<p>Boarding Schools spend 70-80K/Student. Good Public Schools spend 14K/Student. Are boarding schools 5 times better than good public schools? I think this is the only industry where the anxious customers seem to pay hyperinflated price and feel good about it.</p>
<p>The BS customers feel they are getting good value because they are getting an exceptional quality product for a SUBSIDIZED price: the schools pays 70-80k/student, but the parents pay only 40-50k. 30%-40% of the parents pay even less.</p>
<p>The designer handbag & luxury watch industry, by comparison, sell a product at a price inflated thousands of times the materials/production cost. </p>
<p>Not every one lives near a good public school, particularly a good magnet school that draws kids of high academic achievement and motivation. If you are lucky enough to have access to one, then by all means embrace the opportunity and consider yourself lucky. The nearest public school to us is 7000 miles away.</p>
<p>Sometimes people don’t think when they post. Even at 40-50K not counting other expenses, that is still 4 times the good PS cost. People go to BS because of bad PS, baloney. These schools are populated with at least 65% rich people who live in affluent neighborhoods with great pubic schools. Would they send their kids those excellent public schools, noo. Poor, middle class people who can barely afford those schools also rush there like bears rushing for honey. What is this allure? If your nearest public school is 7000 miles away, you must live on a different planet, jk. What is the distance got to do with BS costs?</p>
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<p>I whole-heartedly agree</p>
<p>@GMT - LOL!</p>
<p>SEW also does not take into account that public schools do not provide room and board for their students.</p>
<p>And Poor, middle class people??? Um…</p>
<p>SEW is a ■■■■■, imo. With a big chip on his or her shoulder about BS. Why bother participating in informational/support boards if all one does is… ■■■■■?</p>
<p>Time to stop responding I think–somewhere far, far away, I hear a young teen giggling about the rise she’s getting from all the Moms with her posts.</p>
<p>'struth, classical. We are caught. Somehow, I think of her as a boy ■■■■■, though. Now I’ll have to add curls to my mental image ;-)</p>
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<p>I’ve explained before that not everyone lives near a good public school, particularly a good magnet school that draws kids of high academic achievement and motivation. And even those that do live nearby, can’t automatically get their kids in (think Stuyvesant & Bronx Science) because the number of available spaces exceed demand. So many of those families will look further afield and consider BS. </p>
<p>In a free market economy, the supplier (BS’s) will set the price of their product at what the market (the willing parents) will bear.</p>
<p>Free markets won’t stop anxious parents from getting fleeced and taken for a ride! Novel discovery in Economics! :D</p>
<p>Yes, sadly some parents do get fleeced:
[Chinese</a> Students Lose as U.S. Schools Exploit Need - Bloomberg](<a href=“Bloomberg - Are you a robot?”>Bloomberg - Are you a robot?)</p>
<p>caveat emptor…</p>
<p>Wow. You know I was thinking the same thing about that boarding school that students were asking about - the new one that goes to a difference country every few months and costs over $100K. People kept defending it and I kept saying, too new, to sketchy on details to trust putting your kids there. Guess if you want to give your money to a stranger, many will step up and take it. :(</p>
<p>I came across the Bloomberg article some time ago. I also found the response of The Association of Boarding Schools: [TABS</a> News - The Association of Boarding Schools (TABS)](<a href=“TABS | The Association of Boarding Schools”>TABS | The Association of Boarding Schools).</p>
<p>@Exie,</p>
<p>With the perspective of having dragged ourselves through many countries and different international schools over many years, I think the concept of kids rotating to a different country and different school every trimester is nuts.</p>
<p>:) Me too, @Gmtplus7. Mine was in a single country last year and it was hectic enough trying to learn the language, culture and still keep up with homework. That kid has more stamina than I do!</p>