Why Is College in America So Expensive? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#71

Post by adventured » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

How come these articles never ask the obvious thing: why did college in America very rapidly become so expensive after being so reasonable for most of the prior century.

And how did that magical cost inflation happen at exactly the same time that healthcare costs skyrocketed and the dollar plunged in value? (while at exactly the same time, all commodities skyrocketed and all foreign GDPs skyrocketed).

That's the result of debased standards of living through destroying a nation's currency in the process of funding economic stupidity (massive budget deficits), war, etc.

It's not just that college got so expensive. It's that the standard of living dropped, amplifying an already elevated cost inflation. That's represented in the permanent price increases you see in all commodities for one example (which are priced in dollars). Gold isn't going back to $300; oil isn't going back to $13. Wages didn't keep up with the rate at which the clowns in DC destroyed the American standard of living. Some things are held in check by market forces, you can only inflate the cost of video games so much in a market system, or you rapidly lose buyers. College was able to skirt that market restraint courtesy of the government's student loan backing, which pretended the US standard of living had just kept right on climbing.

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#72

Post by dnissley » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

IronWolve wrote: post #4

Many western states got together to provide a cheaper alternative to state schools. Western Governors University is about 6k a year and is online and accredited. Its also used for teachers to get their advanced degrees while working full-time jobs. You can also go as fast or slow as you can/want. You could, in theory, do it in 3 years, so 18k TOTAL, that's pretty affordable. No idea if there is an option for eastern…

I'm currently in their CS program that just opened up in June. I've been a software engineer for about a decade and so have picked up a pretty decent CS background just through osmosis. Here's the response I gave to a young person who wanted to know if they should go to a community college or WGU:

Honestly if I didn't already know like 3/4 the stuff for almost every class I've taken so far I would probably hate this program because the materials and curriculum within each class aren't great. There are lots of errors and sloppiness all around, even on many of the exams. I can imagine trying to learn this all from scratch would be a crapshoot and take a really long time and be really frustrating.

That said, if you're motivated it could be worth the time savings just to get out there and start working. You'll learn far more on the job than you would in the classroom anyway, and for me at least I definitely didn't appreciate the more abstract knowledge I came into contact with before I started working. But after a few years I had an actual application for it, and started to re-examine it in my own time. And it was a lot more interesting and actually held my attention at that point.

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#73

Post by dboreham » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #54

> Ultimately, college is expensive in the U.S. for the same reason MRIs are expensive: There is no central mechanism to control price increases. “Universities extract money from students because they can,” says Schleicher at the OECD. “It’s the inevitable outcome of an unregulated fee structure.” That assertion makes no sense. In a market economy, almost all prices are unregulated. Yet the prices of TVs, hamburgers,…

Well :

>no central mechanism to control price increases

Which would be "competition" or "regulation", right?

It seems to me that the underlying problem is a principal-agent one (same as in healthcare): my son may want to go to Harvard or Princeton, but I get to foot the bill. If I point out that in-state public university would be much cheaper and nearly as good an education at undergrad level, I get to become Least Popular Dad...

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#74

Post by sli » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

Domenic_S wrote: post #3

I didn't see this discussed in the article, but IMO the main driver is the availability of student loans. When the government guarantees loans, you can lend whatever you want! The price of a TRIPLE occupancy dorm + 7 day meal access is $14,813.29/YEAR at UC Davis. The "meals", if they haven't changed in the last decade, are Sodexo garbage. And don't forget a "year" doesn't count the summer, or winter break.

I live in a small city (~106k people) and the nearest university has quadruple occupancy dorms, with no kitchens, that cost $1200/mo. Apartments in this city are still (barely) under $1000/mo, except the university is in about as remote of a location as you can get in this city. An expensive Sodexo meal plan is required by the school if you live in the dorms.

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#75

Post by Alupis » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

pwthornton wrote: post #58

Alupis wrote: post #9

> Americans spend about $30,000 per student a year—nearly twice as much as the average developed country. This narrative needs to die. Hear me out before judging... Yes, University is expensive! But - a large portion of the numbers you see thrown around include living expenses! The same living expenses a student would incur if they were not attending University. The predominant reason for this is students are still t…

The market is not looking to hire a bunch more unskilled 18 year olds. If the U.S. military wasn't essentially a workforce development program for unskilled 18-year-olds, we would have an even bigger glut. Your argument is flawed. This may be true for master's degrees, where it makes sense to work full time and take courses part time, but the idea that it makes sense for a bunch of 18-year-olds to try to compete over…

Working professional doesn't necessarily mean bachelor-degree professionals.

