My baby bro ended up going to Tennessee tech over Georgia tech because of tuition costs. Due to his major he would have been considered an instate student, but the cost was way above our means.

It is a real judgement call.

My University was WAY overpriced. Part of this was because over 80% of the student population was on some form of financial aid. When the government increases its financial aid, the University ups tuition because they know they can now get more money from the government.

The government has unlimited amounts of cash. It is now expected that no parent ends up paying the "sticker price" for university. You are expected to appeal to the government for financial aid.

This was not the intent of financial aid programs. It was to assist people in gaining an education who are in actual financial constraints. Now people who are NOT really in financial constraints ALSO cannot afford to send their children to college without government assistance.

I know parents who sent their children to private schools at between 8-15k a year during their formative years who had to apply to financial aid to allow their kids to attend college.

The problem is the system...it is designed to make the student dependent on the government by making college astronomically expensive. The colleges take advantage of this assistance by upping their prices, thereby yielding more money from the federal government.

The American public (in particular, though the world is catching up) does not shop by value, but by perception of a bargain. Raising the price and discounting it (via financial aid) to students helps feed this silly, but oh so necessary model. Now the parents can moan about the costs they pay, even though they don't necessarily pay it. It's like buying a Gucci dress on the off price rack. Who would have bought the dress if it was just priced fairly to begin with?

I think there are a couple points that need constant stressing, because they tend to be overlooked in coverage of college tuition. First, at most expensive private schools no-one--not even the students paying the total sticker price--is paying the whole cost of their education. I believe that most schools where the whole package is billed at around $40,000 would probably agree that the total cost of educating a student is around $60,000--so that everyone starts out on a $20,000 scholarship, regardless of merit or financial need. Clearly it would be better if the billed price more closely related to the actual price, so that Bill Gates's kids would pay $60,000, which he could afford, thus making an additional $20,000 available for financial aid. It is clear that while there may be incentives for schools to raise prices to indicate quality--as the article suggests--they can't actually go so far as to bill for their actual costs. Second, we need to remember how much non-educational material is covered by tuition: a gym, yoga classes, sports teams that travel, subsidized theater tickets, film series, etc. They call it tuition but it is financing a whole raft of activities that have to do more with a lifestyle than with classes. And these non-educational aspects are tremendously more varied than they were two generations ago--and are probably thus responsible for a large degree of the apparent increase in higher education costs.