A Defense of a Liberal Arts Education

[Diogenes]

Until recent times, Republicans regularly won the vote of college educated voters, and the Democratic base was heavily working class. Reagan won not only college educated voters he won a majority of voters with advanced degrees.

The Democrats abandoned the working class. Simple as that.

The party’s coalition has inverted along education and class lines. Non-college voters (the most common proxy for the working class) now lean Republican, while college-educated professionals and higher-income voters have become the Democratic core. This is visible in voting data, party identification, geography, and union households.

Why it happened​

Multiple factors operated at once:

• Economics and trade: NAFTA, China’s WTO entry, and later TPP were Democratic-led or supported policies that accelerated deindustrialization in the Midwest and South. Manufacturing job losses and wage stagnation for non-college men were real. Biden-era industrial policy (CHIPS, IRA) tried to reverse this but did not restore the old coalition. Working-class voters remain more protectionist than Democratic elites.
• Cultural and priority mismatch: Focus groups and post-2024 Democratic research find working-class voters view the party as “woke, weak, and out-of-touch,” overly focused on social issues rather than paychecks, prices, crime, and borders. Patriotism, self-reliance, and personal security rank higher for these voters than for the party’s college-educated base.
• Coalition and candidate effects: The party’s growing professional-class and urban base changed its incentives and messaging. Trump’s explicit economic nationalism and cultural appeals accelerated the realignment that was already underway. Recent gains among non-white working-class voters show the pattern is not only about white voters.
• Union decline: Membership fell from ~20% of workers in the early 1980s to ~10% today. Unions historically socialized members toward Democrats; their shrinkage removed a key transmission belt.

Thomas Frank’s Listen, Liberal captured an earlier version of this argument: after the 1970s the party increasingly oriented itself around professionals, meritocracy, and “competence” rather than industrial unions and wage solidarity. That description fits the current donor, staff, and activist base even if Democratic platforms still contain redistributionist language.


The lowest-income voters still lean Democratic more than the upper-middle class does in some measures, and Democrats retain advantages among public-sector unions and certain urban working-class pockets. But the larger non-college electorate, the geographic heartland of older industrial regions, and growing shares of Hispanic and Black working-class voters have moved. That is a large-scale abandonment of the party’s mid-20th-century working-class identity, whether measured by votes, identification, or policy priorities.

But I’m missing what any of that has to do with liberal arts.

That's because it has nothing to do with it.

 

[cawacko]

I’m sure there are other ways to achieve what I am talking about. I think it’s hard to measure. I really do not think that doing amazing things and having a great life are necessarily the measure of whether you had a great liberal art education. For me, and I have never done anything that people would look at and say, amazing. But it is amazing to me.

I think education is one way to achieve what I’m talking about. Some people seem to be born with it. Some people get it from their family. Some people have an experience in life that opens their mind. Plenty of people who had the same education as me, did not have the same experience.

For me, it made all the difference. Fame, money or accomplishing something amazing is not, to me, a mark of attaining a fulfilled life. In fact, it’s my observation that people who are recognized by our society as having accomplished something amazing, are generally not the happiest people.

To be clear by amazing life, I didn't mean one had to be famous or extremely wealthy. I suppose I could have chosen a different word but what I meant was a life well lived and moving beyond what they faced in their childhood.

I agree about the importance of education but education encompasses more than just liberal arts (STEM, Business school etc.) so since the OP was about the importance of liberal arts I was speaking from that perspective.

 

[cawacko]

I think there are so many different paths people can used to obtain in life they can feel proud of and happy about. I personally believe that a strong liberal arts education should be available to everyone, it is not.

The public schools do not provide a strong liberal arts, education, and I don’t think most of these state schools do either.

This isn't a gotcha question, I'm just asking because I think it's the case. Do you get a sense on this board that people tend to look down on those without a college degree? Because again, that ties into challenging norms.

What do you believe public Universities aren't doing or offering today that you feel they should vis a vis a liberal arts education?

