Interesting stuff, but it needs to be unbundled a bit.
Just for clarity, and to avoid confusion -it helps to call this listed “cost” as the expenditures by the institution. The IPEDS data, which this referenced web source is built from lists 7 different bins of average expenditures per student at each institution. You can look this up annually in the “Finances” listing for any college. Some times institutions vary in how they do the defining or accounting for the different bins (so things can vary across institutions in this way). For a family looking at a college or university, 2 or 3 of these expenditure bins are fairly straightforward. This referenced website appears looking a 4(?) of those expenditure bins: (a) instructional; (b) academic support; © student services; and (d) institutional support. Note that (a) and (b) are the the two most directly related to educating, and what families may be most interested in.The further point to be recognized is that these “costs” listed (or, again, expenditures) by the school wouldn’t typically be covering R&B, but © and (d) can sometimes bleed into that at different institutions. [For the vast majority of families, you’ll just be covering this part, it won’t be discounted or subsidized - at least not at the institutions I’ve worked at.]
Also,I would take this one step further and move away from posted prices (about tuition) and look at your net prices (for each individual family or on average at the institution).
I have often thought that this calculation - the ratio of the average expenditures per student by a college or university divided by actual net price a family pays - is not well understood by many people, and should be what a key variable that is focused on.
To do that, I would argue that first a family should look at all the accepts or options for their DC, and then ask what is the feasible set that we can actually afford on our budget once we know our “net price” at each. And THEN you have to ask what expenditures per student you can expect to get relative to what you are paying. You are hoping these are positive - and you’ll be surprised how this can vary. So, what you then want to do is split out and focus on the TUITION & FEES part of your net price, and compare this to what the school spends per student on (a) instructional; (b) academic support.
Yes, at some schools you may have a net price on TUITION & FEES that ranges from $6K to $45K across schools, but what are you getting for this in terms of (a) instructional expenditures per capita; (b) academic support per capita.
Yes, there are complications, but less so if done this way. And again, fairly straightforward to look this up in IPEDS.
My two cents…