One thing that was mentioned in the article, but which seems to be missing from the discussion is the decrease in state funding for higher education.
When I was looking for colleges in the 80s, the most expensive private schools were on the order of $20K all in. Those same schools are on the order of $85K all in, which is an increase of "only" (hah) 450%.
However, my alma mater (SUNY Buffalo) has increased in-state tuition 830% ($1300 to 10.8K). When I went to school there, minimum wage was $3.35/hr. That means that I could work 10 weeks at 40hr/week and pay for my tuition. That's the main reason I graduated without student loan debt. The NYS min. wage is $15/hr, so a student today would have to work 18 weeks to pay for their tuition.
We need to increase state funding for higher education.
Indeed. I attended a talk by one of the presidents of a local state university about a decade ago, and she showed a plot showing that the overall cost to educate a student hadn't changed in 30 years (inflation adjusted). What had changed was the state support per student. As it dwindled, the university continually increased the tuition such that the overall cost remained constant.
It's one university, so I don't know if it applies to the others, but drops in state support is often excluded from these conversations.
IDK that we _need_ to increase state funding, but it absolutely explains the tuition trend. I don't feel particularly bad about people graduating with student debt if they have high paying jobs on the other side.
What does feel bad is turning qualified students away, like one school I know used to do.[1] Every year they would pick a GPA cutoff to admit more engineering students to the upper level classes you need to graduate, not based on evidence of students failing but on faculty headcount. It's a total bait and switch, and thankfully it seems they ended the practice right before the pandemic.
And it's tricky, we run teaching universities because we think there's some benefit to students being taught by practicing researchers. But the reality is that, especially in STEM, research funding is what matters more than tuition funding. Which in essence means in order to admit more students we need more research labs and buildings, because the 3/3 teaching load of a tenure track faculty member will not yield competitive wages.
Its made worse by the fact that pure-teaching positions at public institutions are frequently filled by adjuncts, so there's next to no benefits or job security, and the pay is often atrocious.
It's really screwy that a great many universities have essentially said there can be no long-term work situation for teachers if they aren't also researchers.
> “If not,” Freeman continued, “we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployed people.” Freeman also said — taking a highly idiosyncratic perspective on the cause of fascism —“that’s what happened in Germany. I saw it happen.”
Adding to this: we should be looking at the actual amount paid by students have receiving financial aid. Analyses of tuition - average financial aid show that the actual amount paid has been relatively flat at private institutions. A lot of private institutions (mine included) give a 50% scholarship to most students.
Increased costs at public universities are driven largely by lack of state funding. This is also in part because the number of students attending public universities has gone up tremendously but state funding hasn't kept up.
In 1975, large state state universities (like Michigan State and U Virginia) cost about $1500 for tuition and another $1500 for room and board.
Since you could earn about $1500 working each summer, your maximum shortfall was $1500 per year (assuming no loans or grants), or $6000 per bachelor degree. At the CPI's 194% inflation, today that would equate to less than $12k of debt.
I'd also like to know how much nonacademic college costs like R&B have inflated -- when provided by the rapacious university system. They should have followed the CPI. But I'd lay strong odds they haven't.
When I was looking for colleges in the 80s, the most expensive private schools were on the order of $20K all in. Those same schools are on the order of $85K all in, which is an increase of "only" (hah) 450%.
However, my alma mater (SUNY Buffalo) has increased in-state tuition 830% ($1300 to 10.8K). When I went to school there, minimum wage was $3.35/hr. That means that I could work 10 weeks at 40hr/week and pay for my tuition. That's the main reason I graduated without student loan debt. The NYS min. wage is $15/hr, so a student today would have to work 18 weeks to pay for their tuition.
We need to increase state funding for higher education.