Upper Middle Class Frustration

Paying for College
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I have been reading the “In Defense of Merit” thread, and like most threads of that nature, it seems to devolve into a “need based” vs “merit based” debate, with need based assuming it holds the moral high ground. I wanted to share some thoughts about who the people are who are shopping for merit ( which is really just looking for a discount off the unrealistic, distorted sticker prices the colleges charge). Disclaimer, I can only speak, generally, about Northeast merit-hunters.

This is a high income, high tax, high cost of living area. Those of us in a certain tax bracket know the drill. We look like high earners because we have two incomes, but we are really nothing special. A nurse married to a police officer would fall into the range of what most people on this site call “wealthy.” Two insurance company employees working in cubicles are “filthy rich”, I guess.

People like us are used to paying high taxes, both on the state and federal level, paying Alternative Minimum tax, and having various tax deductions and credits denied or curtailed due to our income level. We even pay high personal property taxes each year for the privilege of owning our cars. We also have to pay extra for basic services, like garbage collection. I kid you not. Because of this, our net income is quite a bit lower than most of you seem to believe.

We also have to plan ahead for the probable needs-testing that will come someday with social security as the baby boomers continue to retire. Wonderful.

In any event, it is quite difficult for people like us to come to terms with the current college landscape without feelings of anger and betrayal factoring in. Most of us and our high school friends went to northeast schools before or at the time the US News rankings began to come out. Before the rankings, these were just known as “good schools” that “good students” could reasonably expect to attend. Like Middlebury, Tufts, Colby, Boston College, Lehigh, Cornell. These are now somehow “dream schools” with outrageous sticker prices.

Back then we also didn’t worry too much about paying for college, scholarships or financial aid, because tuition and costs were generally in line with the value of the product and the means of its purchasers.

Fast forward a generation or two, and the landscape has completely changed. Universities and colleges are now “ranked” and they have chosen to completely disconnect their sticker price from their objective market value. They know that their price is wildly disproportionate to their value, so they have engaged in building brand names rather than in creating value. (I exempt HYPS from this to some extent, because they have some objective value to the mega-rich as networking/matchmaking centers).

The true “rich” (people with both substantial assets and income) want the “brand name”, and they will pay anything to get it ( think of as the equivalent of Hermes, which charges $3,500 for a wallet). For people like that, $70,000 per year is nothing. Normal people, even the high salaried dual income households in the Northeast, look at a sticker price like that and recognize that the price is completely disconnected from the market value of the product. Normal people understand that the sticker price is a rip off – a fraud, so to speak.

So what is the problem? Well, here it is. We are angry.

We are angry that the schools we all went to and loved do not love us back. They have betrayed us. They have taken our love and our support and our money over the years and they have transformed themselves into places where are children are not welcome.

We are angry because the absolute number of seats at these schools has not increased, even though the population has increased.

We are angry that these institutions have greatly (and quietly) increased the number of full-pay internationals they enroll, further increasing competition for limited seats.

We are angry because all colleges, private and public, receive huge taxpayer subsidies, both direct ( research grants) and indirect (Pell Grant funds, various govt backed loan programs, various tax exemptions and the fact that people can write off donations to the schools ). These subsidies are what enable the decisions that price our children out of the schools.

We are angry that, for historical reasons, the Northeast has not developed a great public college system. We are working on it, but the reputation schools here are all private. That means we either have to send our children far away to second or third tier schools, send them to mediocre Northeast publics or send them to small, “no name” privates in the Northeast. Even these options (with merit) tend to run about $40K to $45K per year, so once again you run into the value for money issue. They also tend to be small, generic LAC’s with highly skewed gender ratios and limited course offerings. Outstanding.

We are angry that there are few or no alternatives within a reasonable distance from our region. Why should we have to send our kids all the way to Alabama or Arizona to get a fair deal? As taxpayers, we are supporting this mess. So many tax dollars are propping up this system that there should be ample local alternatives available.

