Surging college costs price out middle class

Everyone talks about the war on the middle class. I believe there is no issue larger or that is ground zero for separation of the classes then the college system.


This is a pain many of us feel, have felt, or wish we could go to college.

I would like to state that the US college system isn't totally bad. The student pays through the nose so the student has more power. Which also gives you the right to change your mind when you figure out that philosophy degree isn't going to work out.

But I don't have a lot of other good things to say. My state in particular in the mid-atlantic region, including the government jobs, obsess over degrees. I have even met people from affluent areas of California say this area obsesses over prestige and degrees. Not having a college degree here makes you akin to being a college dropout.
The education system is powerful. More powerful then people can give it credit for.

Not only does my over-achieving state only places value on degrees, it gets a D- for affordability. The average person cannot afford the degree.

This article highlights the ripoff that is the education system. I believe the education system is one area that should not be privatized. But because of the huge tuition hikes, now only the rich can afford to send their kids to college, or kids are strapped for a decade with student loans.

The crux of the problem: Tuition and fees at public universities, according to the College Board, have surged almost 130% over the last 20 years -- while middle class incomes have stagnated.

130%

About two thirds of students graduating with four-year degrees recently did so with loans hanging over their heads, and their average bill comes in at a whopping $23,186, according to FinAid.org.

cnn

If employers are going to require these lofty degrees, then they need to start paying for people to get them. Period.

And we need to go back to a time when experience and credibility and loyalty are your ticket, not being the person lucky enough to afford college.

Damn, $23k, Over here in the UK at Universities, Students are looking at £40k Minimum !

Although i dont think it holds as much 'prestige' as it seems to hold in california, People might like to think it does & use it as a reason to justify getting into such massive debt, but the reality is, once you come out, its probably going to be harder to find a well paid job thats relevant to your degree, than to find a 'lower down' job which may not require you to have your degree, but you will get a pat on the head for having it.

As useful as a pat on the head is

College is worthless, it's not even worth the paper your degree is printed on.

There is a huge "College Bubble" that is about to burst. In fact it already burst, but people still feel entitled to a successful career, because they paid $100,000 for a degree.

**News Flash**

They only want your money dude. They need to buy a new $30 million dollar stadium.

College costs exploded with the massive increase in needs based financial aid that started in the 1980's. In the 2007-2008 fiscal year the average amount of FEDERAL aid per student was over $8,000.
So guess what happens when you tell a company, such as a university, that they can get a guaranteed paycheck from the government? Answer: They charge as much as freaking possible! These universities no longer have to worry much about being price competitive with each other since they all get a vast amount of dollars from the same source......our government.
If you cut away all government financial aid, college prices would drop like a freaking rock because no one would be able to afford the current government rate scam prices. Every college would once again be forced to compete for your hard earned dollars and would have to provide the best education at the lowest price possible.

reply to post by nixie_nox


Nixie_nox

As Vanishr has just stated, in the UK Degrees are going to be around £40k and payable back after the Graduate earns over a certain income (£25k ??? i think, can't remember)...
This whole issue is merely a distraction away from the bigger point which is this............ the western economic model of capitalism does not work anymore!!!!!! period.!!!!!

A few have got and are still getting wealthy and they 'sell' a dream to others that if you go to school and study hard then maybe you can succeed as well as them...... in reality unless we start to correct the MASSIVE wealth imbalance which currently exisits then education to a certain level is no better than getting out on the streets and selling apples and pears and building your own business....

The other point to consider is this......... our society demands continual growth to fuel wealth creation and improving living standards.......... Expected Increrases in salaries will eventually ''cost ourselves'' out of the market and maybe that's what your seeing here.......... it is becoming to expensive and uncompetative to educate ourselves.....

PDUK

reply to post by PurpleDog UK


So what you are saying is that when and only when you start getting paid over 25k, then you have to start paying back the loan.

Here in the states, you start paying it off after 6 months, regardless of your income. You can get a waiver if your in a financial mess, but it still accrues interest no matter what.

