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International students pay full price, unlike American students. That's why the loss is such a big deal for them and also for American students, whose education

International students pay full price, unlike American students. That's why the loss is such a big deal for them and also for American students, whose education was being subsidized by international student tuition.

octopoc 1y ago
“Subsidized” is inaccurate. A more accurate way to describe what’s been happening is that international students drove up the cost of tuition, forcing American students into debt or out of college. The reason I characterize it this way is college tuition has skyrocketed. The same thing happens in private schools—wealthy grandparents are common enough that children without wealthy grandparents are much less likely to be able to go to private school.
- HankStallone 1y ago
  Right, you're not being subsidized if you can't get enrolled at all at the school of your choice because the school filled up with full-freight foreign students.
  - alistairSH 1y ago
    Many top universities in the US have ~10-15% international. Hardly "filled up" with international students.
    - HankStallone 1y ago
      If they're filling 10-15% of the seats, that's 10-15% of the domestic student body they would have had that's been bumped.
      - foldr 1y ago
        A university's capacity isn't static. The money that comes in from foreign students can pay for additional capacity. You're talking as if every university was allocated a fixed number of seats in 1955 and now we all have to fight for one.
        NoMoreNicksLeft 1y ago
        >A university's capacity isn't static. Adding capacity isn't cheap. That gets passed on to the "customers". Which also raises the price for Americans. >The money that comes in from foreign students can pay for additional capacity. No, the cost gets spread out among all the customers. There are no mechanisms where discriminatory pricing kicks in, and only the foreign students pay for the additional capacity.
        shadowgovt 1y ago
        Foreign students aren't eligible for the scholarships and in-state bonuses American students are.
        foldr 1y ago
        >There are no mechanisms where discriminatory pricing kicks in, and only the foreign students pay for the additional capacity. There is exactly such a mechanism. The foreign students pay more! I don't have the exact figures to crunch the numbers (and I doubt you do either), but it's pretty implausible to suggest that foreign students are somehow a loss maker for US universities. If foreign students were a net loss, then universities wouldn’t be so keen to admit them. And if they're profitable then they pay for their seats. The US university system is an incredible national asset. There are incalculable benefits to having the world's best universities attracting the best students from all over the world. That some Americans have managed to convince themselves that this is a bad thing is enough to turn my brain inside out.
        dragonwriter 1y ago
        > There are no mechanisms where discriminatory pricing kicks in, and only the foreign students pay for the additional capacity. Uh, state universities often have a mechanism for that, its called “out of state tuition”.
    - realitybitez 1y ago
      [flagged]
    - NoMoreNicksLeft 1y ago
      15% soaks up quite a bit of the excess supply in any market.
- alistairSH 1y ago
  Correlation != Causation. Do you have any evidence that international student enrollment is driving costs up (vs easy access to loans or other factors)?
  - HankStallone 1y ago
    I'm sure there's no hard "evidence" in the sense of a college administrator on video saying, "Gosh, I love these international students because they let us charge more!" But it's just how prices work. If you're selling widgets for $5 each, and a new batch of customers come along who are willing to pay $10 for a widget, guess what your per-widget price is now. If you can't sell them all for $10, you might put the rest on sale for $5, but only after you've served all the $10 customers. The universities are still taking some domestic and/or scholarship students too, but they're naturally giving preference to the full-paying ones. Could there be other factors driving up tuition? Maybe, but student loans have been around for a long time, and I don't know that they've gotten a lot easier to get. Maybe the recent talk about student loan forgiveness has made some people more casual about taking on debt, assuming it will be forgiven, but that's questionable. The growth in international student enrollment is the one big obvious change.
    - Swenrekcah 1y ago
      It is interesting that you believe this is mainly caused by foreign students. It is a recurring theme in today’s society. If you look at the data here [1] you can see there is a wide range of tuition costs for the top 100 universities in the USA, going as low as 6000 usd with the average in-state cost at 17,000 usd. The most prestigious ones are more expensive. Why is that? A very significant part is the network effect people are buying, they are hoping to either get to know well off or connected colleagues, finish a thesis under a prestigious professor or just simply to have a degree from the fancy university. This is all in an attempt to get ahead. This effect is there regardless of any international students. [1]: https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/best-schools/us-top-100/ https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/best-schools/us-top-10...
qzw 1y ago
Some part of American students’ education, yes, but a large number of colleges have also used the extra money to inflate spending in other non-academic areas such as administrator salaries, athletics, resort style dorms, etc. Of course when the international money runs dry, those are not necessarily the first areas to see cutbacks.
- salynchnew 1y ago
  Most states (at least in the midwest) have not kept up with their obligations when it comes to funding the historical land grand universities ("state" university, etc.).
  - qzw 1y ago
    A lot of state universities (not just in the Midwest) have become professional football teams with an educational institution attached. And I say this as a fan of one of those teams.
    - stockresearcher 1y ago
      There might be one or two exceptions, but generally the schools you are referring to are bursting at the seams with students. Quick web search: University of Georgia - enrollment up 3% Ohio State - enrollment up 2.3%, highest in history University of Alabama - enrollment exceeds 40,000 for first time in history University of Michigan - couldn’t find enrollment, but it reported a record number of applications

octopoc 1y ago

“Subsidized” is inaccurate. A more accurate way to describe what’s been happening is that international students drove up the cost of tuition, forcing American students into debt or out of college. The reason I characterize it this way is college tuition has skyrocketed. The same thing happens in private schools—wealthy grandparents are common enough that children without wealthy grandparents are much less likely to be able to go to private school.

