3 ms·

Because the US government will loan people very large sums to attend, which allows the universities to raise prices at will. The buyers are price-inelastic, whi

Because the US government will loan people very large sums to attend, which allows the universities to raise prices at will. The buyers are price-inelastic, which means that they want to go regardless of price, because they are surrounded by people that tell them that going to college is the right thing to do - and the more prestigious the better. College in the US would be a lot cheaper if the government didn't inflate it. If you go back in time just a few decades, this is how it was: you paid for it, either in cash or with a PRIVATE loan, and people didn't see college as an automatic requirement. Then it was 1/10th as expensive.

Figs 2y ago
> If you go back in time just a few decades, this is how it was: you paid for it, either in cash or with a PRIVATE loan, and people didn't see college as an automatic requirement. Then it was 1/10th as expensive. ...if you go back in time a few decades basically everything was about 1/10th as expensive. e.g. "Adjusted for inflation, $1.00 in 1960 is equal to $10.43 in 2024" according to https://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php?amount=1&year=1960 https://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php?amount=1...
- mminer237 2y ago
  Tuition is like 3–5 times the price even adjusted for inflation though
- baq 2y ago
  Costs ballooned in real terms.
- mportela 2y ago
  Sure, but education (and healthcare) costs grew much faster than the inflation. "The average annual cost of tuition at a public 4-year college is 40 times higher than tuition in 1963. (...) After adjusting for currency inflation, college tuition has increased 197.4% since 1963." https://educationdata.org/college-tuition-inflation-rate https://educationdata.org/college-tuition-inflation-rate
seanmcdirmid 2y ago
European colleges are incredibly thrifty, though. German universities for example can lack dorms, student unions, and professors lack TAs to grade homework (so homework isn't graded) and your entire grade depends on one final. We could do this in the USA also, or perhaps even bother with online universities, except those are generally considered not very useful as degrees.
- nisa 2y ago
  I can't agree with your experience regarding German universities. Usually dorms are offered by the university but students usually just rent a room in the city. I've had to submit weekly sheets that were graded in almost all courses and these qualify for the final exam (in STEM). There were two exercise groups with competent ta to ask questions.. What's missing is some kind of Disneyland experience, student unions also exist to some degree but it's more low key. Not saying that German university is better or worse - I'm convinced it has it's own problems that only will get worse if nothing is changing but it's not like it's subpar and you are alone with your book.
- arlort 2y ago
  > your entire grade depends on one final This isn't due to staff shortages, it's more of a difference in tradition/philosophy of teaching
- bigbacaloa 2y ago
  [dead]
- reererer 2y ago
  That varies a lot between countries in EU. I live in Finland and my country has student unions, and professors are quite free to choose how they do the grading, so it's not always just one final exam per course. There are no dorms, but there is cheaper only-for-student housing. There are also really cheap state-subsidized meals in student restaurants on campus.
- cultofmetatron 2y ago
  the real issue in american universities is that the tuition largely goes to paying for administrators. they do no teaching and largly dont' add much value to the experience. if we capped administratiors to 1 per 5 professors, that would go a ong way towards paying for tutors and services that actually do help students.
burroisolator 2y ago
This is a common myth. This might explain why Harvard or MIT tuition is high but not the average college. Tuition mostly reflects staff costs and those have been going up due to Baumol's cost disease. Dentists, along with many other industries with its main cost being highly educated staff that haven't managed to scale production like online brokerages, have had a similar price increase since 1970.
- adastra22 2y ago
  You’re going to have to qualify where you are talking about. Where I am, California, that only describes community colleges. Even state and especially UC have “invested” significantly in infrastructure improvements paid for with loans backed by expectations of tuition income, which has had an absurd effect on growing tuition far outside of inflation. Very little of your tuition at these schools goes towards teaching salaries.
  - vitus 2y ago
    > Even state and especially UC have “invested” significantly in infrastructure improvements paid for with loans backed by expectations of tuition income, which has had an absurd effect on growing tuition far outside of inflation. What timeframe are you looking at? Back in 2011, registration fees at UC Berkeley were $7,230 per semester, with $813 allotted to health insurance (which could be waived if you provided proof of existing insurance from your family), so $6,417 ignoring health insurance. Meanwhile, last year, registration fees were an eye-popping $9,847 for new students, but cost of health insurance grew much faster to $1,929 ($7,918 ignoring health insurance). This is about a 23% increase, compared to CPI-measured inflation of about 35% between Sep 2011 and Sep 2023. (The next biggest driver of the overall increase was the campus fee, which went from $253 to $820.) Or, if you look at just tuition alone, that went from $5610 to $6261, or just barely above 10%. https://registrar.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Fee-Schedule-2011-2012.pdf https://registrar.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Fe... https://registrar.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/fee_schedule_2023-24.pdf https://registrar.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/fee_schedu... If you look further back, in 1999, tuition was a mere $1543, but I posit that tuition at UCs has actually been fairly stable over the past decade.
kevin_thibedeau 2y ago
It isn't solely the government's fault. Most American universities are corporatized and exist primarily as money printers for the admin staff. The purpose of an adjunct professor is to cost the institution as little as possible while passing as many marginal students as possible so they can maximize profits with sheep that keep coming back to the trough.
- Nifty3929 2y ago
  This only works if students have the money though - which the government helpfully provides. The Universities are just milking the system - which isn't their fault - it's ours as the voters.
mschuster91 2y ago
> and people didn't see college as an automatic requirement This here is where the money is... college degrees are a very effective dull-weeder for job applications. It filters out people of lower social classes (because they cannot afford college or effects of their social status like having to work jobs next to school to help their family make rent prevent them from getting good enough grades), it filters out people with unmanaged mental health issues, it filters out young parents (good luck managing to get a degree parallel to raising a child), it filters out people with disabilities... and all of that without violating a single anti-discrimination law.

