Posted on 02/13/2005 1:35:47 PM PST by Willie Green
The Boston Globe's Jeff Jacoby wrote for Thursday the column that I intended to write for today. I'll go a bit further.
Mr. Jacoby offered a wonderfully accessible explanation of how 60 years of federal tuition aid only has served to increase the cost of a college education.
That's daft, you say. How can that be?
Actually, it's not that unhinged at all. And as Jacoby notes, it's quite elementary: "Every dollar that Washington generates in student aid is another dollar that colleges and universities have an incentive to harvest, either by raising their sticker price or reducing the financial aid they offer from their own funds."
The bottom line, as Cato Institute scholar Gary Wolfram found in a new study, is that "federal loans, Pell Grants and other assistance programs result in higher tuition for students ... ."
(Excerpt) Read more at pittsburghlive.com ...
bump
I've beem saying this for years. What, is the world finally catching up?
Higher salaries for administration, too. More "programs," departments, chairs. Whoopeee!
I noticed that trend, sir, while at the University of Nebraska many years ago, and then for many years afterwards.
(I worked my way through college; had less than $1500 in student loans to pay off when I was done.)
Every time the federal government raised student assistance, for example, say, 10%, it seemed the University of Nebraska then raised tuition or fees, or both, circa 10% (maybe 10.5%, 11%, 11.25%, but something close to the percentage increase in federal assistance).
The purpose of increased federal assistance WAS to help more poorer students get into, and finish, college; however, the effect was that college became more and more expensive, cutting those poorer, potential, students out of the action even more.
The only way increased federal assistance would help the poor was if the colleges and universities had kept costs stable, or at least below the increase in federal assistance.
What gets my goat is that even today, students at the University of Nebraska tend to think of the university administration as being on "their side," and the state and federal legislators, "against" them, whenever a budget is discussed.
When I attended the University of Nebraska, it was a fairly decent middling university; it met all academic standards, and was pretty much what Nebraska could afford (we are after all one of the smallest states in the union).....and tuition and fees were cheap.
Now, with "empire builders" having vaccuumed up the substantial increases in student aid to finance their personal kingdoms, principalities, and grand duchies, the University of Nebraska--the stated goal of one its recent presidents being to change it to "the Harvard of the Plains"--is not even a "C+" university any more.
And the only way it equals Harvard (slight exaggeration, but slowly coming true) is in.....what it charges.
I much appreciate your post. I graduated for UW-Madison. My tuiton was $75 per semester (no, it was not the 1920s), in state, and, after the first year, was covered by an academic scholarship. Govenment money begain to be more available during that time and I was urged often to "borrow" some of it. Didn't do it until the IRS demanded $400 from a 3 year old mistake and threatened to take my car (which I am sure was worth at least $25). So I borrowed money from the Government to pay the Government. I am still angry about this, and I get over most things very quickly. ;)
The rate of inflation is not the appropriate comparison for public school tuition, because state legislatures have been consistently cutting back the amount of money they give to public schools. Thus, even if public schools had not inceased spending at all on science equipment and buildings, sports programs and recreational facilities, dormitories, faculty, staff, student financial aid and the like, schools would have to charge the students more. As legislatures have spent less on public education, the cost of that education has been increasingly borne by individual students (rather than taxpayers). In fact, "public" schools (like the University of Virginia) are becoming almost independent of the state legislature.
Now, it may be appropriate to ask the students to pay rather than the taxpayers, but that's a separate question from why the costs are increasing or whether the increase in tuition is inappropriate. If you want a better comparison, look at how expenditure increases (not tuition) compare with inflation.
This theory also directly applies to the cost of health care.
Education funding is just as much of a scheme to rip off the young and inexperienced as is Social Security. It's a racket. If you take a look at most schools they waste huge amounts of funds on marginally or non-academic fields, like Ward Churchill and his ilk.
I can't improve on that, so yes.
Same thing with the price of drugs and health care in general.
Probably the price of all road building is adjusted "UP" by federal incursion too.. where does it stop... A smaller federal government across the board could start a virtual boom in U.S. business.. makeing for some REAL capitalism.. leaving all URP and Asia in the dust.. Exposing URPean socialism as the slavery by government that is..
I attended the University of Nebraska during the 1970s; tuiton my first two years there was the equivalent of $10 per credit-hour.
At the time, the minimum wage was $2.00 per hour (no, this was not the 1920s either), meaning one had to work five hours in such a job, to pay for one credit hour of tuition.
As of this year, the University of Nebraska is charging tuition of circa $100 per credit hour (besides much more in fees).
The minimum wage is now $5.15 per hour.....meaning a current student there has to work nearly twenty hours in such a job, to pay for one credit hour of tuition.
(And no, the problem is NOT the minimum wage; the problem IS "empire-building" among administrators and academicians, driving up college costs faster than the general inflation.)
Yes, it is.
This is really true and student loans are a form of indentured servitude for the victims. What a bad deal..pay interest on tuition to hear Churchill rant,because, diversity studies is part of your requirements..ugh.
But we parents are letting it happen..paying and not regulating what your kids take in college.
Hmmm introducing government inefficiency into a market results in higher prices and less efficiency? Who would have thunk it?
My son recently graduated from college. Tuition went up about 70% in the 3 1/2 years he was a student. Every year the amount of money borrowed was more to cover the increased tuition.
It seems like there are no controls over tuition increases.
Tuition goes up, borrowing goes up. More subsidy is involved. The college knows the student and the parents will sign the notes to cover. It is a crock. I agree with the premise of the article.
Well, after they get the money they have to spend it... but the getting of it is the point.
Rush pointed this out years ago, just as subsidized rental fees increase the cost of renting a house or apartment...
This theory also directly applies to the cost of health care.
.....and insurance. We could probably come up with several ripoffs that claim to help us average Americans.
I read somewhere that the most financially endowed private institution after the Vatican is Harvard University - much of this comes from donations from alumni and business.
That being the case, why the bloody hell do they charge students so much (my sister is there for graduate school)? There is a very strange form of economics at work with universities.
Regards, Ivan
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