What’s the TERRIBLE history of college costs?

The history of student loans don’t go too far back.

Shocker? Not really.

Costs of higher education were significantly lower than now!

Think about it, when we hear of our grandparents or aunts and uncles bragging about how they’ve paid off their first year of college easily, we question how.

The answer is that students of the past did not struggle to pay for their education as much as students do now.

College tuition was affordable in the past

IF compared to the cost of education now…

According to a survey by TIME,

“college costs included $2,015 for tuition, room and board, and fees for a year at Bates, and $1,450 for Lewis and Clark. (That’s $16,400 and $11,800 today.)” (Rothman, 2016).

“Vassar these days costs $52,320 for a year’s tuition, and Bates is $64,500 for tuition, room and board and fees”

Compare that to “$16,400” and “$11,800” in the 1960’s, that is an extreme change in tuition costs. Due to this, it is completely unreasonable for the cost of college today. Students will continue to struggle in large amounts of loans in the continuing future.

When did it happen though?

“Federal grant aid for needy students seeking to attend public or private institutions had not even kept up with the rate of inflation since the program began in the early 1970’s” (O’Malley, 2002)

”institutions replaced aid that would previously have come from the government with their own internal funds” (O’Malley, 2002)

In the 1980’s, the expenses of college have skyrocketed through the roof because of the carelessness of the government.

“the 1980s, the cost of attending college rose over three times as fast as median family income”

It “increases exceeded the rise in the Consumer Price Index by 8.4 and 4.7 percent” (Boehner et al, 2003).

“From 1978 to 2011, tuition and fees in higher education have on average increased by 7.6% each year, 3.8% higher than the CPI index of all items” (Zou, 2013).

When college prices passed the line of CPI, that is when colleges and the government should’ve taken notice and addressed it in order to lessen the tuition. Yeah, that wasn’t the case. So the prices continued to increase by each year, and then the following year, to a whole decade now. Gathered data from the National Center for Education Statistics shows that the tuition for all institutions in 1985-85 were 10,696, compared to a doubled tuition of 22,432 in 2015-16. 

Costs of college increased to “catch up” with the economy…

So what is the main cause of tuition increase?

“in order to catch up with the increasing salary in the manufacturing world and make performing arts as competitive as the other jobs, society would raise the salary for actors. Such action would lead to increase in the cost of performing service and finally, increase in the price of service products” (Zou, 2013). This is a performing arts school example, that explains the cost of colleges.

Basically, the costs changed in favor of the market. IF consumers are willing to pay to get into a top school, why not raise prices? As for graduate school, it is more expensive because graduates already have the income necessities to pay. If they have the required income, schools won’t have a problem raising the tuition skyrocket high.

In general higher education (undergraduate), majority of college students come from higher income families. They have the advantage to attend schools at a much higher rate than lower income students. This continues to increase the tuition prices too!

The issue is also that admins of institutions are not considering the needs of lower incomes students. They only cater to the majority, rather than the minority. So then what happens? Well – They continue to increase prices to compete with other schools. They want to be the best and top school. 

Colleges will NEVER stop their rise of tuitions because of their desires to top other schools. This is another add-on to the rise of cost of tuition.

Of course, it is understandable that colleges want students to come to their college. They increase the costs to seem more top quality. The problem is that it draws more students away from their colleges, especially lower income students. There are MILLIONS of gifted students who are unseen because of their income housing situation.

These colleges often forget that there is a bigger portion of students who want to attend. But they can’t due to the high prices.

Over more, institutions have not made any action towards helping alleviate the prices at all.

“Ivy league institutions have accepted the same applicants to meet to discuss the financial needs of those applicants” which decreases “the government’s continual efforts to reduce the indirect cost rates associated with sponsored research” (O’Malley, 2002).

If colleges are continuing to do this to their advantage, it is nothing but cruel again our young students of the nation. Loans upon loans will continue to drown out these students, who will eventually keep paying it off into their adult years like any other adult we have in our work industry today. Not only has competition caused the rise of costs, but there are a few reasonable rises to the tuition of college as well, such as the technology and science research necessities in campuses for students researches. However, this does not draw from the fact that admins of institutions lack care for the plans to lessen tuition costs for their students, as discussed. 

Are there solutions?

Through all of the causes I have went over above, there remains much discussion for the possible solutions the nation can do in order to stop this exceeding issue. However, there are some solutions that can be offered from the research I’ve examined.

First, more government assistance and aid could be given to institutions. If the federal aid will catch up to what it needs to for the present tuition costs, prices can definitely lower, especially for those in need of funds.

Secondly, there needs to be “less institutional aid” for students in college. If students are offered 10,000 as institutional aid, it equals to the amount they’re already paying for in college (basically loans!). This is why private colleges are expensive. Because of institutional aid offers, prices go up. If they give less aid, tuition will lower.

The very last solution is to MAKE ADMINISTRATORS, of these high costed institutions, take action. Getting admins to acknowledge the rising issue of student loans (rather than keeping the mindset to compete with other colleges…) will surely PROMPT students go to their colleges compared to colleges that may cost over 50,000 a year.

Of all that has been discussed, from the history of college prices, to the extreme causes, and lastly the solutions, there is still much to be done in order to lessen the cost.

Overall, the government and institutions must come together to help their students in achieving success in education and into the workforce. Loans ARE NOT always the answer to everything. Without the government and the institutions help, even little steps would help. The future of our younger generations depend on this action.