<p>$18,000/year - if you don't buy books, pay fees, have health insurance, pay a cent to live, or eat. </p>
<p>Once you factor in cost of living, it's $31,000/year - which is why it costs almost a hundred grand to go through, in-state. </p>
<p>For law school, there's a lot of stuff you need - books, outlines, hornbooks, a laptop, a laser printer, etc. There's a reason why the tuition alone is a very bad measure of what you're going to spend. If the tuition is five cents a year, but miscellaneous costs are thirty grand, I can guarantee that you're going to graduate with a lot of debt. </p>
<p>For many law schools, cost of living alone adds about $15k/year to the debt. That doesn't count books, health insurance, etc. For city schools, expect that you'll end up spending $15,000 - $20,000/year over the cost of tuition.</p>
<p>You don't really need health insurance UNTIL you need health insurance. Joev, I am glad you've been OK without insurance. You have been LUCKY. I agree most young people can manage with less health insurance than old folk like me. A low cost policy, with a high deductible, that insures you only for large expenses, like hospitalizations, would prudent. One hospitalization, without insurance, could strap you with a very large bill.</p>
<p>This is why lots of kids at top schools choose jobs such as Ibanking... 150k in debt? no prob, you got a job that starts off at 100k/year and you have no free time to spend any of your hard earned money.</p>
<p>JoeV: Some states require any student in that state (whether or not you attend a public school!) to have health insurance. My law school requires that you purchase their plan or have an equivalent one.</p>
<p>Umm.... all you folks who are hell-bent on making law school cheaper.... how do we then provide societal welfare for all the unemployed lawyers? Are you ready to support these folks out of your pocket? In many large cities there is already a glut of lawyers... so the band-aid of making law school affordable to everyone, while a sweet notion, exacerbates and already existing over-supply.</p>
<p>How about making nursing school cheaper? Why not deal with a labor shortage in a creative way, rather than create still more lawyers?</p>
<p>I believe the law school discussion is simply a metaphor for the entire increasing cost of all professional education and the central problem of pricing certain income groups out of the market that in years past would, through hard work and diligent study, have had the opportunity.</p>
<p>Having gone through this debt assessment last year with D now being a 2nd semester freshman, it's amazing how you don't know how it feels until you go through it...</p>
<p>Same time last year...D was in the throes of acceptances/1 rejection at high-powered (and high-cost, all $40K+) Eastern universities. Partial tuition scholarships were offered, bringing out-the-door yearly costs to just shy of $30K. Still a buncha money.</p>
<p>When we were close to the drop-dead date of May 1, I wrote the itemized cost for each school on a separate piece of paper, with the 1-year AND 4-year totals (minus scholarships) circled! I also did the same thing for State U. and Adjacent State U., and fanned them all out on the kitchen table. (We had already discussed the academic & geographic pros & cons to each school.) I said OK, D, what do you think? After careful deliberation, she thankfully picked Adjacent State U., which had a 4-year net cost of ~$85K. Presently she's immersed in a great pre-health sciences program there & loves the school, so apparently it's worked out fine.</p>
<p>I may never know how much this tactic helped make her decision, but I figured that her seeing the different totals in front of her couldn't hurt. More importantly, though, how would wife & myself reacted had she picked the much more costly choice?</p>
<p>Know what? We work hard to do the best for our kids, and I have to say honestly we'd have made it work. Just a bigger loan.</p>
<p>life is about making choices- life isn't fair- but we always have choices-
If we have informed ourselves, we can make informed choices.
When someone sees the ramifications of a certain choice- doesn't like them but makes that choice anyway- I have to wonder...........</p>
<p>jnm123 said: "I may never know how much this tactic helped make her decision, but I figured that her seeing the different totals in front of her couldn't hurt."</p>
<p>jnm, we did the same thing with S last April. The choice was either a highly-ranked private U at total cost to us of $170,000 (not including presumed tuition increases) or our (nearly as) highly ranked flagship state U at $96,000. There were other schools with merit money that fell in between, price-wise. If he'd picked the private, we would have made it work through loans. Since he picked the public, we are able to swing it through a combination of savings and scrimping and H and I each working second jobs (and S working, too), and we will be able to help with some grad school costs. It worked out great because he is very happy at flagship U, and I think he's getting a wonderful education, so far. The checks are still tough to write (actually we don't write checks, we press "enter" on the billing website) but it could be a lot worse.</p>
<p>Jnm and Inca2mom...that's what my parents did with me when I went to school as well. I had narrowed it down to one public in state, one public out of state, and a private LAC. We looked at the financial aid and what things would actually cost. They let me make the final decision. In looking at the bottom line it made sense to me not to shoulder a huge burden of debt when I could go somewhere else and actually have enough scholarship money to help with living experiences. I chose the in state public. However, if I had chosen one of the other two I would have gone into it with my eyes wide open knowing what I was taking on in terms of debt. I am still thankful for this discussion which now took place over ten years ago.</p>
<p>what I am saying is I don't see anyone twisting anyones arm to incur a lot of debt so that they can attend college.
It is a choice.
While I agree with taxes going to support preK-16 education, I agree less with tax dollars going for graduate school education, particulary in fields where there is not a demonstrated need for additional people in that field.
I would like to have a larger house and a credit card with no limit so that I can live at the level to which I would like to become accustomed. But do I expect the taxpayers to pay for that?