I understand that degrees are expensive there. But I don't play the, mine is more expensive so you dont' have the right to complain, contest. But too expensive is too expensive, whether it is by a little or by a lot.

I don't know if the median income has gone up. But what this article is stating is that tuition hikes far exceed any income hikes. In fact, people are making less.

I am pointing out that I don't think it is an accident that tuition is going up,many of these schools are for profit, and a lot of industries are now requiring degrees.

Now I give these kids A LOT of kudos to what they are doing.

But I have to question a school for boys, an elementary, middle and high school at that, that is 31k per year per student.

At that price, my kid better be a cryptologist or go straight to astronaut for NASA.

The learning exeperience for these boys probably outstrip any educational system. More power to them.
But paying that is just insanity imo.

The brothers, who live in Prince George’s County, donate some of that money to charity. The rest goes toward tuition ($31,000 per student) and toward helping repay their parents for ice machines, a trailer and a truck.These young capitalists, 15 and 14, are chief executive and chief operating officer of AJ’s Hawaiian Iceez, an ice-shaving enterprise (think snow cones) that expects to gross about $50,000 this year. The boys’ profits will run to about $25,000.

Washington Post

Just going to state my personal opinion here...


Schooling is for losers, and the winners are edumacated entrepreneurs...

Originally posted by unityemissions
Just going to state my personal opinion here...


Schooling is for losers, and the winners are edumacated entrepreneurs...

Unless you place more value on being able to engage in cognitively demanding acts than on being rich. I think going to college for technical degrees is a good option.

reply to post by nixie_nox


I disagree with you on the merits of a college degree, primarily due to the total absence of proper education in secondary school in the US. If you have ever attempted to hire a high school graduate for a position that, for example requires written communication, you will likely find yourself with someone who requires a significant amount of remedial training. I don't have the time to teach someone how to write.

Critical thinking is totally absent from most public schools, who school their students on things like woman, gay and minority studies, politically correct history and literature. Speak with someone in their 70s or 80s about what they learned in high school and it will sound much like today's college degree. They will also tell you that kids who did not perform or who disrupted the learning environment were simply kicked out of school. The greater good of educating large segments of the population out weighed the inclusion of the irresponsible, plain stupid or kid with the behavior problem. Today, our education establishment is geared around inclusion when in fact it should be about exclusion.

In school the thing you should primarily learn is how to think. How to deal with complexity and ambiguity, how to solve problems. Those are items that are simply not taught in today's schools. You'll learn all about Harvey Milk and Rosa Parks and Che, but you won't learn how to think.

Fix the public school system and you will not find such a stigma against those with only a high school degree.

As far as costs go, you need to understand that universities and colleges are as much banks and asset management firms than schools. When you consider the endowments of universities, it is completely irresponsible for tuition to go up at all and in fact should be totally free. It certainly should not be anything close to what it is today. A few of the largest endowments:

Harvard $27.5 Billion
Yale $16.5 Billion
University of Texas $14 Billion
Princeton $14 Billion
Standford $13.8 Billion

Other endowments at the following link:
www.ask.com...

There is absolutely no reason for a college with a $billion endowment, let alone a multi $billion endowment to charge $1 for tuition, room or board.

Most of these schools also receive massive amount of government money to subsidize their operations, off-set costs of performing research, endowing professors in specific subject matter, student loans, infrastructure grants and other areas.

Colleges are banks. They run more money than most hedge funds or private equity funds and they have ceased to be in the primary business of educating people years ago.

How does it change? The first thing that should be done tomorrow is remove their tax exempt status

People seem to forget that colleges have expenses. You need to think about all the people that take care of the business or running the college.

You can start with all the departmental staff, the technical people, the grounds people etc. Their overhead is considerable.

When you're a student, you don't see all the people that work behind the scene to make the colleges work.

Think about what it takes to keep a campus open. It's huge.

Colleges are a business - plain and simple.

