By Taylor Boggs ’16, Perspectives Section Editor
According to recent surveys conducted by the College Board regarding college pricing, the average “sticker price” of a university during the 2015-2016 school year is $24,061 at an in-state public college and $47,831 at a private college. Mind you, these are considered “moderate” budgets among the many. The college budget however is in fact much more than this “sticker price” and requires money for several different areas bringing the net price to a usually-inconvenient sum. Many things go into the college cost: tuition (payment for the instruction that an institution provides), major-specific tuition (especially for engineering, sciences, pre-med), fees of service (for use of library and athletic facilities), room and board (average $10,138 at public schools to $11,516 at private schools), books and supplies (usually an extra $1,000-$2,000), and not to mention any personal expenses. Disregarding inflation, the cost of college continues to rise. Comparing tuition in fees of the 1975-76 academic year to the 2015-16 academic year in 2015 dollars, private four-year universities have gone from $16,213 to $43,921 and public four-year universities have gone from $7,833 to $19,548.
In another example, at Harvard University the annual tuition and fees, not including room and board, is $45,278. This is 17 times the 1971-72 cost. If it had only tracked the inflation rate the tuition would be $15,189. Ray Franke, a professor of education at the University of Massachusetts said “if you look at the long-term trend, [college tuition] has been rising 6% above the inflation rate.” So why does receiving a degree cost so much? First, schools are competing for applicants and to obtain them they must constantly be improving their campuses and offering the best facilities that they can. The increased cost can also account for the rising cost of college sports and salaries, expenses devoted to student services, and expanding payrolls. The only thing that has remained relatively constant is professors’ salaries. Last, it also seems as if the students and parents have to pay for more of the college cost because state funding has been cut for public higher education in a lot of cases and there have been smaller subsidies at private schools.
Under President Obama and with new ideas from Democratic Presidential Candidate Bernie Sanders, a lot of controversy has sparked regarding the concept of free higher education in the United States. In reality, this has been an ongoing debate since the implementation of land grant universities, but as college prices have continued to rise the Democratic Party has argued that college should and can be free. Some argue that if government spending on higher education was redirected so that public and community colleges could be free and the colleges reduced athletic funding and focused on reducing class sizes, the feasibility of free higher education increases. This seems realistic as over the years more and more colleges have put obscene amounts of money into amenities instead of into the classroom and more non-academic administrators have been hired.
Free public higher education would have several benefits. First, it pools risk as loans are no longer the responsibility of one individual. People from all income levels are encouraged to attend school and there is more cost control because the school would have a limit to what it could spend. Earlier this year President Barack Obama announced a plan to offer free tuition for students who attend a community college and maintain a 2.5 grade-point average and are willing to work hard (roughly half of the U.S.’s college students attend community college). Arranged so that the federal government would pay three-fourths of the cost and the states would pay for the rest, the initiative would roughly cost $60 million over a decade. In addition, some states such as North Dakota are attempting to implement a tuition freeze at two-year community colleges. The difficulty behind creating a system of free education is that the colleges still have to provide services and the issue is how those services can be supported.
Senator Bernie Sanders on the other hand wants free tuition at four-year public colleges. This legislation would eliminate undergraduate tuition a public universities and aid those at private universities as well as reduce interest on college loans. Senator Sanders argues that countries such as Germany, Denmark and Sweden offer free or inexpensive higher education and as a result have surpassed us in the academic sphere—furthermore, “we should be investing in our youth.” His plan would cost roughly $70 billion per year; states would pay for one third of costs and the federal government would pay for two thirds. In attempt to fix the issues plaguing higher education, Sanders would not pay administrator salaries, merit-based financial aid or construction of amenities. He is attempting to reverse trends, but it will take a lot of compliance. While the idea of free college is appealing, many ague that this proposal is not sustainable.
The biggest argument against free higher education is that obtaining a zero tuition base for public universities is going to be very expensive. Today the federal deficit is over $18 trillion and it is going to continue to rise. In addition to putting the strain of paying for millions of undergraduate students, the national and state governments would have to support teacher salaries, the construction of new facilities, room and board, and numerous other expenses. Also, these plans fail to address the core problem of the rising cost of college—the price of providing a college education. While advocates of free college state that zero tuition will enable people from any socioeconomic level to attend university, tuition as is today provides that the wealthy pay more so that the poor can pay less. Similarly, the college scene is always going to be thirsty for more money—that is why subsidies and donations are relied on so heavily now. Whether it is good or bad, it is the wealthy that pay to keep the universities running. Also, even if tuition was free, people would want more. As soon as college is free for everyone some other mundane problems arise as well: people will abuse that privilege. It is not hard to see that some people would attend university for years knowing that they will not incur debt.
While these goals are the right ones, free public college would make it harder to achieve them. Costing over 50 billion dollars a year, it is also a question of how to most effectively utilize government funds. In addition, much of the money would provide a free education to students whose families can already afford it, rather than benefiting those who cannot. Ideally everyone likes the idea of free higher education, but the reality is that it is not as simple as people make it sound; it would require time, money, and perfect planning. That being said, maybe free higher education is the key to getting the United States back on top of the educational sphere.
We will continue hearing the arguments for and against public education over the next year leading up to the Presidential Election in 2016 and continuing into the next presidency. It will be interesting to see which path we decide to pursue as a nation.
Sources:
http://www.collegedata.com/cs/content/content_payarticle_tmpl.jhtml?articleId=10064
http://www.cnbc.com/2015/06/16/why-college-costs-are-so-high-and-rising.html
http://www.populareconomics.org/can-american-higher-education-free/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshfreedman/2014/02/14/the-promise-of-free-public-higher-education/
Image Source:
http://brighterbrains.org/articles/entry/want-usa-colleges-to-be-free-nationalize-energy-tax-churches-halt-offshore
