<p>sticker shock well said, and dstark well said. Those 2 posts sum it up for me.</p>
<p>"But how would I feel if I was a full payer who can afford school until the school has raised prices above the inflation rate for so long."</p>
<p>Well, if I knew that 50% or more of the students attending the school have always been full pay, and the their costs have gone DOWN for 25 years in relation to the increase in their family's income and assets, and that as a result an increasing subsidy has gone to those who LEAST require it - and it's cheaper for me than ever before, and that, further, both need-based and merit-based policies have been aimed at attracting just those applicants who can "almost" pay the full-freight, and I knew that the school is less economically diverse than it was 25 years ago, I'd feel like the cat who ate the canary.</p>
<p>Many families get hit with both the high COL & the redistriibution & have been for many years. That was one reason few of us even thought about going to an OOS school when we planned for college. HI has a very high COL and is OOS for nearly everywhere.</p>
<p>"I don't get it either. It feels like a false sense of "entitlement" to me, and I have no idea where the parents got it."</p>
<p>I think mini is talking about the very expensive privates. Historically, these colleges have always been expensive and mostly off-limits, economically, to the middle and lower classes. Nothing new today. Except that FAFSA tries to provide some help. </p>
<p>Maybe COL is not taken into account because, other than taxes, COL is also driven by median home prices. When a family is sitting on a half million or more in equity, it's hard to play the violin.</p>
<p>FAFSA and other need based programs are designed so that a college education is possible. It isn't there to guarantee an Ivy League or private college education.</p>
<p>fafsa does not take home equity into account, but not everyone in high COL areas have 1/2 million+ in equity either.</p>
<p>I think some of the "whiners" percieve an unfairness in the system. Here is a real-life example. </p>
<p>Child "A" and a fellow classmate "B" were both admitted to the same Ivy. They have very similar stats and ECs. Same public high school and neighborhood with attendant opportunities, etc. Both drive similar used cars. Generally, the same lifestyle, other than that "A" lives in a larger home with gainfully employed parents, while classmate "B" lives in a condo with her recently widowed mother, who works a government job for less than $60,000 annually.</p>
<p>A qualifies for no financial aid, so parents will pay approx. $200,000 and incur some impactful lifestyle changes. Classmate B attends for free and her family incurs NO lifestyle changes.</p>
<p>I really don't think the "wealthy" feel an entitlement to an affordable education for their kids, I think they would just feel better if the "pain" of it seemed the same for everyone.</p>
<p>"But how would I feel if I was a full payer who can afford school until the school has raised prices above the inflation rate for so long."</p>
<p>"Well, if I knew that 50% or more of the students attending the school have always been full pay, and the their costs have gone DOWN for 25 years in relation to the increase in their family's income and assets, and that as a result an increasing subsidy has gone to those who LEAST require it, and that, further both need-based and merit-based policies have been aimed at attracting just those applicants who can "almost" pay the full-freight, and I knew that the school is less economically diverse than it was 25 years ago, I'd feel like the cat who ate the canary."</p>
<p>I don't think that is what comes to mind when a person is struggling with his own college costs. :)</p>
<p>Bay, anyone who wants a low EFC, or a zero EFC can certainly get one. The other way around is much more difficult. I very much doubt if Family A if given the window of opportunity to give up their jobs, find ones to get to B's pay, sell the house and give away assets so the financial portfolio is identical to B's to get that zero EFC. By the way, if they did, they would even have a benefit over the B's as the allowance for a couple is more than double that of a single parent by some fluke of the system.</p>
<p>*think they would just feel better if the "pain" of it seemed the same for everyone. </p>
<p>Generally, the same lifestyle, other than that "A" lives in a larger home with gainfully employed parents, while classmate "B" lives in a condo with her recently widowed mother, who works a government job for less than $60,000 annually.*</p>
<p>So one student is living in a large single family home- where both parents are together and employed- sounds pretty nice</p>
<p>The other students father is deceased, not only leaving the family without the financial support- but the emotional support- mother alone and struggling to make ends meet with a low paying job living in a small condo.</p>
<p>Doesn't sound like * similar* lifestyles to me.</p>
<p>One way to consider the EFC and if things are "fair" or not. The government's ultimate role in financial aid is to create more Tax payers than tax takers. </p>