Figs 2y ago

> If you go back in time just a few decades, this is how it was: you paid for it, either in cash or with a PRIVATE loan, and people didn't see college as an automatic requirement. Then it was 1/10th as expensive. ...if you go back in time a few decades basically everything was about 1/10th as expensive. e.g. "Adjusted for inflation, $1.00 in 1960 is equal to $10.43 in 2024" according to https://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php?amount=1&year=1960 https://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php?amount=1...

mminer237 2y ago
Tuition is like 3–5 times the price even adjusted for inflation though
baq 2y ago
Costs ballooned in real terms.
mportela 2y ago
Sure, but education (and healthcare) costs grew much faster than the inflation. "The average annual cost of tuition at a public 4-year college is 40 times higher than tuition in 1963. (...) After adjusting for currency inflation, college tuition has increased 197.4% since 1963." https://educationdata.org/college-tuition-inflation-rate https://educationdata.org/college-tuition-inflation-rate

seanmcdirmid 2y ago

European colleges are incredibly thrifty, though. German universities for example can lack dorms, student unions, and professors lack TAs to grade homework (so homework isn't graded) and your entire grade depends on one final. We could do this in the USA also, or perhaps even bother with online universities, except those are generally considered not very useful as degrees.

nisa 2y ago
I can't agree with your experience regarding German universities. Usually dorms are offered by the university but students usually just rent a room in the city. I've had to submit weekly sheets that were graded in almost all courses and these qualify for the final exam (in STEM). There were two exercise groups with competent ta to ask questions.. What's missing is some kind of Disneyland experience, student unions also exist to some degree but it's more low key. Not saying that German university is better or worse - I'm convinced it has it's own problems that only will get worse if nothing is changing but it's not like it's subpar and you are alone with your book.
arlort 2y ago
> your entire grade depends on one final This isn't due to staff shortages, it's more of a difference in tradition/philosophy of teaching
bigbacaloa 2y ago
[dead]
reererer 2y ago
That varies a lot between countries in EU. I live in Finland and my country has student unions, and professors are quite free to choose how they do the grading, so it's not always just one final exam per course. There are no dorms, but there is cheaper only-for-student housing. There are also really cheap state-subsidized meals in student restaurants on campus.
cultofmetatron 2y ago
the real issue in american universities is that the tuition largely goes to paying for administrators. they do no teaching and largly dont' add much value to the experience. if we capped administratiors to 1 per 5 professors, that would go a ong way towards paying for tutors and services that actually do help students.

burroisolator 2y ago

This is a common myth. This might explain why Harvard or MIT tuition is high but not the average college. Tuition mostly reflects staff costs and those have been going up due to Baumol's cost disease. Dentists, along with many other industries with its main cost being highly educated staff that haven't managed to scale production like online brokerages, have had a similar price increase since 1970.

adastra22 2y ago
You’re going to have to qualify where you are talking about. Where I am, California, that only describes community colleges. Even state and especially UC have “invested” significantly in infrastructure improvements paid for with loans backed by expectations of tuition income, which has had an absurd effect on growing tuition far outside of inflation. Very little of your tuition at these schools goes towards teaching salaries.
- vitus 2y ago
  > Even state and especially UC have “invested” significantly in infrastructure improvements paid for with loans backed by expectations of tuition income, which has had an absurd effect on growing tuition far outside of inflation. What timeframe are you looking at? Back in 2011, registration fees at UC Berkeley were $7,230 per semester, with $813 allotted to health insurance (which could be waived if you provided proof of existing insurance from your family), so $6,417 ignoring health insurance. Meanwhile, last year, registration fees were an eye-popping $9,847 for new students, but cost of health insurance grew much faster to $1,929 ($7,918 ignoring health insurance). This is about a 23% increase, compared to CPI-measured inflation of about 35% between Sep 2011 and Sep 2023. (The next biggest driver of the overall increase was the campus fee, which went from $253 to $820.) Or, if you look at just tuition alone, that went from $5610 to $6261, or just barely above 10%. https://registrar.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Fee-Schedule-2011-2012.pdf https://registrar.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Fe... https://registrar.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/fee_schedule_2023-24.pdf https://registrar.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/fee_schedu... If you look further back, in 1999, tuition was a mere $1543, but I posit that tuition at UCs has actually been fairly stable over the past decade.

kevin_thibedeau 2y ago

It isn't solely the government's fault. Most American universities are corporatized and exist primarily as money printers for the admin staff. The purpose of an adjunct professor is to cost the institution as little as possible while passing as many marginal students as possible so they can maximize profits with sheep that keep coming back to the trough.

Nifty3929 2y ago
This only works if students have the money though - which the government helpfully provides. The Universities are just milking the system - which isn't their fault - it's ours as the voters.

mschuster91 2y ago

> and people didn't see college as an automatic requirement This here is where the money is... college degrees are a very effective dull-weeder for job applications. It filters out people of lower social classes (because they cannot afford college or effects of their social status like having to work jobs next to school to help their family make rent prevent them from getting good enough grades), it filters out people with unmanaged mental health issues, it filters out young parents (good luck managing to get a degree parallel to raising a child), it filters out people with disabilities... and all of that without violating a single anti-discrimination law.