Why are college tuition costs soaring?
 

This is an interesting take on the huge rise in college tuition costs:

Tuition Soars Due To Knowledge Shortfall

Every sentient, literate adult knows that the current spike in gas prices is 90 percent due to forces completely beyond the control of Congress, the White House or even "Big Oil" itself. The laws of supply and demand determine gas prices the same way those laws determine the price of eggs, acid-washed blue jeans and Kanye West downloads.

What determines the price of college tuition? It certainly isn't the quality of the product — as copiously demonstrated in David Horowitz's new book, "The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America."

The two big topics on CNN last week were (1) high gas prices and (2) the high cost of college tuition. (Also a story about an angry Hispanic lacrosse player who vanished from a cruise ship during Bush's low poll numbers.)

CNN reports that college tuition has risen an astonishing 40 percent since 2000. But the proposed solutions to the exact same problem — high prices for gasoline and tuition, respectively — were diametrically opposed.

The only solution to high gas prices considered on CNN was to pay oil company executives less, perhaps by order of the president. But somehow, no one ever suggested that the solution to the high price of college — far outpacing inflation — was to pay professors less. In that case, the solution is for the government to subsidize college professors' salaries even more than it already does.

Based on CNN's special coverage of high gas prices, the unfolding crisis in college tuition ought to be reported like this:

Coming up, soaring prices at the colleges. Who's to blame? How can you keep your child in college and cash in your wallet? And Harvard outrage, big education makes big bucks, but we pay the price. So should President Bush limit prices? ...

To our top story now. It seems like a summer ritual. Rising professors' salaries mean rising tuition prices. But this year, sticker shock at the tuition window is fueling more concern than ever. And it has many people asking where is it going to end?

JAMIE COURT, CONSUMER RIGHTS ADVOCATE: Every time you see the price of tuition go up, you can hear "ka-ching, ka-ching" in the bank accounts of the college professors.

That's how oil company profits are reported. Why not subsidize the oil companies, which provide a product essential to allowing 300 million Americans to live, and put a cap on the price of college, which seems designed to turn out more liberal parasites on the productive?

As economist Richard Vedder of Ohio University has demonstrated, every time the government subsidizes college tuition through tuition tax credits, college tuition rises by the precise amount of the tuition tax credit.

How about investigating the "shameful display of greed" by college professors?

Liberals think hardworking taxpayers who can't afford gas should pay more in taxes because it is vitally important that young people be taught that America is the worst country on Earth and that the American bond traders who were murdered on 9/11 deserved it.

Maybe with a little less subsidized tuition, colleges couldn't afford luxuries like non-Indian of Indian studies professor Ward Churchill. He makes $120,000 a year as a department head at the University of Colorado, in addition to many speaking fees paid to him by other institutions of higher learning — all heavily subsidized by taxpayers.

In addition to providing a vital product, former Exxon CEO Lee Raymond has a Ph.D. in chemical engineering.

Churchill doesn't have a Ph.D., not even one of those phony ones you have to buy on the Internet before you can host your own show on Air America Radio. He does not produce a product that allows New Yorkers to eat without turning 90 percent of the city into an agricultural processing plant.

His list of academic achievements consists of his majoring in communications and graphic arts. That's the only part of his resume that has not already been proved false, probably because no one would make that up.

Churchill's written oeuvre consists of rants about how the Americans who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11 deserved it: "Well, really. Let's get a grip here, shall we? True enough, they were civilians of a sort. But innocent? Gimme a break. ... If there was a better, more effective, or in fact any other way of visiting some penalty befitting their participation upon the little Eichmanns inhabiting the sterile sanctuary of the twin towers, I'd really be interested in hearing about it."

And thus, Churchill joined the ranks of Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Faulkner and other great writers who use the phrase, "Gimme a break." Perhaps he expresses himself better in "graphic arts."

American taxpayers subsidize the most cretinous, idiotic, hate-filled lunatics in the universe — and liberals are demanding that we direct our hate toward people like Lee Raymond who allow us to go to the bathroom indoors.

How about Congress having weekly hearings on the price of college and the salaries of professors like Churchill? Horowitz has already provided the witness list for the first two years.
By: Ann Coulter

Well, that goes to show anyone who sucks off an editor well enough can get their drivel published. :rolleyes:

Coulter is so misinformed, pejorative and prejudgmental, she's laughable.

1) Tuition is based as much, if not more, on infrastructure of the university and its departments, than the professors' salaries.

2) Obviously she has it out for one professor in particular, weakening her argument by citing his political stance, not the quality or lack thereof of the lessons he provides.

3) The day congress debates professors' salaries, is the same day they should debate taxing religion.

4) Is she suggesting big oil CEOs hold more value to America than professors? Her contrast between a guy who's just left his post with a $168 million dollar retirement package to a professor who makes $120,000 yearly, is just plain bizarre. Who the hell is overpaid on that front?

5) Any half-wit will realize the real cost to America with the rise in tuition is that less people can afford higher learning, resulting in less with advanced knowledge, and finally, a less informed (i.e. dumber) nation.

6) As is, the article needs a re-write - it reads very poorly IMO.

:p

Even so, Coulter's still kinda cute in that crystal-meth-double-wide trailer trash sort of way. :D

I don't even bother to read Fints publications...but DD we don't need our educational system to be a DUMBER Nation all U have to do for that is watch TV....

One of the larger reasons for the failure of our Education system is the Bureaucracy that is imposed...that is where the money is being sucked off into. Administration costs...everything has to be done in triplicate and have U checked the price of paper lately?

