How is the quality of engineering education in Germany these days? I quote Paul Graham:
"There don't seem to be many universities elsewhere that compare with the best in America, at least in technology.
In some countries this is the result of a deliberate policy. The German and Dutch governments, perhaps from fear of elitism, try to ensure that all universities are roughly equal in quality. The downside is that none are especially good." [1]
Disclaimer: I'm asian and obtained my Master degree in Germany. I am now working in academia in Germany.
Yes, Graham goes on. With a bunch of what I consider to be odd statements: "There are few Jews left in Germany and most Jews I know would not want to move there. And if you took any great American university and removed the Jews, you'd have some pretty big gaps. So maybe it would be a lost cause trying to create a silicon valley in Germany, because you couldn't establish the level of university you'd need as a seed."
So, basically you need a bunch of Jews in order to create a decent academic landscape? That sounds pretty far-fetched. In turn, I am going to offer some anecdotal evidence as well: the faculty I am working / doing research for is providing an international CS degree (MSc.), taught solely in English. We get a lot of international students, the majority from Asia, with only around 15%-20% of German students each term, but given that we partner with some universities in Canada and the U.S., we also have a share of students from those countries. I have been working here for about 5 years, which equals 10 semesters, i.e. I have witnessed at least 10 different batches of students coming here, and so far, US/Canadian students didn't stand out particularly. There is of course some selection bias at work, in that students studying abroad need a certain financial background, language and social skills etc., but I'd counter Graham's "argument" and say that what the German government tries to do is not to ensure that all universities are of (roughly) equal quality, but that there is a common, minimum baseline as to what to expect from a certain level of education.
Our university is part of an organization that spans several universities, research institutes and for a lack of a better word, "think tanks" that offer both education and research facilities for industry / government partners. Each university has student teams that participate in international competitions in our sub-field of CS and constantly come out among the first three places in those competitions. Again, this is a biased result of course, maybe education is simply quite good w.r.t. that specific field, but I highly doubt it, given personal experience. And yes, I consider my personal experience to be as valuable as Graham's assertions above, who is not personally involved in German academia and is providing some very odd reasons for the perceived success of U.S. universities...
He has a number of blanket statements ready about Europe, but Europe is a very diverse place, much more so than the US. Norway, Turkey, Russia, Luxembourg, the UK differ much more from each other than Alaska, Louisiana, Texas, New York, California.
In the end I don't think it has much to do with 'America' vs 'Not America', but with Silicon Valley having been the place where it started. You can't create a second silicon valley in Florida any more than you can in Germany. The startups go to Silicon Valley because that's where the investors are. The investors go to Silicon Valley because that's where the startups go. You can't create a second Hollywood, a second Mecca, a second Rome.
I don't think these things develop according to a plan. Perhaps a generation from now, the Chinese equivalent of Hacker News will mock American attempts to create a second Shanghai or Moscow.
Since when Turkey and Russia became "Europe"? Don't get me wrong - probably both are super-interesting places in their own right, but including them into "Europe" is like including Mexico and Brasil into "America". Again, nothing wrong with those as well, they are just vastly different places, far outside of "education and taxes in US vs. that in EU" discourse.
I don't mean to be pedantic, but it's basic geography and history.
Russia has been part of Europe ever since it was founded in the middle ages. It only built an Asian empire from the 17th century onward. Russia is European in just the same way as the UK and France were before they lost their empires.
Turkey became part of Europe when the Ottomans started expanding into Europe, in the 14th century. Even today, the largest city in Europe is Istanbul, Turkey. Fun fact: Istanbul has more inhabitants than most EU member states.
I was responding to that 'paulgraham' article, and he consistently talks about 'Europe' (not the EU) like it's this one homogeneous blob.
I'm from germany and spend some time at the technical university of munich.
This statement was not accurate at the time of writing and is even less accurate today.
There is a well known university ranking in germany, named "Hochschulranking". An older version for sports can be seen at e.g. https://www.sport.uni-freiburg.de/bachelor-ranking2012.pdf
There was no such thing as equal quality, obviously, just a baseline of what you should learn. This baseline is from what I've heard higher than in the US.
One more thing, I'm currently trying to find the source again, but ~20% of foreign students decide to stay in Germany after receiving free education.
Those numbers were way lower in the US iirc. Given such a high number of staying students I'd say it's well worth the money (for Germany).
And I don't think his statement is true. He may be right that there is no single(!) university that can compete with MIT for example. But there are excellent groups in various fields at various universities.
"There don't seem to be many universities elsewhere that compare with the best in America, at least in technology.
In some countries this is the result of a deliberate policy. The German and Dutch governments, perhaps from fear of elitism, try to ensure that all universities are roughly equal in quality. The downside is that none are especially good." [1]
He goes on. Is this still accurate?
[1] http://paulgraham.com/america.html