What if I decided that was necessary for me to be "fulfilled"?</p>
<p>How is that any less valid than someone else who wishes to attain an advanced professional degree, just because that is what they are interested in, but they think the taxpayers should pay for that?</p>
<p>I allow that this society requires a higher educational background than 100 yrs ago, when an 8th gd education seemed to be equivalent to a high school graduate now, no offense, but I think more lawyers are one of the last things we need.</p>
<p>EK: How about we just discuss what kind of people do and don't become lawyers under different circumstances? The fact is, getting a law degree isn't necessary to be "fulfilled" - it's necessary to get a license to practice law. And the financial barrier to obtaining that license is high and getting higher. So the issue isn't personal gratification or generating an overabundance of lawyers, but simply that we are creating a filter for that profession which will restrict it to a financially defined subset of society. Is that a good thing? You don't like lawyers? Do you think you'd like them any more if only rich kids or people willing to take on $100,000+ of postgraduate debt for the privilege of being a lawyer were allowed to practice law? Because that's basically the "Bar exam" we're now creating.</p>
<p>(And Idad, you're right - I'm just talking about lawyers because I actually know about that field, unlike some people I could name :) But it is my impression that the same thing is happening with all postgraduate "professional" schools.) Maybe EmeraldKity thinks we have too many pharmacists, too.)</p>
<p>Hey, back off on Emerald. The point was made earlier in the thread that people like you and me should subsidize tuition so that kids who were interested in law school wouldn't have to graduate with too much debt to go out and enjoy life. So-- Emerald points out a legitimate question-- is having more lawyers a "public good" which suggests that all of us-- truckdrivers, waitress, cable TV repair people-- should pay higher taxes to allow your kid to go to law school debt free.</p>
<p>I don't see evidence that the professions are less democratic than they were 100 years ago in the US-- Jews couldn't get accepted to Med school; Blacks couldn't make a living practicing law in many states even if they could get into law school; the number of women in any post-graduate program was infinitesmal. Nobody has suggested that a kid who is really motivated to get an advanced degree can't do it, or that there are barriers to employment once they graduate-- just that they don't want to take on debt, tap into home equity, do ROTC, work fulltime and do law school at night, etc.</p>
<p>Blossom, you're right that professions are more democratic now than they were 100 years ago. But I don't see that as a justification for making them less democratic now than they were 25 years ago, which is the inevitable result of the ramp-up in professional education fees. And you've missed the point exactly the same way EK did - it's not about having "more lawyers" or enabling all students who go to law school to "enjoy life" after graduation - it's about the fact that we are structuring the "facts of life" in our society so that only certain types of people are likely to enter certain occupations - and that is what I think is a bad thing. I don't see public support of professional school education as being inherently different than K-12 or K-16 - and remember, it's only "professional" education that we're talking about. If you want to get a Ph.D in advanced basketweaving from Whatsamatta State you generally will pay little or no more than an undergraduate. </p>
<p>I don't think it's right to place a barrier between the sons and daughters of the truckdrivers, waitresses and cable TV repair people and the right to enter a profession they are capable of performing. Requiring a professional degree as a condition of licensure and making the tuition cost of that degree start at $60,000 creates exactly that type of barrier. </p>
<p>In particular, when you consider that a disproportionate number of the policy makers in our country have law degrees do you think it's a good idea to limit that franchise and those who are, for whatever reason, willing to take on massive debt for the right to hold that license - plus, of course, the children of the wealthy? We already have lots and lots of lawyers working full time, for good pay, to maintain the status quo. There are jobs available in that line of work for those who need the money coming out of law school. Wealthy people and businesses can hire all the lawyers they need to protect their interests. The way things are going, that's the only kind of lawyers we'll have in the future. </p>
<p>Sure, a superstar kid who is "really motivated" can overcome the obstacles; but is it really in the public interest to limit the right to practice a profession be limited to the wealthy and those willing to make great sacrifices? Make no mistake - under the current circumstances the last thing I would encourage my kids to do would be to go to law school - there are other occupations which are just as interesting and pay better. But that might be different if I were extremely wealthy, or extremely ambitious. </p>
<p>Kluge, you pointed out your position very cogently so let me point out mine. I agree with everything you said.... but I disagree that 60K in debt is burdensome for a professional degree, especially in a society where middle class people routinely take out loans for cars which cost almost half of that.... which depreciate quickly as they drive them off the lot. All those SUV's can't possibly be driven by wealthy people.... there just aren't enough wealthy people in America to be buying every cellphone, Ipod, Big screen TV, or whatever new consumer good comes out every year. Blame the marketers if you want- but people seem happy to load themselves up with debt to consume this stuff, but then want taxpayers to send their kids to grad school so their kids don't have to pay off school loans which reduces their ability to load themselves up with consumer debt buying their own toys.</p>
<p>I don't buy it. I see how my middle income neighbors live... the kids get a car at 16, and then two years later they're complaining they can't afford State U and why can't the legislature cap the tuition at $2500 like it was 30 years ago.</p>
<p>You've raised an interesting point about policy makers and law degrees. I'm not interested in limiting the franchise.... but I've got to believe that since the time of our founding fathers when the "politicians" were farmers and plantation owners, something has pushed that transition and it wasn't the high cost of law school.</p>