Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you have data to support this claim? The data I have shows that expenditures have gone up, but no where near what the nameplate tuition has or what detractors claim: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d22/tables/dt22_334.10.a... College Board data shows that Tuition and Fees net of financial aid has fallen by significant amounts over the past 20 years (see page 18). Room and board has gone up, but that is broadly…
My comment was on the price of higher ed, not its cost, which is what your ed.gov source shows. CPI component calculations done by the BLS shows "College tuition and fees", including adjustments for scholarships and grants, had a 63% increase from 2009 (to match the CB data baseline) to now, which outpaces overall inflation of 56% over the same timeframe. I'm not sure what methodology CB uses to show falling inflatio…
That's true, but as non-profits, the revenues and expenditures of higher ed have to balance; they can't take out surplus revenue as profit.
I think we largely agree overall, the CPI numbers are close enough that I wouldn't dispute them; they align with my argument that the rhetoric and public discussion of massive tuition increases is not supported by the data when using actual tuition paid rather than nameplate/MSRP prices.
> In many places the local university is the largest landowner in town, and is tax-exempt to boot. They might hold some of the blame in those costs.
This is probably true, and campuses could run housing at less-than-market rates. Whether that would be a better model than just giving students more financial aid that then gets paid back to the University as rent is something we'd have to model. Either way, my point is that we've seen a significant increase in the cost of rent across the entire country in the post-COVID era. That makes the Cost of College seem higher, but is something that Universities are subject to as much as a cause of.