We are frustrated to see the social problems developing on elite campuses, now that these schools have decided to shut out the upper middle class kids. When I went to school, kids like us were the “mediators”. We helped bridge the gap between the low income kids and the wealthier kids (i.e., kids from families with substantial ASSETS, not just income). The wealthy snubbed us too, by the way, but we felt reasonably comfortable in the elite environment and had friendships with the low income kids. Now there seems to be a trend of the lower income kids feeling increasingly isolated, devalued and frustrated by their college experiences. I don’t blame them for feeling this way. I blame the administrators. Safe spaces and picture books are not a long term solution to these real issues of social isolation. Bringing back the upper middle class would help a great deal.

So, it would be greatly appreciated if folks would take a deep breath and try to tone down the “you are rich so shut up and take it” mentality that I see a great deal around here. We have a higher education system that is causing stress and pain for the vast majority of Americans. Something has to give.

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Excellent post.

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Thanks, @Veryapparent . I get frustrated because many of the folks here don’t seem to understand the situation in the Northeast.

We are a VERY densely populated region with a large number of small to medium sized private schools. Up until about 30 years ago, nearly all Northheast kids went to private Northeast colleges. The publics were CHEAP CHEAP CHEAP and existed to serve low income families.

You can debate the merits of that system, but it had significant structural consequences when the Northeast privates suddenly decided to redefine themselves as “National” and even “International” institutions.

Colleges that had built themselves up using vast public subsidies and Northeast alumni donations for multiple generations on a sort of assumed understanding that they existed to serve the Northeast kids, suddenly started taking much, much larger percentages of their students from outside the region. When they did that, they essentially “stole” all of our college seats out from under us like some nightmarish game of musical chairs.

Some of the states seem to recognize the problem and are throwing money at the publics, trying to create a place for the displaced kids, but States like New York, which had opted for decentralized affordable campuses to better serve the poor, are at a distinct disadvantage. They don’t have a flagship to enhance.

I am also seeing some states scramble to enhance the smaller, regional state schools, which had formerly served a lot of non-traditional students and commuters, to absorb the students pushed out of the enhanced flagships.

It’s all a big mess and it just drives me nuts that these privates can consume so many public resources, and then leave us all high and dry!

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Actually, the elite privates are charging market prices. It’s just that the market price for Ivies/equivalents is very high now due to increasing inequality (the rich becoming much richer and numerous). And to be honest, the Ivies/equivalents were a steal in the '70’s and '80’s. The benefit you got back then from going to those schools far outweighed what you paid.

And yes, because the elites in your region did not support public higher ed much traditionally (you’d have to blame your former classmates as private college alums in the Northeast kept your publics weak through much of your history), your kids may have to go far away if you want someplace top-tier and affordable. I disagree, though, that you are only left with 2nd and 3rd tier choices.

McGill (which has been called the Harvard of Canada but is more the UMich/Wisconsin of Quebec) has some degrees where total costs would be about the same as in-state some places (about $30K USD/year).
If your kid knows for sure what they want to study, many majors at many top UK unis (outside Oxbridge) come in at roughly $40-45K/year, but most English uni degrees are only 3 years.
And many top LACs and other privates in the Midwest and South are more willing to give merit aid.
Finally, if your kid is that good, they may be able to shave off a semester or two of costs through AP/IB credit.

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When we went to a private colleges in the 70s/80s, upper middle class alums would also complain that their offspring were not admitted. The difference then was that legacy admit rates started at 40% for HYP and went up from there at other schools. So if their kid was rejected it was a true slap in the face.

The world is so, so much different now. I get, and feel, similar frustration, but I’m not sure it’s anything other than complaining about the weather.

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@Quietlylurking With all due respect, I disagree with your entire post from top to bottom.

As I’ve said on other posts, I grew up poor, and have been through every station along the way. You are not worse off than the poor that you begrudge. I can assure you that being poor sucks, and few make it college let alone to those fancy privates. Those that do make it there have risen through enormous difficulty. I look at my upbringing to the life we’ve given our kids, and there is no comparison. There are fine public schools in the Northeast, including New York, and they are good enough for your kids if you don’t want to pay what college costs.