<p>wha? By giving lower income families a break on college costs, these children will have an opportunity to one day repay the system via a higher income than their family had before. The upper middle and high income families will still produce higher income tax producing offspring regardless of funding. So by giving finanical aid during the college years to lower and lower middle class kids the government is actually helping increase the income tax base for the future. </p>
<p>If A and B both end up a xyz school, study the same major and enter the work force, both pay the same taxes. The thing is it is unlikely A's tax base will be that far removed from his family's. B meanwhile, whose family paid much less in taxes, will actually pay more than his family did because he should improve his finanical situation with a degree. </p>
<p>So in theory, Financial aid is given to help increase future tax rolls, not to reward families that are finanically secure now.</p>
<p>Both mine recieve both scholarship and some finanical aide. They both will do better profesionally than their middle class parents. They will make more individually than we do collectively. </p>
<p>They will also pay more in taxes, thus repaying the government for the finanical aid in college over and over. Their kids will probably outside of merit scholarships, will not get a subsidy to attend college. That subsidy will be used by another family to raise their children into a greater revenue producing tax bracket.</p>
<p>Right, Ekity, but it wasn't my impression that FA was supposed to be based on emotional factors, just numbers. Plus, you cannot assume that the mother is "struggling to make ends meet."</p>
<p>Dstark, have you ever given any thought to how those of us whose kids attend low-resource public schools "feel" when we see kids in wealthier communities have so much more in their schools? How did it "feel" for my kids to attend high schools that did not offer ANY AP math or science courses? How did it "feel" for my daughter to attend a high school where there were 45 kids in her algebra II classroom, where the only way to take calculus was an on-line course (non AP) which produce 100% failure rate on the AP exam? My daughter was watching Oprah one day and there was a minority student attending a top college, coming from an inner city school, talking about the extra work she had to do to catch up with her peers; she mentioned starting with college biology after coming from a school where she hadn't even learned how to use a microscope. My daughter was feeling a little sorry for that kid, and then she realized that her own school didn't have microscopes either. </p>
<p>I'm not talking about the worst public schools -- my son's high school had a California API of 8 and my daughter's high school's API is 9 (on a 10 point scale) -- so both of these schools are considered to be pretty good as far as what California offers -- but I'll bet the public high schools in Palo Alto or Orinda have microscopes for the biology students. </p>
<p>The family with the $140K income earns 2.8 times as much as I do, but their higher "cost of living" is not that much different -- they don't pay more than I do for milk and eggs, and all the day to day expenses -- and my lower income doesn't get me a reduced price on health insurance for my kids. And as I noted, I am living on that median income IN a high cost area --and when I say "median" I mean median for my area. That is, I'm not doing worse than the average single parent in the SF Bay area -- I pretty much have the same standard of living as the typical parent at my kids' public schools. </p>
<p>When a school like Harvard announces they will give free tuition to families with under $60K in income -- $60K is a generous allowance even in high cost areas.</p>
<p>As regards the state schools, the state has a legitimate interest in preventing or ameliorating the development of a permanent underclass (or caste) which is then more likely to drain other health, social service, and criminal justice resources. To the degree that higher education can do that (of course, it is only one piece of the puzzle), I would argue (but would agree that it could be argued the other way) that the state has even greater interest in doing that than it does in admitting the most talented students. </p>
<p>In my state, but not California, we do not have an income tax, but rely on a highly regressive sales tax, whereby low-income families, many of whom have kids who cannot afford college, subsidize the college costs of upper income ones. </p>
<p>"I don't think that is what comes to mind when a person is struggling with his own college costs."</p>
<p>But the point is that so often they've freely CHOSEN the struggle, when there are other available choices. And I think it is fine to make that choice. For others, that choice is often not even there.</p>
<p>"When a school like Harvard announces they will give free tuition to families with under $60K in income -- $60K is a generous allowance even in high cost areas."</p>
<p>They can especially afford to do that when they've chosen to admit so few of them. I think it is wonderful that they are doing it, don't get me wrong, but let's remember who is getting the bulk of Harvard's largesse.</p>
<p>Calmom, you and Mini, said you don't get it. So I explained it to you from a different perspective. You don't have to like it. You don't have to understand it.</p>
