<p>I’ve only seen it used in the context of children.</p>
<p>I interpreted it in the context of marysidney’s post about supporting socialism in medicine and education, and took that to mean she believes in a free college education for all. Since she told us she’s in the 1%, then she’s got a lot of $$ to hand out to those who need a free college education now, like some people on this thread, so what’s she waiting for?</p>
<p>1% is about income, not wealth which is assets. If you’re on the edge of 1%, that income won’t fund very many college educations.</p>
<p>Is that a reason not to do it?</p>
<p>Everybody’s reasons for doing or not doing something is different. What are we aguing about, what is a purpose of discussion? Some people want to plan ahead, and they do it, others do not want to plan and complain later and they do it. Discussion will not change anything.</p>
<p>MarySidney, I too am “a socialist when it comes to medicine and education. Proud of it, what’s more: a liberal, socialist, feminist, environmentalist hoping for opportunity for all.”</p>
<p>Not a member of the 1% but lucky enough to be in the upper middle class (family income is less than 100K. I don’t go by how I feel, I go by the facts.) </p>
<p>Welcome!</p>
<p>^You are confusing “opportunity for all” and “income equality”. These are not the same by far. In societies that pursue “income equality”, there are NO opportunities fo anybody, but thieves. This is cold and truthfull fact.<br>
The “opportunity for all” society will never result in “income equality” because not everybody is taking advantages of “opportunity for all”, people who do, get ahead, people who do not fall behind.
The opposite exists in “income equality” society. No matter who does what, their level of living is about the same, eqauly miserable, becuase there is no sense to work harder without additional rewards.<br>
There are different labels for both of them, you know them.
Some of us have experiences on both sides. Others have one and imaginning another. Imaginary is not always equal reality.</p>
<p>Imaginary is not always equal reality.</p>
<p>I always learn something on CC.</p>
<p>I have another potential solution to the OP’s question of how people with the $200k income pay for the $50k/yr college - they connect with people like MarySidney and get them to hand them some money for free so their kid can go to whatever college they want regardless of the cost of the college and regardless of the responsibility or irresponsibility demonstrated and decisions made throughout life an individual happens to make. </p>
<p>Granted, the above paradigm doesn’t scale well and is usually one of the downfalls of any socialistic society but it might sound good to the OP (but maybe not so good to people like MarySidney when it actually comes time to write the check).</p>
<p>Low cost, access, quality: pick two out of three. You can’t have all three on a mass scale in higher education.</p>
<p>But when I sign that check for $55k next summer will it feel good???</p>
<p>^Signing check is by choice. You have predicted how you would feel when you have chosen to do so. We do not know how you would feel. I feel good doing exactly the same. I hope it will help my kid to do the same for her kids. However, I realize that I can only hope for it, I cannot make it reality, it will be my D’s choice to subsidize her kids’ college education or not. All I can do is to make it easier.</p>
<p>eastcoascrazy–in your Grinnell example are you comparing apples to apples though? Do you live in a small town/low cost of living town like your parents? Is your house paid for? Do you have outside expenses your parents didn’t have-car payments, a cabin, etc.? Also, Grinnell does not cost $60,000. It’s still expensive but not quite to $60,000.</p>
<p>If you want to use past salary/college costs compared to current salary/college costs with a personal example–school I attended cost about $16,000 for total costs when I attended in the dark ages. Salary at the time for my parent’s occupation was about $40,000 and for where we were living, that was a very comfortable salary. Take the same school today with a total cost of about $43,000 and that same salary, for that same job with the same work experience at the same company in the same location is $150,000. Using that example, colleges look pretty cheep today. If you want to take that cost analysis further, the house I lived in when I was in high school sold for about $88,000 shortly after I graduated from high school. That same house today recently sold, in a down market, for $280,000 but sold at a loss from the previous sale of $310,000. Basically meaning, everything, except electronics, is more expensive these days.</p>
