Princeton spared from endowment tax

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So if the colleges have enough money and can offer free tuition instead of paying a tax, the college chooses free tuition?

Why doesn't Harvard do this? It would have to curtail the 25% of students from the rich, private, Independent schools, but Harvard is about equity??

Harvard is too big. Law school, medical school, business school, etc

I thought the count that matter was fewer than 3,000 undergraduate students paying tuition?

I think it's 3000 students total. Harvard has a gazillion cash cow graduate degree programs and a bigger undergrad class than Princeton.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So if the colleges have enough money and can offer free tuition instead of paying a tax, the college chooses free tuition?

Why doesn't Harvard do this? It would have to curtail the 25% of students from the rich, private, Independent schools, but Harvard is about equity??

Princeton made it work by taking a certain set of kids who got some financial aid and giving them free tuition instead. That took Princeton under the 3000 student limit. It only works at Princeton because they have no med or law school and their grad students are mostly funded (not tuition paying). Princeton calculated the giving a certain number of kids free tuition would be cheaper than paying the endowment tax. The same isn’t true for Harvard or Yale. It wouldn’t be true for Princeton either if the number was set much lower than 3000.

[Anonymous]

Using this loophole, Princeton’s tax savings are basically equal to its total financial aid expenditures. So in effect, the U.S. taxpayers are now funding the tuition of over half of the Princeton student body.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Princeton lobbied for the loophole and got it. Now it's working just as they intended. Hopefully, though, the loophole is closed by a future Congress. Princeton is an absurdly rich school that should pay its fair share.

Princeton didn’t lobby for the loophole, they were just able to take advantage of it. The loophole exists to protect Hillsdale.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s very clever, but when my child was looking at Princeton, I did think about what it would be like to pay full tuition at a place where the majority of classmates are paying little or nothing. I’m glad for them but schools with less generous policies (Yale) do feel fairer to payers like me who aren’t rich. Which is not something I’d thought about before.

This is an interesting and weird take. Princeton is still a quarter full pay students. That is a lot. How is it not fair if you can afford the full pay and others who can’t receive aid? (We are a full pay family)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Princeton lobbied for the loophole and got it. Now it's working just as they intended. Hopefully, though, the loophole is closed by a future Congress. Princeton is an absurdly rich school that should pay its fair share.

Princeton didn’t lobby for the loophole, they were just able to take advantage of it. The loophole exists to protect Hillsdale.

I’m in alum and live in Pennsylvania and got emails and outreach from the school telling me to call my senator to ask him to help Princeton with the endowment tax - so yes, they lobbied. I’m sure other schools did too, but in twenty years it is the only time I have gotten messages like that from Princeton.

[Anonymous]

From a “do gooder” perspective, Princeton seems to be doing great. However, it’s worth pointing out that under its current president, Princeton has a reputation as the least happy Ivy with seven student suicides since 2021.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Princeton lobbied for the loophole and got it. Now it's working just as they intended. Hopefully, though, the loophole is closed by a future Congress. Princeton is an absurdly rich school that should pay its fair share.

Princeton didn’t lobby for the loophole, they were just able to take advantage of it. The loophole exists to protect Hillsdale.

I’m in alum and live in Pennsylvania and got emails and outreach from the school telling me to call my senator to ask him to help Princeton with the endowment tax - so yes, they lobbied. I’m sure other schools did too, but in twenty years it is the only time I have gotten messages like that from Princeton.

The elite LACs all lobbied for it, including Swarthmore.

[Anonymous]

Actually for class of 2025, 62 percent of undergrads received aid, meaning 38% were full pay. That is stil a significant number of full pay students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s very clever, but when my child was looking at Princeton, I did think about what it would be like to pay full tuition at a place where the majority of classmates are paying little or nothing. I’m glad for them but schools with less generous policies (Yale) do feel fairer to payers like me who aren’t rich. Which is not something I’d thought about before.

This is an interesting and weird take. Princeton is still a quarter full pay students. That is a lot. How is it not fair if you can afford the full pay and others who can’t receive aid? (We are a full pay family)

A quarter isn’t that many! Especially considering how rich the richest are. My family income is under 200,000 a year and we live modestly. We have retirement savings and an inheritance that are not inside a retirement vehicle and therefore are not excluded from calculations. We would pay $95,000 a year and someone in a similar financial situation with their money in retirement funds would pay much less. Obviously we are lucky we can pay at all.

When we toured Princeton, our tour guide made a point of saying that people with income under $300,000 will get financial aid and that only extremely wealthy families have to pay full tuition. I understand she was making a general point but wondered whether that was what students think.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s very clever, but when my child was looking at Princeton, I did think about what it would be like to pay full tuition at a place where the majority of classmates are paying little or nothing. I’m glad for them but schools with less generous policies (Yale) do feel fairer to payers like me who aren’t rich. Which is not something I’d thought about before.

This is an interesting and weird take. Princeton is still a quarter full pay students. That is a lot. How is it not fair if you can afford the full pay and others who can’t receive aid? (We are a full pay family)

A quarter isn’t that many! Especially considering how rich the richest are. My family income is under 200,000 a year and we live modestly. We have retirement savings and an inheritance that are not inside a retirement vehicle and therefore are not excluded from calculations. We would pay $95,000 a year and someone in a similar financial situation with their money in retirement funds would pay much less. Obviously we are lucky we can pay at all.

When we toured Princeton, our tour guide made a point of saying that people with income under $300,000 will get financial aid and that only extremely wealthy families have to pay full tuition. I understand she was making a general point but wondered whether that was what students think.

You would NOT be full pay at Princeton. Princeton is far and away the most generous school in the country with aid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Brilliant and well-played. Curious how it'll work out for the other 10 or so schools hit with the endowment tax.

https://www.dailyprincetonian.com/article/2026/05/princeton-news-adpol-university-spared-endowment-tax-financial-aid-millions-princo

I mean, despite the dumb stuff done by the Trump admin, it seems like the tax is working the way it was supposed to. More money spent on getting kids in the door who otherwise couldn't afford it.

Don't sanewash them.

There's no reason 1 one large school should pay a huge tax that 2 smaller schools dont.

What's the point if Harvard-Radcliffe just splits into Harvard and Radcliffe to avoid the tax?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Actually for class of 2025, 62 percent of undergrads received aid, meaning 38% were full pay. That is stil a significant number of full pay students.

Class of 2025 was before this happened. It was 69/31 for 2029 and is at least 70/30 for 2030.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually for class of 2025, 62 percent of undergrads received aid, meaning 38% were full pay. That is stil a significant number of full pay students.

Class of 2025 was before this happened. It was 69/31 for 2029 and is at least 70/30 for 2030.

I still consider 30% a significant percentage of full pay families. Surprised that it is still even higher at other peer schools.

[Anonymous]

Doesn’t seem fair to exempt Princeton, Schools like Holy Cross and Colgate both SLACs with 3300 kids will have to pay.