Here in Texas they voted in 2003 to deregulate tuition in the state.
The result? Tuition amounts soared!

According to Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board data, since tuition deregulation was passed in 2003, overall designated tuition has increased 156 percent. The percentage increase at select Texas universities is even higher. Since fall 2003, tuition at the University of Texas at Austin has increased 230 percent; tuition at the University of Texas at Dallas has increased 219 percent; tuition at Texas Tech University and the University of Houston has increased 178 percent; and tuition at Texas A&M University and increased 165 percent. "Eight years ago, this legislature did not want to make tough decisions on tuition and, instead, passed the buck to the schools. We've spent years blaming them for doing what they had to do to keep their schools running. It is time to put the horse back in the barn and require the legislature to do its job funding Texas universities.

Source: Texas Senate won't touch tuition deregulation

A bold senator from a Houston district tried to reign in these skyrocketing costs but it was narrowly defeated.

Originally posted by 547000

Originally posted by unityemissions
Just going to state my personal opinion here...


Schooling is for losers, and the winners are edumacated entrepreneurs...

Unless you place more value on being able to engage in cognitively demanding acts than on being rich. I think going to college for technical degrees is a good option.

Schooling never was cognitively demanding. I aced the material without studying, and would get laughed at by students and shunned by professors for being too far ahead and speaking my mind. It's taken some years for the truth to come out, but much of what I posited that was thought of as bizarre and illogical is just now being shown to be truth.

Being an entrepreneur IS cognitively demanding. It depends on how you go about it. Technical schools are for the bright, not gifted.

reply to post by Wildbob77


No doubt you are right. A reasonable market return, one you should estimate for planning purposes is 5%.

A 1$bn endowment thus generates $50M/year in return, absent hitting principal.

Every private college and university makes a profit. Harvard, for example the School of Arts and Sciences, the largest college within the university had an operating budget of $698M in the last year figures were made available. The School of Arts and Sciences had revenue of $800M, generating roughly $100M in profit. With a $27 billion endowment, is it really necessary to make a profit?

Based on the 5% return, Harvard makes roughly $1.3bn/year in investment income alone, independant of revenue from each college or graduate school. Why are they charging $33K/year for tuition? Harvard, as do most universities has a tax exempt asset management firm. Is it really reasonable that they can generate over $1.5 billion and not pay taxes?

Harvard and many of these schools could provide free tuition in perpetuity. Many of the others could offer significantly reduced tuition without tapping into principal of their investment accounts. They could cap their tuition at, say $20K/year. What they certainly don't need to do is raise it 3.3% like they did last year.

