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Blog : 3 January 2017 (Feesmustfall.. Most household reported fees not to high)
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In today's blog we take a look at one of Statistics South Africa's Household surveys, the General Household Survey (GHS) results for 2015 and investigate the question of whether education/tuition fees are too high or not. Note the question is asked to households selected in the sample. We take a look at the results below.
*Note we do feel that there is case for investigating higher education fees. This article just highlights results shown by a official statistics survey |
Are fees to high?
In the GHS households are asked about various different aspects of their life. One of them is education. And questions vary from level of education to how students physically get to their respective institutions of education, how long it takes them to get there and whether students think the classes they attend are to full . One of the questions asked in the GHS is whether the respondent feels that the fees charged for education is too high.
The available responses are:
Yes
No
Don't Know
Not applicable
Unspecified
Sadly a large number of the answers are grouped under Not applicable and Unspecified. But there respondents that completed this question.
The bubble chart below shows the responses of respondents for different ages (18 to 30) and the percentage each of these responses made up for the specific age. And it is clear that in all these age groups that the percentage of people that responded No to the question on whether education fees are to high is far greater than the percentage of people that responded Yes to this question. (The size of the bubble represents the relative importance of each category for the specific age).
See the bubble chart below. Drag the scroll bar to left around to select a different age, or select the age from the drop down list.
The available responses are:
Yes
No
Don't Know
Not applicable
Unspecified
Sadly a large number of the answers are grouped under Not applicable and Unspecified. But there respondents that completed this question.
The bubble chart below shows the responses of respondents for different ages (18 to 30) and the percentage each of these responses made up for the specific age. And it is clear that in all these age groups that the percentage of people that responded No to the question on whether education fees are to high is far greater than the percentage of people that responded Yes to this question. (The size of the bubble represents the relative importance of each category for the specific age).
See the bubble chart below. Drag the scroll bar to left around to select a different age, or select the age from the drop down list.
So why the massive protests by students regarding feesmustfall? When those that did answer between yes and no answered resoundingly No.
As the people in the survey get's older, the gap between those that answered yes and no decreases. One can assume the older the people get the more likely they are to pay for their own education, instead of children's parents paying for them. Or the realisation that the study loan needs to be paid off and that is going to cost a lot of money and take a lot of time to do so.
Students cant use the excuse that they are stricking and destroying property on behalf of their parents. In the GHS for those who answered yes or no to the fees to high question, only 14% of people between the age of 30 to 60 answered Yes it is too high, while 86% answered no it is not to high.
This makes one wonder about comments that the protests were politically motivated and driven and not by the students and the parents of the students as they would have us believe since those that answered yes fees are too high are in the absolute minority when looking at the GHS results. Where there is smoke there is fire.
This makes one wonder about comments that the protests were politically motivated and driven and not by the students and the parents of the students as they would have us believe since those that answered yes fees are too high are in the absolute minority when looking at the GHS results. Where there is smoke there is fire.