In this article, the authors discuss the problems of professional education. They state that, the source of these problems--the violation of the constitutional rights of citizens to obtain an education accessible to all; the commercialization of education; and the worsening of the financial, material, technical, and cadre support of the system of educational institutions--is to be sought in the weakening of the role played by the state in the sphere of education. In addition, the difficult financial and economic condition of educational institutions and the failure to pay wages and salaries for months at a time provoked numerous protest actions by workers in education. The authors also discuss one of the main reasons and some factors why so many high-class specialists are leaving Russia.