Maybe I should have been more clear; the costs of education go up concurrently with with CPI. CPI is used as a general measure of inflation. If you're not takin

Maybe I should have been more clear; the costs of education go up concurrently with with CPI. CPI is used as a general measure of inflation. If you're not taking that into account, you're measuring the change in nominal, not real dollars. That's much less useful. My point about income increasing was meant to show how the burden of college has not increased significantly to those who are paying the full costs. The fraction it is of their income has decreased or remained roughly the same. If the issue is that people aren't getting their money's worth out of the investment that an education is, then that's one problem. On the other hand, if the $25k of debt is worth more than $25k + inflation (measured by CPI ;) + opportunity cost, then it's worth it. >If Exxon decides to double their prices because people's incomes have doubled would you think that was acceptable? If the market would bear it, why shouldn't they? >If it's cost is going up exponentially its because someone is making a lot of profit. I don't speak for all colleges out there, but at least many of the smaller liberal arts colleges that command these very high prices of ~$50k/yr, the costs of education are indeed increasing. Instead of vapidly speculating that "someone" is making a large profit because, prima facia, costs are increasing, take a look at the improvements in education since the first half of last century. Things are changing. No longer is education a matter of a room and a professor. It is more costly to provide.