For the record, I’m not American nor live in the US, but I have a 19-year-old son who started attending the University of Chicago this year, studying economics. Just the tuition itself is $70k. My husband and I are lucky enough to be able to afford it - I still believe it’s an outrageous amount of money to attend college.
Because there’s nothing more American than getting ripped off.
Because Reagan defunded public secondary education. And then instead of fixing that in the late 90s/early 00s, they made school loans non expungable and federally guaranteed, so schools didn’t need to keep their process know and competitive anymore.
It always goes back to Reagan…
secondary --> tertiary?
Sure, I guess post-secondary is the term usually used
Jesus Christ, so many people don’t know the real history of what happened while this is the real answer.
To add on to Ronald “Fucking” Reagan defunding universities, he did it because as governor of California he absolutely hated the anti-Vietnam War protests happening on University of California campuses and thought a good way to limit attendance of ‘rabble rousing’ (re: poor) students was to take away their funding. Conservatives nationwide saw this and thought ‘that’s great, we should do that, too.’ and they did.
Thanks Ronnie. You’re the unwanted microwaved dog shit that ruined America 40 years and your stink is still smelled in full force to this day. I didn’t believe in hell, but I hope they made a special one just for you.
Yep, this needs to be higher. Since student loans are guaranteed and pushed on all students, universities have been spending oodles of fucking money to justify higher tuition costs, which justifies bigger loans that can never be discharged. The banks win, the schools win, the student lose both academically and financially.
Public universities could actually have stricter requirements on who could go to college, because if it’s already funded by taxes, you don’t want to be throwing money away on students who will fail out of the degree path they’re trying to pursue.
Finally, two words: “Legacy Admissions”
While true overall, University of Chicago is an elite private school with a hedge fund sized endowment with vast majority of students coming from families who pay 70k with two checks two weeks before each semester starts.
This how they stay elite.
The government also ramped up the interest rates on student loans while universities increased the price faster than inflation, I paid around 3-4% in 2008, the lowest was around 2.7% in 2020, currently they are close to 7%. The whole thing should be covered by state and federal taxes we’re already paying to subsidize them, but it just keeps getting worse to squeeze every drop of blood from people who weren’t born with a trust fund.
This is the real answer I was looking for in the comments.
US universities engage in price discrimination between different students.
For public schools, there is different tuition between in state and out of state students. There are also some state government programs based on merit and financial considerations.
For well endowed private schools, the universities will provide scholarships based on a variety of reasons. For students from rich families, those families are generally paying full price and there generally is the implication of additional donations.
This is the reason. Every public school, like University of Chicago, has non-resident pricing that’s typically two to four times higher than in-state resident tuition. Source: used to work at a state university.
The original idea was probably to encourage people to stay within their state and boost the state economy, but greed from the admins kinda changed the nature of things.
The University of Chicago is private. The University of Illinois Chicago is public. They have the added issue the people definitely use the names interchangeably because they don’t know there’s more than one.
When I worked at the state University, we had lists to check that stuff. Sometimes it’s obvious, other times, not so much. Good catch!
Given that state taxes heavily support higher education, it’s not the craziest idea in the world to give lower tuition to those who’ve been paying those taxes their whole lives.
Because people are still paying it. That’s how you set the price of things. If people are paying 70k why would you sell it cheaper?
If you can charge for something mandatory (minimum requirement for a decent job, house, healthcare) then you can set whatever price you want for it. You just need to push it to the limit of what people can finance to keep paying for over their whole lives.
All the schools rip off the rich to subsidize the middle class. You’re essentially subsidizing a bunch of students who are paying close to nothing.m, because you can afford $70k tuition.
As another example, Harvard is free for anyone whose family makes less than $85k per year. Not just the tuition ($56k per year), but also the housing (worth $13k), food ($8k), health insurance ($1600), books, and a modest living stipend designed to cover things like a computer, commuting/travel, other expenses.
And those who make up to $150k per year are capped at 10% of their income to pay for all that. In the end, the average cost of Harvard for the typical student is about $15,000 per year including housing and food.
In other words, attending Harvard is cheaper than not attending school for anyone whose families make less than $150k, which is basically 75% of the nation. So if you’re actually paying full tuition, you’re probably pretty rich.
Only thing I’ll disagree with is they’re not ripping off the rich, because it doesn’t matter to the rich. They’re killing the middle class though, but that is the way it’s been and the way it will continue to be. You will either be rich (haha, jk) or poor, and that’s the end game.
A lot of folks are overlooking one of the largest factors, unlimited student loans for whatever.
As long as people have access to an ever increasing amount of money to use for tuition, it is in those institutions’ interests to rise their prices to extract as much as possible.