 

[cawacko]

I think most modern employers are looking for productivity, and ability to earn money for the company. That’s not the goal of a liberal art, education, and to me not the measure of anyone’s value to humanity or themselves.

I'll speak to my experiences hiring people but I don't think I'm alone in this. When we're looking for someone to fill a role, I'm not interviewing them to judge their value to humanity.

I've interviewed people who come across as nice as can be but for whatever reason aren't a good fit for the position. That doesn't make them a bad person, it just means it wasn't a good fit. Plenty of us can excel in one role but it doesn't mean we'd be as good in other roles. That's not a judgement on us as a person.

And when interviewing people I also don't delve a whole lot into their majors.

 

[Walt]

Then you are an idiot.

Calculus--and I did take and pass it--isn't that useful for roughly 90 to 95% of the population. Trig is a shortcut for geometry if you have a calculator. For everyday use, knowing algebra and statistics is what matters along with some basic geometry (like the 3, 4, 5 rule in carpentry).

Unless you are an engineer, calculus is largely going to go unused. For me, one time I did bother using it was in a (unfinished) paper I did on advance rates in warfare. Unfortunately, I was unable to get anywhere near enough raw data to make the idea validated so I tabled it.

My view is that there are those that can do basic math--maybe. Add, multiply, do fractions. They're basic work skills everyone needs. Algebra and statistics are things supervisors and managers need a good understanding of.

You still have no idea what a shibboleth is.

 

[Into the Night]

You're an idiot. The 3,4,5 rule is the Pythagorean theorem. It is from geometry.

Trigonometry.

It's a shortcut using math you can do with a tape measure. 3^2 + 4^2 = 5^2 or 9 + 16 = 25.

Or any other measuring device.

Any combination with the same ratio works. It's for finding if two walls of a room are square at 90 degrees to each other.

No, it's for finding out if a layout is square. That layout may be for a floor, walls, foundation or other masonry, etc.

No, usually in the form of laying out conduit bends, box fills, and doing load calculations for panels.

Yes, it is also used there.

Every carpenter I know uses shortcuts and math that can be done on a scrap piece of wood.

It's still math. It doesn't matter where he writes it. It is still algebra as well.

Competent plumbers use a tape measure or something like this:

Not good enough, as any competent plumber will tell you. That tool is an aid, not a cross check.

To get the grade on a drainpipe correct. Simplicity and speed at getting a right answer are the goal.

Which is algebra.

Virtually all painters and drywallers I've ever met or worked with can barely do math.

They do it all the time.

They use shortcuts and trade tricks to get things correct.

Just as you do.

Putting up drywall with a window opening in the panel. Screw or nail the whole sheet up then go back and cut the window out with an oscillating or stab saw. No math and the fit is perfect.

Special pleading fallacy. Specifying a particular technique to save time does not nullify the math.

The amount of drywall to put up in the first place must be calculated.

Just because you use a stripping tool or a screwdriver means you don't know any math? That's your argument.

 

[Jarod]

To be clear by amazing life, I didn't mean one had to be famous or extremely wealthy. I suppose I could have chosen a different word but what I meant was a life well lived and moving beyond what they faced in their childhood.

I agree about the importance of education but education encompasses more than just liberal arts (STEM, Business school etc.) so since the OP was about the importance of liberal arts I was speaking from that perspective.

Sure, and I feel like STEM and business are well taught around here in schools, but to me, it does not give the specific life skills I was referring to. The liberal arts take a beating, I was reading about the philosophy on how history considered the liberal arts and how they came about, its just not considered as valuable as it once war. It is not calculated specifically toward the ability to make money or be productive, although Id argue it helps in those areas. The idea of being a renaissance man is considered much less valuable than in the past. I believe it deserves a second look. Open thinking, critical reading, ongoing desire for education that have been important to me and making my life so much more than it could have been.

I do not think that learning for learnings sake is a bad thing, and I still agree that learning for a specific goal, like the ability to have a career has its own value.

Law School is not a Liberal Arts education, yet still it mostly is not an education in the specifics of the law; more about learning the thinking skills a lawyer needs. One does not come out of law knowing how to practice law, like an accountant comes out of school knowing accounting standards.