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<p>I disagree. The best of the public universities see it as their mission to provide all three. They’re not perfect by any means–who is?–but the best of them come pretty close to striking a balance and they score pretty well on all three dimensions.</p>
<p>I’m not quite sure how you are defining the best publics, but ones like Berkeley, Virginia (so called "public ivies) are actually kind of hard to get into. There are many complaints on these boards about how difficult it is for even an above-average student to get into a UC these days. So access is a problem.</p>
<p>There are PLENTY of state schools that are not highly selective but are still very good schools.</p>
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<p>…and unless you think $32K per year is “low cost,” UC Berkeley doesn’t meet that criteria either.[UC</a> Berkeley Financial Aid and Scholarships Office Cost of Attendance](<a href=“http://students.berkeley.edu/finaid/home/cost.htm]UC”>http://students.berkeley.edu/finaid/home/cost.htm)</p>
<p>I think we should not be cutting state school budgets and raising tuition, so that poor and middle-class kids have to go heavily into debt in order to attend them. I think, as a society, it profits us all to have affordable college choices for kids who can benefit from them. I don’t think every kid should go to college, nor that college should be promoted as a superior choice for everyone, but yes, I think we owe it to our society to fund state schools. I went to school with substantial financial aid; I worked hard, and graduated with debt; I earned my degree, in more ways than one, but I acknowledge, with gratitude, that others helped me.</p>
<p>I’m not sure why some of you responded so snarkily–I do contribute to my alma mater, and I have helped some kids with college costs. Why do you assume I haven’t put my money where my mouth is? Why do you assume that, if push came to shove, I wouldn’t be willing to? But one person can’t do much; I could pay for one, ten, a hundred kids to attend school, and it would be meaningless. Our society pays lip service to the idea that we are a land of opportunity, while it is increasingly difficult for the lowest classes to climb up by themselves. “I’m not worried about the very poor, they have a safety net”: I am worried about the very poor, because they should have a future they can create for themselves, without a net. Lots of you may respond that a poor but very smart kid can get a better shot at Harvard than my kid; that’s true, but what about the better-than-average-but-not-Harvard-quality kid, for whom our state schools were designed, who now can’t afford even the state schools? SUNY is $15,000/year. Even with max Pell grants, a kid with nothing can’t attend, even with loans, unless his family takes out a loan, and what if your family isn’t a good credit risk, or is nonexistent? He should work his way through, perhaps; but if you have only a high school degree, can you save enough money to put yourself through school any more? And unemployment among young people without a college degree is 50% in most places, so even if you want to work your way through, you may not be able to. </p>
<p>I don’t think everyone should go for free–I think you value something more if you earn it, for one thing–but I think everyone should be able to swing it if they’re willing to work hard. I don’t think it should be impossible. Tuition should be low enough that smart kids know that if they can get in, they can go.</p>
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<p>Actually, if the student is a NYS resident attending SUNY as max pell grant kid, s/he would receive 5550, they would have 4995 in TAP, 5500 in stafford loans (totaling 16,045). If the kid is “academically disadvantage” he would EOP eligible in which s/he could receive a EOP grant (minimally 2k), a book stipend between 500-750 per term and a federal work study job, pretty much covering the full COA. </p>
<p>If the 0 EFC student is a CUNY resident, TAP and Pell would cover the cost of CUNY. An academically disadvantaged student would be eligible for seek/college discovery. Once a student starts in an opportunity program (seek/EOP/HEOP )they can stay go into the graduate tuition program, which includes the professional schools at SUNY.</p>
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<p>If they were not eligible for seek/college discovery, they may be eligible for ASAP at the community college level with comes with a $500 book stipend and free metro cards to get back and forth to school.</p>
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<p>Is that what is happening? What I see is public universities raising
their sticker prices and then raising the amount of aid for poor and
middle-class students. Basically full-pay students are subsidizing
those with less - they’re copying the expensive privates.</p>