Although I agree that much of what the OP has said is true, there IS a cheap alternative, online university. It is much cheaper and the fact is it is now beleived to be a better education than the traditional colleges. There are many accredited online schools (primarily Pheonix college) And there are even well established colleges offering classes online. This will be the education of the future. AND they also get government stipened grants as well, and they still don't charge exhorbitant prices. Why is that? Simple you aren't paying to provide AC/Heat, dorms, water, electricity, sports complexes, libraries, labs, etc. etc. for all the other students, the list could go on, but you get the point. Oh and computers are a great portion of that, with online college, everybody has already provided their own computer and internet access, so that greatly reduces overhead. I think a college degree is still greatly valuable. I constantly tell my children they should do the online college as I am doing now. I have experience both in a public traditional college as well as online college and I can see for myself that online is much more and has been much more conducive to not only my learning, but the amount of money that I will be owing after graduation is a fraction of what it would have costed me for traditional school for the same degree. It is also a fallacy that the online degree is not as "prestigious" as traditional degrees. The only place this is NOT true is when you're talking Harvard and Yale. Why it would be any different, is beyond me though, because they have certainly not produced any graduates of any quality within the last decade or so. LOL. I think that if more and more students chose online schooling, well the competition could actually produce incentive to traditional colleges to lower their fees.
Also, I know a lot of children want that "College" experience, The pledging a sorority or fraternity, the parties, etc etc. Well leave that to the rich sprats, because those who are really interested in an education will not worry about these things. Soon all traditional colleges will be for elitist dope heads and the true brains of the country will be going online and saving their money to take a trip to Europe while the Party college people have got to go straight to work because they will have run out of money. Soon Harvard and Yale will strictly be known as "Party Colleges" if not already.
I think that parents and colleges should offer incentives to high school graduates to attend online colleges. Schools can offer incentives such as, a 30% discount for anyone you may refer to the online college, parents can offer that they stay in the home rent free and not only that, that trip to Europe after graduation as an incentive for thier child to attend online. If I had the money I would offer that to my children. Right now alls I can offer them is rent free room and board until they graduate and maybe beyond until they find a job they want in a place they want and maybe we will even be able to help with moving costs. Rent downpayment whatever at the very least. I am sure we could swing that much. But this has gotta be done on a large scale. Even high school counselors should be touting the advantages to soon to be graduates/seniors. I think online college is the next best thing since sliced bread. Some may disagree, but I really think the future of producers in this country will be getting online degrees. There are more benefits that outwiegh the negatives in online, whereas in traditional colleges the negatives far outweigh the benefits! Just an observation.
I also agree that education should not be a business. That everyone who shows incentive should be able to attend and get their degree in whatever their true passion is, the problem with that is Human Nature though. And the fact that today most children never grow up, but that's a whole 'nother can o' worms as they say. Too many look at school as the time to party, these kinds are what's making the world it is today they spent almost all their time at school high or drunk have barely any brain cells left and they're the people running this country! That's scary!!!!

reply to post by unityemissions


I don't know about that. A master carpenter/cabinet maker or stone mason has as much a grasp on mathmetics and engineering as do most graduate students, most of it self taught. They routinely tackle very sophisticated problems using the fundamental principals of trigonomerty and calculus.

Many of these folks, as well as others in skilled trades are more than just "bright".

Originally posted by dolphinfan
reply to post by unityemissions

 

I don't know about that. A master carpenter/cabinet maker or stone mason has as much a grasp on mathmetics and engineering as do most graduate students, most of it self taught. They routinely tackle very sophisticated problems using the fundamental principals of trigonomerty and calculus.

Many of these folks, as well as others in skilled trades are more than just "bright".

edit on 14-6-2011 by dolphinfan because: (no reason given)

edit on 14-6-2011 by dolphinfan because: (no reason given)

Ah I agree, that is true, and this is the people who should be ruling our country, not some elitist ivy league drones who never put what they've learned to practical use.

I will have to agree that college loans hurt and hurt alot. Both me and my wife have masters degrees hers in Biology and mine in geology and when the loans finally hit us it was more than a huge chunk of our income. I was actually forced to go work for the University since by doing that alot of my debt was forgiven but i'm locked into this job for the next 5 years. I do however get the chance for more education at no cost so am working on a history and political science degree since my job is just boring research.

However because of the high cost of our loans we are effectively locked down in this state and unable to move and even though i've had fairly decent job offers they do not pay enough to justify leaving my current situation so I feel stuck in a job a high school student could do and my degree is not being used in the way I had envisioned when I started down this road.

Originally posted by dolphinfan
reply to post by unityemissions

 

I don't know about that. A master carpenter/cabinet maker or stone mason has as much a grasp on mathmetics and engineering as do most graduate students, most of it self taught. They routinely tackle very sophisticated problems using the fundamental principals of trigonomerty and calculus.

Many of these folks, as well as others in skilled trades are more than just "bright".

edit on 14-6-2011 by dolphinfan because: (no reason given)

edit on 14-6-2011 by dolphinfan because: (no reason given)

Again

Mathematics and physics are not challenging to me.

Not sure where we're in disagreement, tbh.

What is fun and challenging is envisioning the future and shaping the community resources to realize the vision.

That takes a lot of brainpower spanning multiple domains....

reply to post by kro32


So was it worth it?