Privates are private. You are not entitled. They are not obligated to serve you. If they want to bring in full-pay international students instead of giving your kids merit aid, that’s their prerogative. If they want to subsidize much needier students than yours, that’s their prerogative. If you thought that your donations to those schools would assure your kids a seat at the table, that mistake was yours.

We saved up for our kids to go to privates depriving ourselves of many aspects of standard upper middle class life - all the cars we didn’t buy, all the vacations we didn’t take, all of the shopping we didn’t do. We did so lovingly. I would have borrowed a lot to send my kids to the school of their choice. Fortunately our situation improved greatly before we needed to pay for college I didn’t have to borrow but I would have. I am a full-pay parent of two kids who attended expensive privates. No aid whatsoever. Additionally, each year my wife and I make significant donations to the Posse Foundations which awards merit aid to urban youth. I believe that those recipients are grateful and we donate enthusiastically because we’ve both experienced the benefits that mobility brings to a society. Whatever subsidies were spent on us were public investments that have been repaid many times over.

I am truly grateful for the free college education I’ve received, for the comfortable life we live, for the success that I’ve been able to achieve. It’s an honor to pay taxes at the highest rate. I owe my great country that. I too live in the expensive Northeast because I like it. It’s expensive because a lot of people do. It’s a blessing. I begrudge nobody because I am not entitled to all of this.

I’m sorry that you feel the way you do but maybe you need to spend some time in less affluent places to appreciate all that you have.

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Your options are, I note, at vast distance and even in foreign countries.

My point is, if the “system” worked, then I wouldn’t have to send my kid overseas or thousands of miles away.

I agree that the HYPS type schools are charging “market rate” by definition, because they can get it. My comments were more focused on the good ( but formerly not “elite” schools) like Middlebury, Boston College, Georgetown, Tufts Brandeis, etc etc . . . . Even Cornell and John Hopkins, which normal kids ( like me at the time) used to be able to get into.

ALL of these schools, and even “no name” schools all purport to state that they are worth $65-$70K per year, all while “discounting” heavily for the groups they want to admit. These groups never seem to include the two-parent insurance company cubicle jockeys working in the Northeast.

That’s my point.

I would suggest that these schools no longer need to benefit from the vast public subsidies which they are given.

That’s purely my perspective. Your mileage may differ.

My overall point is merely a plea for understanding for the upper middle class anger and feelings of betrayal. Solutions are not usually crafted unless all interested parties’ concerns are recognized and understood.

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No group holds the moral ground.

There are those with low EFCs who really aren’t poor, simply because of how things are calculated (modest income, but lots of assets, assets then don’t count…businesses that don’t count…high income NCPs). Yes, at CSS profile schools these things may come into play, but at FAFSA only schools like the UCs that give great instate aid, there is a lot of funny business going on.

There is a wrong assumption that low income kids get free rides, etc. Really only the elite poor get those freebies.

there are those with high incomes or assets that truly can’t pay a lot for a variety of reasons…new high income, pricey living area, other financial demands, money tied up, divorce issues, etc.

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What groups is Middlebury providing big “discounts” to?

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@ClassicRockerDad Well said! I could not agree more. Are you sure you are not my husband?

If the AMT tax is hitting you, you are the fortunate.

You don’t like the situation with your state schools, vote differently. You don’t like your high property tax? Vote with your feet and take your family elsewhere.

I would be interested if there is any data on student’s family income in the 70’s. Before the generous financial aid kicked in, I theorize that there were far fewer low income students.

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We do need to get back to where attending one’s instate school is an affordable option for all.

I disagree with the idea that the NE publics are somehow inadequate. They may not be MIT/Ivy quality, but they certainly can get 99.9% of people into the career paths of their choosing.

The one state that needs to beef up its publics is Nevada.

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One can, of course, appreciate what one has and still lament the cost of college. The fact is “need” is quite subjective. We were deemed too well-off for aid but there is no way we can afford the $68,000 per year our daughter’s school is costing us. We had to take out a second on our house.

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“My point is, if the “system” worked, then I wouldn’t have to send my kid overseas or thousands of miles away.”

