( I do not understand how people with a $20k EFC won’t pay one penny for a child’s college education. It’s one thing to say, we can’t afford the EFC. It’s another to say “we won’t give you ANYTHING.” jeez…these people better hope and pray they don’t need any assistance in their senior years… 
Let’s hope some of these investment will have a pay back. It is not a guarantee. 
K-12 education is expensive enough? It’s FREE, if you don’t own real property. And you fund it with your property taxes, for everyone, even if you have no kids of your own, if you do own real property. (At least, that is how it is set up in my state.)
If you pay rent, the cost of the taxes the owner has are likely included in your rent bill.
Generally, in countries where it’s free, not everyone is entitled to go.
Our taxes already pay for universal education. I’d rather my taxes pay for that than more wars in the Middle East. Yes, even if students had wealthy parents. Better to send them to school so they can learn to make some contribution to society.
Increase the estate tax for estates over $5M only, to pay for it. No more deadbeat trust fund heirs/heiresses, thank you.
Just gonna say … freedom is not free. Yeah, college is expensive. It stinks. But I don’t want the government paying for me to go. “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”
Students that wouldn’t be able to attend college without the “government paying for” them to be able to go probably wouldn’t be able to do as much for their country as they would otherwise. Return on investment.
@irlandaise That’s probably true. It’s just the thought of the government paying for EVERYBODY that gives me the creeps.
I’m not sure how I feel about it. I don’t feel weird about public K-12 being “free” to all. I don’t know what “free” public college would be like, and I don’t think it’d ever actually happen. I would rather more resources go to low-income students who wouldn’t even be able to go to flagships without aid (so more Pell grants, etc) than “free for all”.
I certainly don’t think that parent income should be not taken into consideration just because a student is (technically) an adult, as OP would seem to want.
@irlandaise Well, as a home schooled student, I always found it stupid that my parents had to pay school taxes. It’s not like we were gaining from the system. I read once that the U.S. schools started deteriorating in quality after the space-age era, when big-government dollars kept getting pumped into the system. It just seems like no matter how much federal money is thrown at education, it never gets much better. Of course, I live in a state with some of the worst schools in the nation (in the bottom 5) so maybe I have a skewed perspective.
Our EPC is 20000. We definitely don’t have that lying around per year. I am all for helping to pay but the cost of college here in the states is crazy!!!
@albert69 How is your family any different from single people, childless couples, and families with children in private school? By your standard, there is no point in anyone’s taxes paying for public schools; which would mean all schools would really be private, if everyone only paid for their own children to attend.
The exact same rationale for taxes paying for public K-12 education also applies beyond.
True European countries do have tracks from like the 5th grade where it is pretty much decided who will eventually go to college and who will go the vocational route. I mentioned “free college” because it isn’t really free because people pay well over 50% tax rate in most of those countries. I mean Americans cry when the cost of gasoline and stamps go up. Can’t imagine the mutiny of taxpayers who would suddenly be taxed at these rates to pay for college and healthcare.
I’d rather pay taxes for public K-12 schooling even I/my parents don’t have anyone directly benefiting because I like living somewhere with a generally educated population.
@FCCDAD
are you talking about TUITION being free? Or tuition, room, board, fees and books being free?
And, I guess you’re only talking about public univs? or privates, too???
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It’s FREE, if you don’t own real property.
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I can tell that you’re an atty.
I own rental properties and if you think that tenants aren’t “paying” for the property taxes, then you need to take a business class or two.
First of all, I deplore the way things are done for college financing. I agree that it is ridiculous, and wonder if it will even stand muster if ever seriously challenged that we hold adults captive to their parents’s finances in that they cannot get financial aid without their parental involvement.
However, when it comes down to private schools, they can do whatever they please. Folks do not expect private schools to give aid when it comes k-12; they understand that aid is very limited and if you have the money, you wo’t get any. Boarding schools? We all understand that when we send a K-12 kid to any boarding programs that, we, the parents are almost always and completely responsible for paying for their food and other living expenses with the few exceptions of scholarship students and a bit of financial aid. But suddenly, we expect schools to pay for our kids living expenses as well as letting them go to a private venue for free? Not only that our taxes, for those of us paying taxes, are subsidizing some of this system at PRIVATE as well as public schools.
The way it works with some higher education models in some states, is that it is indeed close to free or on the kids, IF the kid stays at home My state is one of them. SUNY Schools meet near full need up to tuition, fees. Those who don’t have the need have the DIrect Loans that cover most of those costs. Not quite there where it is free for college for everyone, but it’s better than the way it works at a lot of places.
It would truly revolutionize the entire college system if college kids’ parents were not stuck for the costs in terms of those kids qualifying need based. A lot of colleges would close, is my opinion. Who else is willing to pay more a year for a person than said person can make on the job market and keep doing so for years, other than the parent?
The point of having the government do things is that we determine those things should be done, for everyone, and they cannot be done by a lesser entity. We deem them too important to leave everybody at the mercy of a “market”. You don’t get a fire department only if you think it’s a good deal, or can afford a firefighting policy; everyone gets it, because everyone benefits by not having the entire city burn down. You don’t get a police department only if you’re willing to subscribe to a private security force. You don’t get food inspected and drugs tested for safety only if you’re willing to pay for the inspection and testing, it’s too important to make sure that we prevent epidemics, so everyone gets the benefits. And so on.
We have determined that K-12 education is of comparable importance, to make sure we have a basic level of education for everyone. We even have laws mandating attendance in classes (or a verified alternative secured by the parents) up to age 16. It’s not because the legislators want free school for their kids, it’s because EVERYONE should be educated.
Then we have this strange mindset that says after 12th grade, education is no longer serving the people - it is suddenly a product for students to buy. We apply this idea only to undergrad and professional/trade schools; when you get into any kind of research-based graduate study, you’re back to the model of your costs being covered by teaching and research assistanceships.
I’m just saying that we should probably have one mindset for educating our people, where we see that we are all better off if they are educated as much as they reasonably can be - and we don’t (or shouldn’t) start personally/individually sticking them with the bill for 4 years of undergrad in the late middle of it. Recognize that we should want a college education to be something that most people should be able to get, because we’re all better off with an educated population.
Rhetorical/sarcastic questions about whether everyone is willing to pay for it do nothing to address the question of how we should handle this. As noted above, I (and many others) are not willing to pay for a military that costs as much as the rest of the civilized world COMBINED, but our unwillingness to pay for that does not stop the money from going to it.
- Who do we think should be educated in the US? (And "educated" means as far as they can go in school and want to, from K to college to grad school.)
- Who do we think should pay for that education? (More specifically: if you think it should be different for undergrad only, why?)
Again… @FCCDAD
Are you suggesting FREE TUITION??? or are you suggesting FREE tuition, room, board, books and fees???
There is a HUGE difference in the short term and long term
And…would it be “every one can go”? or would admissions be stricter?
Right now, the cost of college is affected by the federal and state grants offered, integrated right into the cost, and parents are also on the line. I’d like to see state schools to be free, let the state/federal funding and aid to all of the privates get yanked and that money used to spruce up state systems and lower those prices. Community colleges need big revamps, should be free for any who want to take bridge courses to get them up to freshman college level, and even after that if the money can go that far. I 'd like to see the state schools be the best ones in the country and the most desired. That’s the case in some states (CA, VA) but not in enough of them.