Whereas other countries tend to subsidize their education at source, that is to say, by funding the schools directly which somehwat obviates the price gouging aspect.
side effects of Boomer economic policies and their ignorance regarding the changes they caused
To ensure a large supply of low wage labor.
because america is the land of profit over humans. its just that simple.
its ingrained in the entire country. if some rando at the top isnt profiting, it must be killed. its the problem with healthcare. its the problem with government (congress). its the reason we are entrenched in a 2-party hellscape.
Is that just America though? Are there other countries where profit isn’t king?
I’m pretty confident the French wouldn’t stand for “rule by profit”
I’m afraid I don’t have good news…
I’d put money down to Kickstart a documentary series where we fly American Redditors (and Lemm users) to Europe to film their reaction when they see that, yes, they still need to pay for items with money (and perform labor to get the money! 😱😱)
I mean, I’m aware that France has a capitalist economy. I mostly meant to say that Americans let capitalists step all over them in many ways that the French would riot over
The French aren’t the bastions maintaining rights they seem to be known as. Yes, they’ll throw a tantrum over political changes they don’t like, but late stange capitalism is still pretty bad and the average store is extremely bad for the standard competition that would favour the individual. Any mention of “I can get this cheaper at X.” is known to be followed up with “Cool. Fuck off over there then.” In as many words. Returning a faulty item will see the item getting a rigorous inspection to check that it’s still in pristine condition so it can be put back on the shelf to be sold to the next sucker (this is in the large supermarkets, not just the rare shady mom and pop stores). And electricity bills are double customer usage because the primary electricity supplier is owner by the state so they’re “legally” able to add 3 different taxes and their R&D bill to your bill. The telecoms companies do similar, partaking in that fun practice of adding nothing services to your plan you didn’t ask for and then “making things even” by raising your bill. And don’t get me started on the standard for customer support.
Consumer rights are a joke in France and for all of these death-by-a-thousand-cuts capitalist agenda BS practices, the people of France do nothing.
Gotcha, I didn’t know that. Thanks for all of the information!
not that im aware of.
america was founded on this crazy idea of ‘rugged individualism’. that ‘socialism’ is inherently evil. its every man for themselves, and anyone not rich is so because they arent doing it correctly.
its also the reason why even a class full of dead kindergartners is ok as long as we get to keep our guns.
And if the university of Chicago is that “Chicago school of economics” then this kid is going to come out the other end repesting close to what you said, but as a positive. :(
If we can reason and communicate effectively then we’re much harder to exploit.
Education is priced above the balance of supply and demand because in wider scope it’s more profitable to deny access.
Denial of access to education is a very good way to leave many people with violence as their only practical means of change.
This is a private school so they don’t get much in the way of direct government funding. State-funded schools are considerably cheaper. I went to Wright State University in Ohio. Right now it’s about $13k/yr in tuition. This is still rather expensive on a global scale.
Why do private schools charge that much? Because people (like you) will pay that much. What about the University of Chicago makes it so that you are willing pay for it? What do you or your son hope to get out of it that a school in your home country (I’m assuming Canada) can’t give him? To compare to Wright State, even for out-of-country students the tuition is less than half of Chicago’s tuition. Is the benefit of going to Chicago worth that much more? If it is, then that is exactly what you’re paying for.
Nobody knows. Serious, there are a lot of factors people will point to in here. Some of them are real factors, but every time I dig in I discovered that they do not explain everything. Prices have gone up much faster than inflation for decades even after accounting for government subsidies.
My parents paid for me to attend a private university in the late 80’s, for which I’m both extremely fortunate and grateful.
I wanted to do the same for my children, but there was no way. I pay half, my parents pay half, and my kids have very small loans.
I was experiencing significant disappointment that I wasn’t able to pay for my kids’ education the way my parents paid for mine.
At one point I used an inflation calculator to get an idea of how much my education cost in today’s dollars, and it turns out that when it’s corrected for inflation, I’m paying what my parents paid. My kids’ education is more than twice as expensive as mine was if you correct for inflation.
learning is just a sidehustle to the sports franchise they run?
Idk why you phrased that as a question as if it isn’t pretty obvious
Same reason everything in the US is expensive: we have largely unregulated, runaway capitalism which pervades every facet of life. Everything from housing to academia to health care is for profit – not only profit, but for obscene year-over-year increases in profit. Those at the top regularly make money hand over fist even selling basic necessities, and if they don’t continue taking more and more, they’re seen as failures and replaced by one who will.
The cherry on top is that, for the most parts, the citizens no longer have any real power to change any of it.
Around the same time that health care becomes affordable in the US (major hypothetical, of course), it probably means a wind change has occurred such that university costs would also be coming down. But it would be a systematic change.
