Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
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Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#2People give these elite colleges and universities a hard time, but I think it is mostly sensational stories with no meat. Do you know how many US schools are need blind and meet full need for all students? 6. [1]
I also have no clue where the story about these schools being for rich kids came from. When my wife went to Princeton a few years back it was one of the cheapest options for her! Schools all base need on the same FASA form, but then these "expensive elite schools" will do things like cover the student portion of the aid with a grant instead of loans [2]. This makes their financial aid package much better than at most schools.
Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#3People give these elite colleges and universities a hard time, but I think it is mostly sensational stories with no meat. Do you know how many US schools are need blind and meet full need for all students? 6. [1] I also have no clue where the story about these schools being for rich kids came from. When my wife went to Princeton a few years back it was one of the cheapest options for her! Schools all base need on the…
I was in the same boat. It was MUCH cheaper (> $20K/yr cheaper) for me to go to an Ivy school than it was for me to go to any of my other options (including an in-state school that people considered to be the 'cheap' option).
Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#4People give these elite colleges and universities a hard time, but I think it is mostly sensational stories with no meat. Do you know how many US schools are need blind and meet full need for all students? 6. [1] I also have no clue where the story about these schools being for rich kids came from. When my wife went to Princeton a few years back it was one of the cheapest options for her! Schools all base need on the…
What would "meat" look like to you?
Suppose you were to start "a hedge fund with a university attached to it", in order to use the university's non-profit status to minimize paying taxes. What would that look like? Would you set up need blind admission, in order to provide better cover to justify the hedge fund?
The article points out that the non-profit status means that "Princeton received $105,000 in tax benefits per student. Rutgers, New Jersey’s flagship public university, got just $12,300 per student in public funding." and "Among the 60 schools Schneider and Klor de Alva analyzed, private universities with large endowments averaged $41,000 in tax subsidies, compared with $15,300 in direct funding for public flagships, $6,700 for regional state colleges, and $5,100 for community colleges."
Perhaps the extra $90K/year effective subsidy per Princeton student explains why Princeton was one of the cheapest options?
Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#5It is disturbing that the author so lightly morphs a tax exemption into a taxpayer subsidy. As if the natural state of things is for the government to tax everything and whatever it doesn't is being subsidized.
Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#6It is disturbing that the author so lightly morphs a tax exemption into a taxpayer subsidy. As if the natural state of things is for the government to tax everything and whatever it doesn't is being subsidized.
What's the difference between giving you $X that other people don't get, and asking you to pay $X less in taxes that other people have to pay?
Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#7People give these elite colleges and universities a hard time, but I think it is mostly sensational stories with no meat. Do you know how many US schools are need blind and meet full need for all students? 6. [1] I also have no clue where the story about these schools being for rich kids came from. When my wife went to Princeton a few years back it was one of the cheapest options for her! Schools all base need on the…
What would "meat" look like to you? Suppose you were to start "a hedge fund with a university attached to it", in order to use the university's non-profit status to minimize paying taxes. What would that look like? Would you set up need blind admission, in order to provide better cover to justify the hedge fund? The article points out that the non-profit status means that "Princeton received $105,000 in tax benefits…
I'm not sure what your point is. Let's say the above were true, a non profit organization uses its tax subsidies to let students attend for free - how is that not a good thing? And how is that not something that should be encouraged?
Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#8People give these elite colleges and universities a hard time, but I think it is mostly sensational stories with no meat. Do you know how many US schools are need blind and meet full need for all students? 6. [1] I also have no clue where the story about these schools being for rich kids came from. When my wife went to Princeton a few years back it was one of the cheapest options for her! Schools all base need on the…
Harvard waives fees altogether for families making less than $65,000. More than 60% of US households have income less than that+, yet only 20% of Harvard's undergraduate class pays no fees. From this we reasonably say that Harvard is mostly a school for rich kids, despite its generosity to those non-rich kids it lets in. In this way it is similar to elite private high schools in NYC or boarding schools in New England (both of which still send many students).
+This in not quite the correct referent class, as you'd want households with an 18 year old rather than all households. Still I'd be suprised if it was too far off.
Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#9People give these elite colleges and universities a hard time, but I think it is mostly sensational stories with no meat. Do you know how many US schools are need blind and meet full need for all students? 6. [1] I also have no clue where the story about these schools being for rich kids came from. When my wife went to Princeton a few years back it was one of the cheapest options for her! Schools all base need on the…
What would "meat" look like to you? Suppose you were to start "a hedge fund with a university attached to it", in order to use the university's non-profit status to minimize paying taxes. What would that look like? Would you set up need blind admission, in order to provide better cover to justify the hedge fund? The article points out that the non-profit status means that "Princeton received $105,000 in tax benefits…
> Suppose you were to start "a hedge fund with a university attached to it", in order to use the university's non-profit status to minimize paying taxes.
Who is "you"? Certainly not someone who expected to ever extract cash from their hedge fund in order to make it part of their income for that year.
Now you might say the school is a lavish club for students and faculty, but who benefits from that? Not the donors. If they're wealthy, they've got far more efficient spending options to enjoy marble floors and leather sofas.
Re: Is It Time to Tax Harvard’s Endowment?
#10People give these elite colleges and universities a hard time, but I think it is mostly sensational stories with no meat. Do you know how many US schools are need blind and meet full need for all students? 6. [1] I also have no clue where the story about these schools being for rich kids came from. When my wife went to Princeton a few years back it was one of the cheapest options for her! Schools all base need on the…
What would "meat" look like to you? Suppose you were to start "a hedge fund with a university attached to it", in order to use the university's non-profit status to minimize paying taxes. What would that look like? Would you set up need blind admission, in order to provide better cover to justify the hedge fund? The article points out that the non-profit status means that "Princeton received $105,000 in tax benefits…
> Suppose you were to start "a hedge fund with a university attached to it", in order to use the university's non-profit status to minimize paying taxes. What would that look like?
As long as all the funds went towards the chartered goals of the non-profit, it would look like a really good idea for sustainable funding.
I don't see any reasonable basis on which the article's comparison makes sense. They compared the tax not paid by a registered non-profit with tax funds taken from taxpayers and spent on public universities, such that if someone doesn't pay . Apples and oranges. To look at it another way, the private university provides what most people consider a "better" education without receiving any public funds; clearly we need more such institutions if possible.
Apart from that, based on past evidence, collecting such taxes would not replace taxes collected from others to support a tax decrease; rather, it would just increase the total size of the budget.
Looking at tax you wish you could collect but have no legal right to and salivating over it makes as much sense as looking at the contents of someone else's bank account and wishing it was yours.