I’m sure 10 years later, a decent portion might have retired hence no more income. During that time period, I would fall into that category as an example. 
Why colleges in European countries and Canada are much cheaper? I have just heard that the tuistion of U. Cambridge is only about $15,000, (just attended a local college fair for independent schools and Cambridge rep was there), also considering it is only a three-year education, it might be cheaper to go to London (even with room and board and travel expenses), than to full-pay American privates.
International students have been growing tremendously over the past several years, they all have to pay the full-sticker price, granted they might make the already competitive college-application landscape worse, they do also help some schools financially viable.
“I have just heard that the tuition of U. Cambridge is only about $15,000”.
This is only the case for domestic and EU students, not internationals. The tuition and fees are about 23K pounds (~$33K) and total COA is around $50K for international students. Still cheaper than private full pay here, and you generally save a year too since most courses are 3 years. Other U.K. universities can be a bit less, in the $40K-$45K range, though note that Scottish courses are 4 years.
These universities are cheaper because of relatively large lectures and less support staff for handholding, plus there are none of the luxury facilities (e.g. sports centers and high end catering) available at US schools.
I posted few years ago about families in the donut hole. I think top schools are missing out on those excellent students. I even went as far to say those students who are from the donut hole are probably the most well adjusted people from stable families.
When I was in college, I was able to work and pay for a big chunk of COA. My parents didn’t have to pay much even though we were middle class back then. But today there is no way for a student to make enough money to afford 70k COA.
Availability of education in this country has always been the biggest equalizer - you could move out of your social economics level by getting a good education and then getting a good job. We continue to see that some of most lucrative jobs only recruit from top tier schools. By not able to afford those schools now, some of those young adults are pretty much shut out of those professions.
I think if we are not careful and do all we can to make those schools be affordable for some of those donut hole families we will find more disparity in income in this country. We will have more haves and have nots, and that’s not good for stability of our society because then we would have very angry have not people.
Off my soap box on a Sat morning before my D’s wedding shower.
@oldfort:
“By not able to afford those schools now, some of those young adults are pretty much shut out of those professions.”
Not really. Elite undergrad isn’t the only route in.
“I think if we are not careful and do all we can to make those schools be affordable for some of those donut hole families we will find more disparity in income in this country. We will have more haves and have nots, and that’s not good for stability of our society because then we would have very angry have not people.”
While I have sympathy for doughnut hole families (I’m smack dab in it), doughnut hole folks aren’t exactly among the have-nots.
Not always for college education. It was mainly after WW2 that the expansion of state universities and government programs like the GI Bill and others greatly increased access to college education by those from non-high income/wealth families. During that time period, some of the most prominent private universities like HYP also shifted toward having a higher percentage of their students being admitted for academic strength, rather than mostly as scions on inherited wealth (though remnants of the latter remain in legacy, celebrity, and development admissions). It was also somewhat later that mandated racial segregation in education in many places began to end.
Regarding full pay families- wonder how many pay/can pay solely out of income and how many use combo of income, savings, 529, loans, gifts from grandparents etc.
The so called donut hole is only a factor at the very top colleges in the country. The number of spots that extremely qualified middle class kids are losing out on due to finances, are minuscule compared to the number of such kids. I doubt there are any donut hole families whose children have no access to a decent education at all. Those kids will find a find education at public colleges and a huge range of private colleges across the country that will offer discounts in the form of “merit” aid to attract them. They can easily achieve lucrative careers in countless fields from those schools. They can also gain admission to excellent graduate schools from all of those places.
The few establishments that recruit exclusively from the top few schools represents a tiny sliver of the opportunity available. Again, its so small as to be irrelevant. Donut hole families need to let go of the idea that there are only a few schools worth attending and that somehow they have a right to a spot at those schools at some predetermined price.
@oldfort Thanks for bringing up the donut hole equation.
In addition, if you are a person who favors equal opportunity and access for all regardless of income, than by default you should also support the notion that the middle class/donut hole/family with variable income and all the rest need to have the means to gain access to the best universities. That is without taking on so much debt that is isn’t feasible. The conversation on CC always seems to come around to the best schools. Everyone realizes there are hundreds of good schools but they all want to go to the top 50 ( really top 25) . And many, though not all, think they deserve to go ( if they have done the work to get in).
Right now the equation just doesn’t work. There are tons of middle class kids who make economic decisions to forgo the best school in favor of the most affordable school. While the Pell grant recipients and top income folks have no worries. I was a Pell grant recipient and know well that someone from an underprivileged background is going to win the $ hands down each time. They will clean up and have very little debt if they are a high stat student. That is just not the case for a kid in the donut hole. There is very little merit money out there and that isn’t a good thing.
Yes, there are lots of opportunities from any school. And yet, coming from the best schools is an easier road. Parents know this, kids know this and recruiters know this and that is why everyone is crushed when Plan A ( getting into their top choice) doesn’t work.
Those of you that are saying it is not fair that upper middle class kids can’t afford elites and that everyone should be charged the same are also saying that it is fair that under that system lower economic class kids can’t afford elites.
Can you defend that?
Many people paying full price consider themselves lucky to have to.
