Government outlays intended to hold down the price of a college degree have ballooned from $29.6 billion in 1985 to $139.7 billion in 2010 - an increase of 372%. Yet, Colleges are more unaffordable than ever.
Federal financial aid is a major source of revenue for colleges and universities, and aid packages are generally based on the gap between what a family can afford to pay to send a student to a given college, and the tuition and fees charged by that college. That gives schools every incentive to keep their tuition unaffordable. Why would they reduce their sticker price to a level more families could afford, when doing so would mean kissing millions of government dollars goodbye?
Directly or indirectly, government loans and grants have led to massive tuition inflation. That has been a boon for colleges and universities, where budgets, payrolls, and amenities have grown amazingly lavish. And it has been a boon for politicians, Republicans and Democrats alike, who are happy to exploit anxiety over tuition to win votes.
But for students and their families, let alone for taxpayers who don’t go to college, it has been a disaster. The more government has done to make higher education affordable, the more unaffordable it has become.
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