Is a College Degree Still Worth It? >
Government Is Behind the Curve
Put more courses online and limit federal student loans to four years of undergraduate work
November 17, 2011
About Lindsey Burke:
Lindsey Burke is Senior Policy Analyst in Domestic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation.
President Obama wants the United States to have the world's highest proportion of college graduates by 2020. But is a college degree still worth what it once was? Less than 60 percent of students at four-year institutions graduate, and many who do are in fields that don't require a degree--two statistics that indicate a potential oversubscription in college.
But the president, parents, and employers place tremendous importance on obtaining at least a bachelor's degree. So students take on thousands upon thousands of dollars in debt to get their foot in the door for a job interview.
There is little pressure on students to choose a course of study that will reap returns on their (or taxpayers') investment. The Obama administration recently announced that students can no longer be required to pay more than 10 percent of their discretionary income on loan repayments, and student loans will be forgiven completely after 20 years. With the knowledge that taxpayers will be the ones on the hook for repaying delinquent loans, students can pursue that overpriced degree in women's studies without worrying about its actual value.
[Lack of Jobs for Young Workers Spells 2012 Trouble for Obama.]
So the question goes beyond whether a college degree is still worth it. The real question is whether the federal government should be continuing to increase subsidies for students to attend college on the backs of American taxpayers.
Higher subsidies are problematic in many ways. Third-party payments inflate costs by making students less sensitive to increases in college tuition. Ever-increasing subsidies also remove any incentive for colleges to be remotely concerned with saving money. Uncle Sam stepping in as Rich Uncle also creates a vicious lending cycle: Washington increases subsidies, giving students a false sense of purchasing power. This enables universities to raise tuition, sending students scrambling for more loans--all of which does nothing to address the college-cost issue.
Worse, increasing federal subsidies shifts the burden of paying for college from the student--the person directly benefiting from having attended college--to the nearly three quarters of Americans who didn't graduate from college. And the price tag for the Obama administration's most recent overreach is steep: $575 million per year, the Congressional Budget Office says.
[To Keep America Great, Students Must Be Taught to Innovate.]
Government is again behind the curve. While more and more universities (such as MIT) are moving to put college courses online, the president wants to subsidize the old model, which has precluded the most underserved students from having access to college while adding to the astronomical cost of college for students everywhere.
Instead, the administration should consider reforms such as limiting access to student loans to four years of undergraduate work. States should push more public universities to put course content online. These are the types of reforms that would ultimately help to pop the higher-ed "bubble." That would do far more to reduce costs and increase access than any federal meddling ever could.
- Congress Should Put a Stop to For-Profit College Rip Offs
- Average Student Debt Reaches All-Time High
- Today's Young Adults Suffering More Financially than Older Generations
- Other Arguments
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#114579
No — Four to six years of partying do not equal an education
CRAIG BRANDON, Author of 'The Five-Year Party: How Colleges Have Given Up On Educating Your Child' and 'What You Can Do About It'
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#213876
Yes — The return on a college investment is more than that on almost any alternative
JULIE MARGETTA MORGAN, Policy Analyst with the Postsecondary Education Program at the Center for American Progress
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#310654
No — We now have nearly 80,000 bartenders and taxi drivers with bachelor's degrees
RICHARD VEDDER, Director of Center for College Affordability and Productivity
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#48339
Yes — Like any smart investment, the pursuit of higher education requires effort to explore the options
PETER KONWERSKI, Senior Associate Vice President and Dean of Students at George Washington University
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#55831
Yes — Students and their families should not simply assume that college will be "worth it"
ROBERT B. SCHWARTZ, Francis Keppel Professor of Practice in Educational Policy and Administration at Harvard University
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#75336
Yes — Encouraging students to go to college is the right choice
ANTHONY P. CARNEVALE, Director of Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce
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#84835
Yes — College often provides the first opportunity for students to direct their own education
TOM CARROLL, President of the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future
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#95746
No — What's the message when grads can't write a simple E-mail?
NAOMI SCHAEFER RILEY, Author of 'The Faculty Lounges ... And Other Reasons Why You Won't Get the College Education You Pay For'
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#104743
Yes — People need to go to college in order to have a fighting chance at a well-paying career
KEVIN CAREY, Policy Director of Education Sector
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#113943
Yes — The return on investment in postsecondary education remains compelling
CHRIS FARRELL, Economics Editor of 'Marketplace Money'
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#123767
Yes — Tuition and student debt have not grown "unmanageable"
CECILIA ELENA ROUSE, Katzman-Ernst Professor in the Economics of Education and Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University