 

[Into the Night]

The Democrats abandoned the working class. Simple as that.

The Democrats abandon everyone, so this statement is correct.

The only thing Democrats are interested in is themselves.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

You still have no idea what a shibboleth is.

shib·bo·leth
[ˈʃɪbəlɛθ]
noun
shibboleth (noun)
shibboleths (plural noun)

1. a custom, principle, or belief distinguishing a particular class or group of people, especially a long-standing one regarded as outmoded or no longer important

 

[Jarod]

To be clear by amazing life, I didn't mean one had to be famous or extremely wealthy. I suppose I could have chosen a different word but what I meant was a life well lived and moving beyond what they faced in their childhood.

I agree about the importance of education but education encompasses more than just liberal arts (STEM, Business school etc.) so since the OP was about the importance of liberal arts I was speaking from that perspective.

I understand the need to be taught specifics, and some careers require that. I am not a specifics person unless it is directly required for a goal I am achieving. I'd rather have the desire and skill to figure out the specifics than have them taught to me in a school.

I learned Calculous on my own, reading, internet and such and understanding is mind expanding, but I did not need a class to learn it.

 

[Diogenes]

I am not a specifics person.

Can confirm.

 

[Jarod]

This isn't a gotcha question, I'm just asking because I think it's the case. Do you get a sense on this board that people tend to look down on those without a college degree? Because again, that ties into challenging norms.

What do you believe public Universities aren't doing or offering today that you feel they should vis a vis a liberal arts education?

I generally do not know who in my life has or does not have a college degree. For many it is a common experience that helped shape them, so two people having that common experience lends itself to developing ties, but the fact of having or not having it is not something one should look down or up upon.

The people here, I don't really know how they view the issue of being college educated or not. I personally could care less where the education came from, but I do believe it is important to be educated.

 

[Diogenes]

I personally could care less where the education came from, but I do believe it is important to be educated.

How very profound.

 

[Jarod]

This isn't a gotcha question, I'm just asking because I think it's the case. Do you get a sense on this board that people tend to look down on those without a college degree? Because again, that ties into challenging norms.

What do you believe public Universities aren't doing or offering today that you feel they should vis a vis a liberal arts education?

I think Universities are leaving the idea of being learning institutions, thinking institutions, and are embracing the idea that their mission is to produce profitable people, people who are financially valuable. This is a failure in my book.

One can learn to build bridges in an engineering class, the math and mechanics of it, without being well educated about the world. So the failure of our higher education, in my opinion is the abandonment of the value of the liberal arts, the art of bridge building, the history of bridge building, the economics of bridge building, the social impact of bridge building...

Being an expert at the Engineering of Bridges does not make you an 'educated' person, but it is a skill that can make you a lot of money.

 

[Into the Night]

Sure, and I feel like STEM and business are well taught around here in schools, but to me, it does not give the specific life skills I was referring to.

Since you have very little in life skills, STEM programs and how to run a business eludes you.

The liberal arts take a beating,

It should. The degree a lot of schools call 'liberal arts' is garbage. It has nothing to do with the Liberal Arts.

I was reading about the philosophy on how history considered the liberal arts and how they came about, its just not considered as valuable as it once war.

Typo noted. I assume you mean 'was'.

So you find you no value in mathematics.
You find no value in music.
You find no value in rhetoric.
You find no value in logic.
You find no value in grammar.
You find no value in geometry.
You find no value in astronomy.

You have already shown your illiteracy in all of them.

It is not calculated specifically toward the ability to make money or be productive,

Yes it does, Pretender.

although Id argue it helps in those areas.

For that reason, Pretender.

The idea of being a renaissance man is considered much less valuable than in the past.

Spoken like an illiterate would.

I can raise my chickens, fix my own cars and tractor. I can design a new computer. I can program that computer and its operating system. I can run a business. I can build a house (I've done it!), including all the plumbing, electrical, foundation, and structural work. I am a reasonably accomplished musician and composer. I can design and build an aircraft (I've done it!), then fly and maintain that aircraft. I can design and build explosive devices and fireworks, and shoot them for town displays. I am a scientist, chemist, mechanic, electrician, plumber, rancher, helmsman, captain, and businessman.

