EPT
Treating the Symptoms
When we talk about a disease or problem, we typically talk about it in terms of causes and effects. A flu is caused by a virus, and effects a variety of symptoms such as fever and coughing. Our treatment and prevention methods either target the cause (flu shots to prevent infection, or sleeping in to recover quickly) or the symptoms (cough syrup). We prefer to treat the cause rather than the symptoms of a problem, since typically addressing the underlying cause will solve the problem in the longer run.
In this paragraph, I talk about suicide. If you find this topic uncomfortable, you can leave the spoiler closed and this blog will still make sense. + Show Spoiler +
A couple years back, my high school was stricken by a great tragedy. In a moment of despair and hopelessness, a student chose to end his life. He stepped in front of an oncoming train and extinguished himself. Following this incident, several more students committed suicide at the same location, over the course of about a year. Parents and teachers were horrified. There was a call for action. Posters with a suicide help hotline phone number went up on campus. Parents volunteered to stand guard by the railroad crossing to prevent further suicides, and set up a rotating schedule.
The city dipped into its infrastructure fund and began a construction project at the railroad crossing. The image below shows a top-down view of what was implemented, at the cost of several million dollars to the city. Guard rails and fences were installed-- to step in front of a train you now have to walk around or step over a small fence.
+ Show Spoiler +![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/f0AGI.png)
As you can see, the vast majority of city funds went towards treating the symptoms. The problem the city addressed wasn't "students want to commit suicide", but rather, "students are successfully committing suicide". Those millions of dollars could have hired therapists and counselors, or been used to address underlying issues of student stress and the aggressive social and academic environment at the high school. The city could have chosen to treat the disease rather than the symptoms. I don't doubt that the fence will have some positive impact-- even a trivial obstacle may be enough to dissuade someone from ending their life. But we could have done better. We could have targetted the problem and the root, and we made a choice not to do so.
The city dipped into its infrastructure fund and began a construction project at the railroad crossing. The image below shows a top-down view of what was implemented, at the cost of several million dollars to the city. Guard rails and fences were installed-- to step in front of a train you now have to walk around or step over a small fence.
+ Show Spoiler +
As you can see, the vast majority of city funds went towards treating the symptoms. The problem the city addressed wasn't "students want to commit suicide", but rather, "students are successfully committing suicide". Those millions of dollars could have hired therapists and counselors, or been used to address underlying issues of student stress and the aggressive social and academic environment at the high school. The city could have chosen to treat the disease rather than the symptoms. I don't doubt that the fence will have some positive impact-- even a trivial obstacle may be enough to dissuade someone from ending their life. But we could have done better. We could have targetted the problem and the root, and we made a choice not to do so.
The reason this comes to mind is the recent discussion of student loan debt in the United States. As a quick primer for those of you from other countries: In the United States, high school does not typically teach job skills. Our schools follow a "liberal arts" model and focus on mathematics, literature, history, and science. Typically you will need additional education, either at a university for many knowledge-based jobs such as accounting or engineering, or at a community college or trade school for skill-based jobs such as plumbing or auto repair.
Typical university expenses, including tuition, books, and other fees will come out to about $16,000 per year in my home state, California. If you choose to live on campus the cost can get as high as $20,000. Most students have to study for at least 4 years to get a degree. Some of this cost can be mitigated by beginning at a junior college, but even so you're looking at a cost of around $40,000 for a public university education. If you want to be a teacher or a journalist or any other of a number of middle class jobs, this is what you'll be dealing with.
Many people who don't come from rich families fund their college education with loans from the federal government. The government offers a loan that requires no payments and has a 0 interest rate until you graduate-- an investment in your education. You can take out these student loans without collateral, but will be liable for them even if you declare bankruptcy. In these tough economic times, when many college graduates are without jobs, these loans have become a large burden. People are saying that the government should forgive these loans, or the interest on these loans. People say that they have to take these loans out for college, and that they shouldn't have to.
I'd characterize this movement to ask for loan forgiveness as a pretty classic example of treating the symptoms. What's the real problem here? It's not that graduates have student loan debt-- that's a symptom. The underlying problem is that public university tuition has skyrocketed, forcing people to take these loans. If we're going to ask for major government outlays, and the taxes that come with that, why should that money be spent forgiving loans that are taken out because a government service is too expensive? It seems the logical solution would be to just use that money to reduce tuition expenses-- for the government to fund higher education like it used to.
That's just a thought, though. The next time you're contemplating something that's treating a symptom rather than a problem (the border fence is an unusually bad offender; so is the drug war), consider how things could be done better. Sometimes it's unfeasible to treat the underlying causes. Maybe it's a disease you can't prevent, and you can only mitigate the symptoms. That's fine-- we do the best we can with what we can do. Sometimes, though, we can do better. Sometimes we deserve to do better.
