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Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

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Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#261

Post by seanmcdirmid »

orangecat wrote: post #251
wnc3141 wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've come to realize what we think as progressive places are what I consider "inclusively conservative" as in liberal socially, but very much bound to keeping wealth strata in place. San Francisco + older bay area cities are a prime example of being a bastion of free market capitalism in the guise of progressivism.

San Francisco + older bay area cities are a prime example of being a bastion of free market capitalism in the guise of progressivism. The main reason SF is unaffordable is that the city government forbids people from building housing, which is the exact opposite of a free market.

SF is already one of the most dense cities in the USA. If the government forbids people from building housing, they've historically done a poor job at it. They are the second most dense city in the USA after NYC, and no would accuse NYC of not being unaffordable either.

The real problem is that more people want to live in SF than they have allowed housing to be built for. But it isn't clear that if they went with Houston-style "anything goes", would they still be that desirable? Or only as desirable as less popular Houston?

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#262

Post by zaptheimpaler »

bradchris wrote: post #45
rs999gti wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> UPenn is THE most obvious. Sitting on a $20,000,000,000 endowment fund that went up +170% over 10 years while Philadelphia rots with drug use, poverty, and gun violence. Why is it UPENN's responsibility to solve these issues? This is Philadelphia's problem, the university is just a business operating in the city.

I think that speaks to the low bar we have come to expect from our endowed institutions today more than anything else. American Universities, historically, are supposed to improve not just their students’ lives but also society as a whole, especially as serving as boosters for the city they’re in and their immediate neighbors. That’s why they’re nonprofits. That’s also likely their strongest lifeline to remain releva…

I doubt they could even if they wanted to. All problems cannot be solved by throwing money at them, and the local governments may not be cooperative or efficient enough to use the money. There are chemically engineered drugs that will gigafry your brain into addiction in one dose getting better every day. Police departments all over the country/west seem to be ineffective at enforcing order, courts are too delayed and too lenient on sentencing, list goes on. Problems on the public side that private enterprise can't really fix without a lot of cooperation. Maybe in a much less regulated world like the Carnegie's, they would be able to try a lot of things without permission, now it would take years of begging to get a permit to build a drug rehab centre somewhere no matter how rich you are and the neighbors would block it.

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#263

Post by testfoobar »

kqr2 wrote: post #181

What about wealthy people with low AGI but lots of assets?

Check out CSS or FAFSA calculators to figure out your expected family contribution. Financial Aid offices at places like MIT that are need blind fill in the gap between your expected contribution and cost of attending with aid.

The answer to your question is it depends. Some assets like your primary home and retirements can be shielded from expected family contribution. If you've got assets sitting in a taxable account....

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#264

Post by [deleted] »

d2049 wrote: post #33

When I was touring colleges as a high school senior I met someone who had gotten into MIT but whose family could only afford to send one kid to an elite college, him or his sister. He decided to go to a state school which was a lot less expensive but whose academics weren't close to the same level. This stuff matters to people.

[deleted]

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#265

Post by kjkjadksj »

kleton wrote: post #227

A sham marriage (get a prenup if you want) is sufficient to have parents' income not counted by FAFSA.

Another way to save money is to rent an apartment and make that your permanent address freshman year than to pay out of state tuition and room and board. I always thought this scheme could never work until I met someone who played it and saved tens of thousands in the process.

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#266

Post by tinyhouse »

TheJoeMan wrote: post #32

This is a great step in the right direction. I can't speak directly for MIT, but there are issues with how these programs don't apply to parents with small family businesses. My parents had a small business, with my father taking home a salary of $XX,XXX. Duke University used the business assets to determine the EFC (expected family contribution) of literally 90% of the salary. Essentially saying to sell off the fami…

This is not a step in the right direction.

Tuition for undergraduate studies should be affordable. Not for a small number of very rich universities that can afford it. But to all universities, as it is in most of the world.

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#267

Post by kjkjadksj »

Spivak wrote: post #48
rs999gti wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> UPenn is THE most obvious. Sitting on a $20,000,000,000 endowment fund that went up +170% over 10 years while Philadelphia rots with drug use, poverty, and gun violence. Why is it UPENN's responsibility to solve these issues? This is Philadelphia's problem, the university is just a business operating in the city.

UPenn is a land-grant institution, they are not "just a business" they were given land and money specifically to serve the public good. They're why we have engineering degrees, the government specifically wanted institutions that taught practical marketable skills and to do research in those fields.

If they are like most other schools with a low income neighborhood nearby, they probably offer an entire k-12 education sequence for these kids ran under their education major’s department. Likewise their hospital probably treats low income people in the community. And of course the school itself is a massive jobs program for low income people in the area as well, who might qualify for reduced or no cost tuition for themselves or their kids.

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#268

Post by bmitc »

blackguardx wrote: post #126
d2049 wrote: post #33

When I was touring colleges as a high school senior I met someone who had gotten into MIT but whose family could only afford to send one kid to an elite college, him or his sister. He decided to go to a state school which was a lot less expensive but whose academics weren't close to the same level. This stuff matters to people.

Most students go into debt to attend college. I fell into a bracket where I didn’t get any financial assistance but my parents didn’t want to/couldn’t pay for tuition. I got personal loans for everything. I think this is a common scenario.

The large majority of MIT undergraduates graduate debt free.

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#269

Post by corimaith »

sunshowers wrote: post #137
nuancebydefault wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are such things in the US so complicated? Where I live, studying is much much cheaper for most professions,for everyone! That's the only fair way. Also, a set of well educated people pays itself back later in the form of mostly income and added value taxes, which provides money to keep studying for cheap for the next generation.

Education in the US isn't cheap but those are elite colleges. The price tag is mostly for the networking.

Funnily enough, if you think about for networking you'd much rather be surrounded by kids who can afford that 200k price tag upfront.

Re: Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT

#270

Post by kjkjadksj »

WorkerBee28474 wrote: post #25
dleink wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Princeton has had a similar rule since 2001. Their current number is $100k. 25% of students pay nothing to attend. [0] [0] https://www.princeton.edu/news/2024/03/29/princeton-trustees... (go tigers)

Approximately 60% of American households earn less than $100K. That's quite a difference in relative size.

The population of people who apply to a nice college, or even college at all, is probably not representative of the average american household
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