What have you done? What can you do? Nothing as far as I can tell, beyond a menial job in a Walmart.

I believe it deserves a second look. Open thinking, critical reading, ongoing desire for education that have been important to me and making my life so much more than it could have been.

Your thinking is closed.
You cut and paste numerous shit on the internet and call it Gospel.
You are illiterate.

Pretending you are educated won't work, Pretender.

I do not think that learning for learnings sake is a bad thing, and I still agree that learning for a specific goal, like the ability to have a career has its own value.

Law School is not a Liberal Arts education, yet still it mostly is not an education in the specifics of the law; more about learning the thinking skills a lawyer needs. One does not come out of law knowing how to practice law, like an accountant comes out of school knowing accounting standards.

You are not a lawyer, Pretender.
You are not an accountant, Pretender.
You are illiterate. You don't even know right from wrong.

 

[Into the Night]

How very profound.

It's also a lie. He's illiterate.

 

[Jarod]

I'll speak to my experiences hiring people but I don't think I'm alone in this. When we're looking for someone to fill a role, I'm not interviewing them to judge their value to humanity.

I've interviewed people who come across as nice as can be but for whatever reason aren't a good fit for the position. That doesn't make them a bad person, it just means it wasn't a good fit. Plenty of us can excel in one role but it doesn't mean we'd be as good in other roles. That's not a judgement on us as a person.

And when interviewing people I also don't delve a whole lot into their majors.

Correct, but Higher education is changing from giving people an understanding of the world they have been born into as we understand it today, to giving people a specific skill that they can make money with.

I did not go to school to become valuable to an employer, I went to school because to me Education is enlightenment as to what I was born into. It helps answer the big questions, or at least understand them. Even Law School was about understanding our society's structure and how we organize it, not about, how to write a will for your neighbor.

 

[Walt]

shib·bo·leth
[ˈʃɪbəlɛθ]
noun
shibboleth (noun)
shibboleths (plural noun)

1. a custom, principle, or belief distinguishing a particular class or group of people, especially a long-standing one regarded as outmoded or no longer important

So for calculus to be a shibboleth, does it have to be important in and of itself?

 

[T. A. Gardner]

So for calculus to be a shibboleth, does it have to be important in and of itself?

Calculus is a niche competency. For those in professions where it is useful, knowing it is important. For the other 90 to 95% of people is isn't. Having a grasp of how it works and being able to understand the principles even if you can't do the details completely, is something another 20% or so of people need.

For example, I can easily grasp the idea behind a PID controller (Proportional, Integration-Differentiation) controller. These are widely used in industry and it helps to understand the math behind them to make the settings on one correctly.

Those are something I've installed and calibrated quite a bit. The real trick is to simplify your explanation to the worker bees, who have no grasp of calculus, how to set one correctly. That requires an understanding of how the math works without actually needing to address the exact equations being used.

 

[Taichiliberal]

Until recent times, Republicans regularly won the vote of college educated voters, and the Democratic base was heavily working class.

Reagan won not only college educated voters he won a majority of voters with advanced degrees.

But I’m missing what any of that has to do with liberal arts. If the most important thing from education is how one vote, I’ve not seen it broken down that those with college degrees that studied liberal arts vote this way compared to those with college degrees who went to business school or compared to those with college that studied stem.

Is the idea that when someone is choosing a major the emphasis will be how do people vote who are in that major?

I was giving an apropos to Hume's post regarding the dynamics of how relative education is to how people vote.

Remember also, that the Republicans traditionally do better with low voter turnout, which was a factor on both term wins. Reagan's win appealed to the "elitist" mindset... college educated/white collar people who gravitate towards corporatocracy/Wall St., the "job creators" whose success would trickle down ... especially with regulations. He appealed the inherent wealthy and the working middle class at the same time, who were told meritocracy was assured for them.