How We Got Exspensive College Tuition And Massive Student Debt

In California, tuition used to be almost free. Reagan disliked Vietnam War protests. Roger Freeman, a Reagan administration operative helped engineer raising tuition, and saddling students with big debts. Last thing America wanted was an "educated protelatariat". Freeman, an Austrian refugee from Austria claimed that was what ushered in National Socialism. This seems to be a largely forgotten bit of American history. The California model rapidly became the college tuition model nation wide.

Over the last two decades, the number of managerial and professional staff that Yale employs has risen three times faster than the undergraduate student body, according to University financial reports. The group’s 44.7 percent expansion since 2003 has had detrimental effects on faculty, students and tuition, according to eight faculty members.

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Note that much of the increase in tuition is due to a decrease in government funding. Every year they put a bit more of the load on the students. While educational spending has risen in real dollars it's nowhere near as dramatic as a superficial look at the numbers would say.

Cheerful Charlie said:

In California, tuition used to be almost free. Reagan disliked Vietnam War protests. Roger Freeman, a Reagan administration operative helped engineer raising tuition, and saddling students with big debts.

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What a country! I mean asshole country.

Loren Pechtel said:

Note that much of the increase in tuition is due to a decrease in government funding. Every year they put a bit more of the load on the students. While educational spending has risen in real dollars it's nowhere near as dramatic as a superficial look at the numbers would say.

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You keep repeating it each time. Private universities increase costs too.
I got my undergrad degree in Russia, And the faculty administration of about 500 students was one room with probably 2-3 secretaries, the head of the faculty and his "lieutenant" (part time) . You almost never see them.
Few more people with full time positions here and there, no more than 10 in total. The rest are part-time professors and teachers. Large number of them, but teaching was part-time for them.

Oleg said:

A “proliferation of administrators”: faculty reflect on two decades of rapid expansion

Yale’s administration has grown rapidly, which some professors say negatively impacts faculty and students.

yaledailynews.com

Over the last two decades, the number of managerial and professional staff that Yale employs has risen three times faster than the undergraduate student body, according to University financial reports. The group’s 44.7 percent expansion since 2003 has had detrimental effects on faculty, students and tuition, according to eight faculty members.

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You would think the massive proliferation of technology over the last couple of decades would reduce the number of managers and administrators needed to run a college, and make it less expensive for students. Yet, the opposite happened. Methinks, there is something rotten in the state of Denmark...

And then we have the very pricey textbook scams.

Cheerful Charlie said:

And then we have the very pricey textbook scams.

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I don't know, isn't that an issue of demand not being too high for those types of books and the expertise required in developing them?

T

Oleg said:

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There are over 60,000 students at OSU so that $1.34 million comes out to about $23 per student - hardly a driven of large tuition. And that does not even address whether those particular jobs are worthwhile.

I am a faculty member at a state university. And I know faculty at many other state universities. All faculty think there are too many administrators and that administrators are overpaid. Maybe they are, but the reality is that compared to the number of students, the increase in their compensation bill does not come close to explaining tuition increase at these places.

There are many drivers of tuition increases. One is a relative lack of public funding for state universities. In most states, public funding as a share of costs (and revenue) has drastically fallen. When I started over 30 years ago, the state funded roughly 55% of our operating expenses (even though there is a statute on the books saying it had to be at least 60%). Now, it is less than a third.
Another is technology. Technology, especially computer technology, is expensive. Moreover, it requires upkeep.
Another are salaries in certain areas. The private sector in the STEM, business and some liberal arts disciplines have bid up the salaries.
Then there are unfunded government mandates.
The last one that comes to my feeble mind is that expectations have changed. The days when students (and their parents) expected the facilities to be only serviceable, and the university was for learning are gone. With the reduction in the number of domestic students and the difficulty for foreign students to come to the US, institutions have to compete more heavily for students. Since quality of the educational experience is difficult to establish and for people to ascertain, institutions also compete on the visual aspects (capital infrastructure, etc....).

Oleg said:

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I love people posting about wasted spending and showing a list of people making $45,000 a year! How out of touch are people today?

And just to put Oleg's AEI propaganda to rest, OSU's annual budget is over $8 billion making that $13 million of grift less than 0.2% of OSU's budget. So again, we see the right-wing propaganda shouting out at windmills.

Jimmy Higgins said:

Cheerful Charlie said:

And then we have the very pricey textbook scams.

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I don't know, isn't that an issue of demand not being too high for those types of books and the expertise required in developing them?

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Partly. However, it is the development of a national used textbook market that really drives up new textbook prices. In the old days, used textbook markets were basically local. Now, they are national with bookstores getting used books from all over the place. This means that publishers need to capture their profits from new book sales which translates in new editions every 3 years or so. New editions cost money to print and market.
Now, along with the book, the costs ancillaries (especially online homework, testing etc...) are included in the price.

Some of it is textbook companies using expensive calendered paper, expensive hard covers, spare no expense on each book. Some Universities have been moving to online textbooks that parts can be printed out on any decent laser printer.

Cheerful Charlie said:

Some of it is textbook companies using expensive calendered paper, expensive hard covers, spare no expense on each book. Some Universities have been moving to online textbooks that parts can be printed out on any decent laser printer.

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Yes. Last year, we took a trip to visit our old alma mater and visited the book store--which sold no books. Oh, a few were located...somewhere. When we inquired we were told that everyone had moved to online books only. I would HATE that.

And it's a shame. I love bookstores and used to browse my university book store to see what was required reading in classes I wanted to take and had not time to take--and bought some extra books that way. Browsing bookstores is itself educational--you can see what might be interesting that you had no idea would be so intriguing by reading course descriptions.

Jimmy Higgins said:

Oleg said:

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I love people posting about wasted spending and showing a list of people making $45,000 a year! How out of touch are people today?

And just to put Oleg's AEI propaganda to rest, OSU's annual budget is over $8 billion making that $13 million of grift less than 0.2% of OSU's budget. So again, we see the right-wing propaganda shouting out at windmills.

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Uh, that $13M may be nothing to you, but if you were a student struggling with tuition you might think differently. Are public universities about the students or the sinecure?

Cheerful Charlie said:

And then we have the very pricey textbook scams.

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This an issue that always annoyed me greatly when doing my degree in the early 90s in Aust. A newer edition of a text book would be released with the only differences seems to be the chapters are re-ordered and a new preface. Yet it is required and a high price. There was nothing wrong with the older edition. The same when my daughter was doing primary, high school, uni in the 00-20s.
I am not surprised it is world wide.

Toni said:

And it's a shame. I love bookstores and used to browse my university book store to see what was required reading in classes I wanted to take and had not time to take--and bought some extra books that way. Browsing bookstores is itself educational--you can see what might be interesting that you had no idea would be so intriguing by reading course descriptions.

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Browsing through book shops is such a pleasant way to pass the time.

“we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployed people.” should probably update that to “we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployable people.”

So many highly trained people in "skills" (liberal arts) that are unemployable with a huge student loan debt seems to be what we are looking at.

TSwizzle said:

“we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployed people.” should probably update that to “we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployable people.”

So many highly trained people in "skills" (liberal arts) that are unemployable with a huge student loan debt seems to be what we are looking at.

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Overproduction of elites. See Turchin.

LOL

TSwizzle said:

“we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployed people.” should probably update that to “we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployable people.”

So many highly trained people in "skills" (liberal arts) that are unemployable with a huge student loan debt seems to be what we are looking at.

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I know that you believe people with degrees in liberal arts are unemployable. Too bad you swallow the anti-education propaganda whole.