You certainly could argue that, but the system didn’t work because your classmates favored private colleges over building up public colleges.

Favoring privates (which you have no control over) over publics never makes sense.

So for instance, NYS gives it’s land grant (Cornell) as much money as VA gives UVa, but far more VA kids get a much bigger discount (and can pursue many more majors) at UVa than NYS kids do at Cornell’s contract colleges with their limited number of majors.

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I don’t agree with this. Both my husband and I grew up where folks went to four year colleges. In our HS communities, better than 90% went on to higher education. No…neither of our families were wealthy ones. Yes, colleges cost less when we attended in the 1970’s.

We did not feel anger or betrayal when we looked at the college landscape when both of our kids applied to college. Yes, costs were higher. Yes, it was harder to get accepted at elite schools. Yes, it was pretty much impossible for a student to pay all the costs to attend college all by themselves. Yes, our family contribution was more. Yes, our cost of living where we reside is high.

We were not gobsmocked by this at all…clearly…not a surprise.

No kid NEEDS to attend a $60,000 plus a year college. The reality is there are plenty of excellent options out there that cost far less. The honors colleges at public universities have really stepped up their game.

And yes, there is merit money at schools for students who are indeed competitive applicants for top 20 schools…but who need some financial assistance to pay college costs.

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[QUOTE=""]
We are angry that there are few or no alternatives within a reasonable distance from our region. Why should we have to send our kids all the way to Alabama or Arizona to get a fair deal? As taxpayers, we are supporting this mess. So many tax dollars are propping up this system that there should be ample local alternatives available.

[/QUOTE]

the same argument could often be given to low/modest income people who feel that they have to send their kids hundreds/thousands of miles away to get to the schools that give great need based aid.

Sometimes the treasure won’t be found in your backyard.

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And @mom2collegekids is right:
Unless you are in NV (or a handful of other low-population states where the top publics are little more than glorified CCs) or PA (where the big “publics” PSU, Pitt, and Temple are really just privates like Cornell who receive some state funding and so are pretty expensive even for in-state while the PASSHE schools are limited), you don’t “have to” send your kids somewhere other than an in-state public. The SUNYs actually provide a plethora of interesting options, for instance.

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Ca publics have become overly competitive, over-crowded and generally over-rated especially for undergraduate studies.
MANY CA families are looking at bargains to be found in AZ, AL, TX, and Mississippi public universities…as well as the great FA at elite privates.
I think of it as a treasure hunt and encourage my kids to think of it that way.

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@thumper1 You were not surprised that schools that have 50% admit rates cost $60K sticker price (same price as the Top 10 schools)? The sticker price is the sticker price -there are PLENTY of people paying it, even a merit schools.

The publics in the northeast are WAY TOO EXPENSIVE, at 30K per year. They were 25% of that in the early 90s.

I agree with OP, 100%.

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With all due respect, that IS affording it. Congratulations on being able to afford to do so.

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And we are only 15 posts in and we are yet again devolving into an "us "vs “them” debate.

@ClassicRockerDad , I respect you greatly and have always enjoyed your posts. These are emotional issues and I understand that each of us tend to read these posts and personalize them. If you go back to me original, admittedly long post, I think you will see that I never said anything denigrating lower income students.

This is more of a lament about the way we have all been manipulated by very wealthy, private institutions that are somewhat disingenuous about the way they manage their finances. Each of us suffer, in our own ways.

Somebody mentioned Middlebury. I don’t mean to pick on them in particular, but they are a good example of a school that was kind of “okay” but not exceptional back in the day. In '82 one of my friends decided to go there and I had to look it up to figure out what it was.

Anyway, my point is that all of the CSS schools are manipulating things to decide who gets how much aid. It would be nice to think of these schools as pure hearted and noble charitable institutions, but if that was true the highly endowed schools wouldn’t even charge admission.

Anyway, it is what it is, I would just dearly love to stop subsidizing this stuff (at the very least, we ought to revisit things like tax exemptions and tax deductions for contributions to these schools).