<p>I couldn't afford a 4 year college. I had to live at home. I worked full time and went to City College of SF. I would have gotten into Berkeley, but I couldn't afford it. Then I worked full time for another 6 months while I saved enough so I could go to Berkeley. I still had to live at home because my family and I couldn't afford anything else at the time. We didn't know about loans, and I don't like loans very much anyway.</p>
<p>So don't assume too much.</p>
<p>Opie's and mini's posts make sense.<br>
Our family doesn't qualify under FAFSA, but in no way shape or form do I covet the 60K/year family who gets a free ride to Harvard. I'll send my kids to a good public university before I trade places with them.</p>
<p>This whole argument reminds me of when I was young and my bro and I fought over who got the larger piece of cake. My mom said, "one of you cuts and the other picks." So which piece of cake would you pick? 60K a year and free ride to Harvard, or 150K per year and pay to play?</p>
<p>So which piece of cake would you pick? 60K a year and free ride to Harvard, or 150K per year and pay to play?</p>
<p>I would pick the 150,000 if all else was equal. Somewhere around $120,000, I would change my mind. (For those 4 years).</p>
<p>"I couldn't afford a 4 year college. I had to live at home. I worked full time and went to City College of SF. Then I worked full time for another 6 months while I saved enough so I could go to Berkeley. I still had to live at home because my family and I couldn't afford anything else at the time. We didn't know about loans, and I don't like loans very much anyway."</p>
<p>Been there. Done that. You already know my story. Weekends during high school years bussing tables in the Catskills, and doing homework dead-tired on long, slow, puke-inducing diesel buses on Sunday nights. Summers at 12-14 hours a day, seven days a week, and could only take a day off if I could find my own replacement, and pay him. During school year, worked at BOTH college bookstores. Never did a fun winter break, or a fun spring break, or a fun summer break, or a junior year abroad. Took exactly one trip to a Broadway play (hitchhiked, and was picked up by Howard da Silva right outside a police station!), two trips to Boston. Literally did walk uphill in the snow both ways to and from class. Everyone would order pizza in the evenings, except me - no one EVER stopped to consider that I didn't have it to order. (I learned to make myself scarce, until finally I got to room with folks from the same economic class.)</p>
<p>I got a great education, for which I am forever grateful.</p>
<p>Dstark, the choice is even more dicey, since the chances of getting accepted to any top flight school, especially Harvard are very, very small. What happens most of the time to famiies at the $60K level is that they do not get any free ride for their kids' college, and end up with either huge gaps in the financial aid packages or lots of loans. As Mini has pointed out, the offer is not costing Harvard that much since the number of cases affected by this policy is small, and the cost is not that much either. Heck, they probably made it up with the last tuition hike alone!</p>
<p>I think that the increasing discrepancy between the "true" cost of college and the sticker price is alarming because it says that the colleges don't have the nerve to charge it to even their most wealthy clientale. Doesn't make financial sense, which tells you what the state of finances are these days with colleges. If they really wanted to be fair about all of this, you would be charged your EFC. Yeah, it would hurt many alot more than the current sticker price, I'm sure, myself included, but I'd like to see how many building the billionairres will be donating if they had to pay a "fair" share of their financial situation for their kids to go to college. Many of the wealthy are getting off cheap even with their hefty contributions to the school. It's those who have to pay EFC or close to it that are being hurt. know</p>
<p>
[quote]
would pick the 150,000 if all else was equal. Somewhere around $120,000, I would change my mind. (For those 4 years).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>LOL, dstark, 'cept, they don't get to do it just for four years. They get the level of education that comes with the 60K before hand, and the lifestyle that comes with it afterward.</p>
<p>cptofthehouse, I was just answering doubleplay's question.
I know it is tough out there.
The fact that Harvard educates very few poor and middle class people is a different issue than what I am addressing.</p>
<p>"I think that the increasing discrepancy between the "true" cost of college and the sticker price is alarming because it says that the colleges don't have the nerve to charge it to even their most wealthy clientale. Doesn't make financial sense, which tells you what the state of finances are these days with colleges."</p>
<p>I have a real problem with this "true cost" business and I alluded to this 50 posts ago. Don't bother going back and looking. It's not important. :)</p>
<p>"If they really wanted to be fair about all of this, you would be charged your EFC."</p>
<p>Fair to who?
It is real easy to spend somebody else's money.</p>
<p>I know college costs are getting out of hand. I just wrote a check last week. :(</p>