...
Beyond $150K, aid phases out quickly. But what that means is that there is a subset of families sending their children to these schools that are paying a very high percentage of their income in college costs, as much as 25% of gross income.
According to the Crimson more than half of all Harvard parents make over $125,000 a year, so that may be quite a subset -- not to mention the set of those who reject Harvard because they don't want such a burden.
“According to the Crimson more than half of all Harvard parents make over $125,000 a year, so that may be quite a subset...”
Indeed. You're describing a small part of the phenomenon that educational attainment is tied to the educational attainment of parents, and that better-educated folks generally make more money. At HYP, this is true in spades. Although financial aid at HYP is very generous to the average American family, it is not so generous to the average HYP family. Nearly 40% of HYP families are full pay. That's about $65K per year. But the median income of Haarvard families is $200K per year, and a substantial number of folks make $500K per year or more, and that's not terribly meaningful to regular folks.
The deeper problem is that higher education is an industry, and the game of this industry is to soak folks as completely as possible, even to the point of impoverishment for the sake of the rent-seekers within the industry. The primary mechanism employed here is to take any income or asset that the school can uncover, leaving just enough to make sure the payer can make it to the next billing cycle, and pay that.
But the one general exception to this rule is that HYP provide adequate financial aid for typical American families. And for that small mercy, I'm grateful, since it applies to me and my two sons.
For ordinary families fortunate enough to have a child accepted to one of these three schools, college does not have to mean poverty.
sitetest