The piece fint posted is the most incoherent thing I have read in a long time. I read it twice trying to figure out what her logic was, then gave up.

A department head in many companies would make well over $120k/yr. even in the gov't, they pay that much, and gov't pay is below that of the private sector. Coulter has no idea how the real world works. :rolleyes:

The only good part of that piece is the tidbit that tuition has increased 40% since 2000. It's an absolute joke, and they continue to climb. No one bothers to question it though, they just let it increase. Before long, college will have priced itself out of the price range of the average American.

Gee it is funny that you guys complain about everything but the real point of the article....the difference in how the similar problems are addressed. If gas prices go up due to effective management and supply and demand...clearly people are paid too much
If tuition goes up...and their product/efficiency goes down...clearly people are paid too little.
Defending a profesor's $120k a year salary who only has his position (Indian studies) because he apparently misrepresented himself as a native american...is just a ridiculous as defending a better paid, but effective manager at an oil company...or whatever.

I thought the first half of the article was spot-on. The second half is lacking.

I think her premise that congress and the press propose two very different solutions for the same problem with similar consequences is very telling. Both education and oil are absolutely vital to the health of the country. The price of each is increasing at unsustainable rates. So why is the solution to one to tax and create artificial price controls, while the solution to the other is to subsidize and let the price fall where it may?

Where does the 40% in 6 years come from? USC's tuition hasn't gone up that amount afaik. That figure is probably public institutions that are now having to deal with *less* subvention from the states.

And as usual, Coulter takes an exception and tries to hold it out as the rule. I didn't make $120K as a professor (not even close), and I *have* a ph.d. from Caltech.

The article at first is in my opinion quite good, showing something rather obvious. It did miss one more area, but I'm not complaining.

The latter part is not as important, articles should have the most important first, then the write pretty much just took up space. Not bad, but could of been better.

There is a mindset today, that everyone needs to go to colledge, with an almost 100% demand by anyone that cna afford it, and often those that can't - the suppliers can put the price to the point it realy hurts, and still get bussiness.

here's the deal...i've spent most of my adult life in academia, as student, researcher, faculty, and administrator. This is an area I know. Is it messed up? Yes. Seriously messed up. I've written multiple internal missives on this subject. American higher education is at a crossroads. In the next twenty years a lot of colleges are going to go out of business. With the advent of digital technologies and alternative models, traditional learning institutions have to seriously evolve or they will become irrelevant. But Coulter's rant doesn't help because she misses the point, and instead focuses on an exception that will outrage people for all the wrong reasons.

Is there deadwood in universities? Yup...one of the reasons I left a tenure-track position at Claremont. Are faculty over-paid? Maybe some, but compared to other salaries in the "real world", not even close.

Now here's a question for you. At a large school like Stanford, Berkeley, and even Univ of Colorado, what is the *primary* (and by far most important) duty of a faculty member?

You think tuition is bad? Have you seen the cost of college textbooks??

And the textbook people (publishers, authors, etc...) put out a new edition every couple of years with few changes and a juggling of the problems or questions in the book. They do this for no other reason than to sell more books. In my calc class for instance. Starting last Aug we used the 8th edition of the calc book. The difference in the 8th and 7th editions is that they moved one chapter from chapt 8 to chapt 5 and they shuffled the problems in each chapter. If you want to do the assigned homework you had to buy the new book.

For exactly the same book in India, the UK, or Asia the price is usually 33-66% cheaper. I think I need to write textbooks.

why do right wing conservatives feel the need to lambast any liberal (Professor) who makes money but praise Conservatives (Exxon CEO) for the same thing. They will never be happy until they have all the money in the world and can tell the lowley serf, especially me a GRAPHIC ARTIST what to do.

Why have Goverment involvent in college wages and not energy prices. I feel dumber for reading her drivil.

Last time I looked 38 Million was a hell of a lot more than 120K. Yeah right greedy teachers should be shot and humble ceo's should be honored.

Writing textbooks isn't going to make you a ton of money. I know plenty of textbook authors, and was approached by a couple of publishing houses to write an organic text. I said, "sure, it's going to be digital first, the print version will be an afterthought, and it has to be available online" (this was in '98). They didn't like that idea. The last book I contributed to will be self-published online and freely available. Another one cost $300...hell, I'm an author and I don't even have a copy.

The publishing industry is part of the problem in academia...and is going to similarly collapse unless they change. We're working on it with some new software tools, and I have a grant to look at viral "open" education materials, but this area is changing crazy fast.

This is NOT a simple, clear cut problem or solution. To distill it down to one thing like Coulter (and some others) do serves no real purpose other than to inflame and illustrates their lack of understanding.

I actually had a couple of college professors that empathized with the students' plight over textbook rip-offs so much they simply published the problems & assignments on the school intranet. No books required for those courses - excellent stuff.

http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html

http://cnx.org/

http://cosl.usu.edu/

http://www.iskme.org/index.html

So what does a year a Bob Jones University cost nowdays?

No one else seemed to notice your question so I'll take a stab at it:

Secure grant funding.

What do I win?



Personally I view any professor not teaching hard sciences as dead weight anyway. While I have to admit the most enjoyable class I ever took was "Indian Buddhism", I probably got a lot more out of "Probability and Random Signals".

How about public school "tuition"? Has anyone checked per-pupil spending in the past 5 years? Where has all that money gone? Where does it come from? How has seen their property taxes go up?

Why does a College Education have to be attainable for all Americans? NOt everybody is College material....