There are plenty of places that hire students full-time, for interships or full positions. Students can even get unskilled jobs - nothing wrong with that.

Working at McDonald's, possibly working you way up to shift leader, team leader or manager is perfectly acceptable.

Just so that you work full-time.

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#76

Post by Alupis » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 8:00 PM UTC

vkou wrote: post #46

Alupis wrote: post #9

> Americans spend about $30,000 per student a year—nearly twice as much as the average developed country. This narrative needs to die. Hear me out before judging... Yes, University is expensive! But - a large portion of the numbers you see thrown around include living expenses! The same living expenses a student would incur if they were not attending University. The predominant reason for this is students are still t…

> Yes, University is expensive! But - a large portion of the numbers you see thrown around include living expenses! The same living expenses a student would incur if they were not attending University. Nearly all American universities require their students to live in dorms for the first X years of their undergrad. You can be exempted from this requirement if you are dirt-poor, or are married. [1] If you are a middle…

This isn't true for all Universities - and for those where it's still an outdated requirement, we should push to change this. Student housing is a rip-off.

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#77

Post by prostoalex » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 8:00 PM UTC

ergothus wrote: post #21

Most of the other points in comments here are valid (or potentially so), but one thing I've not seen mentioned is the decrease in govt funding of public colleges and university. When I attended college 20 years ago (Penn State)I remember seeing graphs showing how decreased state funding matched tuition hikes pretty well. A quick google search turned up https://budgetandpolicy.org/schmudget/cuts-to-higher-educati... w…

Spreading the costs among multiple wallets (tuition fees, state funding, private donations, endowments, borrowing) does not mean the costs themselves have decreased.

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#78

Post by l9k » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 8:01 PM UTC

grandinj wrote: post #29

That's not a very useful article. They touch on some possibilities, but never peel the data enough to come to useful conclusions. They also jump between different kinds of costs - cost to the student, and cost to the country. Which is a pity, because normally the Atlantic does better.

Points I found lacking:

- Comparing cost of education between countries not adapted to overall cost of living

- Importance of college sports in the US vs youth sports in club academies in Europe

- Research conducted inside the university in the US vs external or independent institutes in other countries like France

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#79

Post by kfoley » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 8:02 PM UTC

armenarmen wrote: post #55

Domenic_S wrote: post #3

I didn't see this discussed in the article, but IMO the main driver is the availability of student loans. When the government guarantees loans, you can lend whatever you want! The price of a TRIPLE occupancy dorm + 7 day meal access is $14,813.29/YEAR at UC Davis. The "meals", if they haven't changed in the last decade, are Sodexo garbage. And don't forget a "year" doesn't count the summer, or winter break.

Exactly. Access to cheap debt will always drive up prices. Lower the interest rates for anything (houses pre recession) and prices skyrocket.

It's not even necessarily cheap debt. A lot of my undergraduate loans were at rates of 6.8% which I consider somewhat high.

The problem is it's easily accessible debt to people who have no concept of what tens of thousands of dollars is really worth. You see the amount you're borrowing on the form and it's really nothing more than a number.

Re: Why Is College in America So Expensive?

#80

Post by squozzer » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 8:03 PM UTC

Domenic_S wrote: post #3

I didn't see this discussed in the article, but IMO the main driver is the availability of student loans. When the government guarantees loans, you can lend whatever you want! The price of a TRIPLE occupancy dorm + 7 day meal access is $14,813.29/YEAR at UC Davis. The "meals", if they haven't changed in the last decade, are Sodexo garbage. And don't forget a "year" doesn't count the summer, or winter break.

Essentially, the loans act as subsidies for colleges. For the student, it's a different story.

And as with medical care, the response to price increases has been to shovel more money.

>Ultimately, college is expensive in the U.S. for the same reason MRIs are expensive: There is no central mechanism to control price increases. “Universities extract money from students because they can,”

Let me rephrase - There is no mechanism of any kind to control price increases.