If “donut hole” means the lower part of the no-FA income/wealth range (probably top ~3% or $250,000+, above the “Romney middle class”), then note that kids from those families are far better represented at elite private schools than those with Pell grants (probably bottom half or so). No-FA students make up around half of those at the elite private schools, while Pell grant students usually make up one tenth to one fifth. As discussed frequently on these forums, high stats is no guarantee of admission to an elite private school; the high income “donut hole” family kids have substantial advantages in getting admitted to such schools compared to the Pell grant kids.
In terms of merit scholarships for stats alone, students from both high and middle/low income families can seek them, so it is not like the “donut hole” family kids are any worse off in this respect than the Pell grant kids. But it is very likely that the “donut hole” family kids’ parents will be able to contribute college money that gives them far more college choices than the Pell grant kids, who are more likely to have a choice limited to (a) elite private school with good FA (if in the unlikely event they are admitted), (b) full ride merit (automatic ones exist, but are not that common; competitive ones should be seen as reaches), or (c) commuting to a local community college or (probably non-flagship) state university.
The “donut hole” descriptor just doesn’t make sense applied to higher ed FA. Traditionally, it has been used for medicare payments where it does make sense. I really don’t get why many folks on CC are increasingly using the term “donut hole” to describe their situation.
It’s not necessarily the case that pricing has to be the same across the board. The upper middle class complaint can be translated as tippy top privates ought to have the same pricing as (say) UCLA/Berkeley/UVA/UMich do for instate students. Yes there is state funding that helps to keep list prices down (and provides need based aid), but not that much any more and even if it was removed completely the sticker price would be a lot less than $70K per year.
But when it comes down to it many people also love to complain about the compromises that entails, like huge class sizes and difficulties getting the classes you want. You can’t have it both ways. And those who do attend the tippy top privates (whether rich or poor) don’t want their school to make those compromises either. But Berkeley and UCLA are doing a better job educating poor kids than tippy top privates, if you measure it in terms of % of Pell grant recipients etc.
Having said that, at our school most of the smartest kids from full pay but not ultra wealthy families are choosing Berkeley, UCLA, UCSD and UCSB over private options because the price/value equation works for them. We are fortunate to be in a state with great schools. It’s far worse for people who aren’t.
Those few very few establishments are also the ones that are paying those select fews top 1% salaries. In order to pay the top 1% salaries they are also taking from the bottom 99%. They may be small in # to be irrelevant, but not so small when it comes to actual $$ amount.
@oldfort, all I can say is that you don’t seem to know what you don’t know.
Of the top 1% who didn’t inherit their wealth, a big chunk are small business owners from all sorts of educational backgrounds. Another big chunk are doctors/lawyers and attending an elite undergraduate institution certainly isn’t required to become a doctor or to go to a top law school. Then you have CEO’s/upper management of big companies, and while some have elite undergrad pedigrees, many do not.
Here is a breakdown:
https://www.economist.com/node/21543178
Plus there are plenty of Wall Street types making big $ who didn’t attend elite colleges.
Maybe I don’t know what I don’t know. Hmmm. Ok, let’s just continue what we do now. Hope those donut hole people also don’t know what they don’t know. Ignorance is always a bless.
Pell Grant students have no worries? In what state might that be?
You do realize that many low income students also have to forgo acceptances due to finances, right? The difference between them and “donut hole” kids is that most of the low income kids will be attending their local commuter school while the “donut hole” kids will settle for a ~$30k/year residential college instead of the $60k one they really want. The number of Pell students who have tippy top stats and who get admitted to a meets need school is a small percentage of the total number of Pell students. Many low income students with great stats get accepted to residential colleges that don’t have the means to make it affordable for them. I’d sooner live in the “donut hole.”
I don’t really understand why there’s a separate term for middle/upper income families who want something that’s more expensive than they can afford. How is that different from all the lower income kids who want to attend a residential college or dream of going OOS and have the stats to get in, but not the money to pay? If you’re too poor to pay, you’re too poor to pay.
Research has found that for families earning less than $30,000, the share of TOTAL family income required to pay the total cost of college attendance was 77 percent at 4-year public universities and 50 percent at public community colleges!! This is more than twice the burden on any other income group.
Pell grants, as I posted earlier, pay 30% of a public 4-year university’s cost, on average, compared to 70% in the 70s, both because of higher college costs and because the size of the grants has not kept up with inflation. And the vast majority of these student are NOT getting need-based aid beyond their Pell grant because so very few go to colleges that can meet that need. Students work and borrow to pay the balance.
So no, Pell recipients do NOT have it made, and in fact many public universities and community colleges are opening FOOD PANTRIES b/c their students are barely scraping by and in fact skipping meals so they can buy textbooks.
My family too is in the ‘donut hole’ but by no means should anyone compare families like mine to the immense struggles that the vast majority of students from low-income families face as they try to get any kind of degree. A few high stat kids from these families can get 100% of need met, but they are a mere teeny tiny sliver of that population.
The $630K number is 1% of all earners, but it should be a much higher percentage of people in their peak earning years, who just happen to overlap quite a bit with parents whose kids are going to college. If this simply changes the percentile from 99th to 98th, and if your fertility rate assumption is correct, then that would be 70K HS grads per year from such families.