HankStallone 1y ago
Right, you're not being subsidized if you can't get enrolled at all at the school of your choice because the school filled up with full-freight foreign students.
- alistairSH 1y ago
  Many top universities in the US have ~10-15% international. Hardly "filled up" with international students.
  - HankStallone 1y ago
    If they're filling 10-15% of the seats, that's 10-15% of the domestic student body they would have had that's been bumped.
    - foldr 1y ago
      A university's capacity isn't static. The money that comes in from foreign students can pay for additional capacity. You're talking as if every university was allocated a fixed number of seats in 1955 and now we all have to fight for one.
      - NoMoreNicksLeft 1y ago
        >A university's capacity isn't static. Adding capacity isn't cheap. That gets passed on to the "customers". Which also raises the price for Americans. >The money that comes in from foreign students can pay for additional capacity. No, the cost gets spread out among all the customers. There are no mechanisms where discriminatory pricing kicks in, and only the foreign students pay for the additional capacity.
        shadowgovt 1y ago
        Foreign students aren't eligible for the scholarships and in-state bonuses American students are.
        foldr 1y ago
        >There are no mechanisms where discriminatory pricing kicks in, and only the foreign students pay for the additional capacity. There is exactly such a mechanism. The foreign students pay more! I don't have the exact figures to crunch the numbers (and I doubt you do either), but it's pretty implausible to suggest that foreign students are somehow a loss maker for US universities. If foreign students were a net loss, then universities wouldn’t be so keen to admit them. And if they're profitable then they pay for their seats. The US university system is an incredible national asset. There are incalculable benefits to having the world's best universities attracting the best students from all over the world. That some Americans have managed to convince themselves that this is a bad thing is enough to turn my brain inside out.
        dragonwriter 1y ago
        > There are no mechanisms where discriminatory pricing kicks in, and only the foreign students pay for the additional capacity. Uh, state universities often have a mechanism for that, its called “out of state tuition”.
  - realitybitez 1y ago
    [flagged]
  - NoMoreNicksLeft 1y ago
    15% soaks up quite a bit of the excess supply in any market.
alistairSH 1y ago
Correlation != Causation. Do you have any evidence that international student enrollment is driving costs up (vs easy access to loans or other factors)?
- HankStallone 1y ago
  I'm sure there's no hard "evidence" in the sense of a college administrator on video saying, "Gosh, I love these international students because they let us charge more!" But it's just how prices work. If you're selling widgets for $5 each, and a new batch of customers come along who are willing to pay $10 for a widget, guess what your per-widget price is now. If you can't sell them all for $10, you might put the rest on sale for $5, but only after you've served all the $10 customers. The universities are still taking some domestic and/or scholarship students too, but they're naturally giving preference to the full-paying ones. Could there be other factors driving up tuition? Maybe, but student loans have been around for a long time, and I don't know that they've gotten a lot easier to get. Maybe the recent talk about student loan forgiveness has made some people more casual about taking on debt, assuming it will be forgiven, but that's questionable. The growth in international student enrollment is the one big obvious change.
  - Swenrekcah 1y ago
    It is interesting that you believe this is mainly caused by foreign students. It is a recurring theme in today’s society. If you look at the data here [1] you can see there is a wide range of tuition costs for the top 100 universities in the USA, going as low as 6000 usd with the average in-state cost at 17,000 usd. The most prestigious ones are more expensive. Why is that? A very significant part is the network effect people are buying, they are hoping to either get to know well off or connected colleagues, finish a thesis under a prestigious professor or just simply to have a degree from the fancy university. This is all in an attempt to get ahead. This effect is there regardless of any international students. [1]: https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/best-schools/us-top-100/ https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/best-schools/us-top-10...

qzw 1y ago

Some part of American students’ education, yes, but a large number of colleges have also used the extra money to inflate spending in other non-academic areas such as administrator salaries, athletics, resort style dorms, etc. Of course when the international money runs dry, those are not necessarily the first areas to see cutbacks.

salynchnew 1y ago
Most states (at least in the midwest) have not kept up with their obligations when it comes to funding the historical land grand universities ("state" university, etc.).
- qzw 1y ago
  A lot of state universities (not just in the Midwest) have become professional football teams with an educational institution attached. And I say this as a fan of one of those teams.
  - stockresearcher 1y ago
    There might be one or two exceptions, but generally the schools you are referring to are bursting at the seams with students. Quick web search: University of Georgia - enrollment up 3% Ohio State - enrollment up 2.3%, highest in history University of Alabama - enrollment exceeds 40,000 for first time in history University of Michigan - couldn’t find enrollment, but it reported a record number of applications