s lots of competition into 4th year, and lots of competition in 4th year — of course we have lots of unmotivated guys too, excluding 4th year, who have essentially given-up or never really started). So I imagine the difference between (1) and (3) is less than you imagine.
An alternative (that is not neccesarily independent of your suggestion for individuals) is those that work a large amount of time esesntially don’t care what they are learning for they figure they need a degree for other reasons (“I have a degree!”), and hence don’t try as hard, and hence are willing to work more. That would be easy to test, incidentally.

By: Andrew Norton

Andrew Norton — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 20:06:10 +0000

Or: people have a rough idea of their own capacities, and people who can work longer hours do so if they want the money.

There is also an assumption here that all students are marks-maximisers, which is not the case.