Why don't wealthy students protest tuition hikes?

nick_scheu
Sat, 19 Nov 2011 19:01:17 +0000

I wasn’t clear before. I’m not advocating a tuition hike for the middle class, I’m advocating one for the top 15% of UC undergraduates, which represent the top 5% of the general population.

Another part of our disagreement centers on the “sticker price” of a university. Because in-state tuition is $12,000 or so, people seem to think that it only costs $12,000 to provide an education. That’s not the case. The market price for a university education is $40,000 per year.

So when I say that right now the middle class gets at least a 75% discount from the cost of an education, it’s 100% true (well, rounded at least). A year’s tuition costs $40,000, but UC charges $14,000 at most (UCLA charges $12k). Any financial aid (on top of the automatic 75% subsidy) is just gravy.

Now of course middle class students get a discount from the full price of a private university. That’s why I’m only advocating such a drastic hike for the wealthiest students–they’re not only best able to afford it, they’re also the students who pay nearly the full sticker price at a private university.

As an example, I played around with the financial aid calculators for Cal, UCLA, Stanford, and USC. Stanford and USC use a similar estimator, but Cal’s and UCLA’s have fewer options. I kept the comparison as close as I could, but it’s not perfect. Anyway, here’s the total net cost of attendance for a student from a family earning $180k with $40,000 in cash and investments:

CURRENT
Stanford: $48,100
USC: $55,728
Cal: $32,634 (with tuition at $14,460 and room/board at $14,990)
UCLA: $30,156 (with tuition at $12,685 and room/board at $13,980)

PROPOSED (tuition at $20,000)
Cal: $38,174
UCLA: $37,471

So at minimum, UC would cost $10,000 less than a private university for students who, in the absence of a public university, would probably be attending a private. Sounds like a pretty good deal to me (although admittedly not as good as they have it now).