Donut hole reality

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is nothing else you buy where the price is set based on what the seller thinks you can afford.

That's not how this works.

Most schools don't meet need. Schools that do, only meet need for the select few they admit (being smart and needy is no sure thing). All you are saying is you would feel better if no one received aid, even though you personally would be no better off, and there would be plenty of rich kids with high test scores willing to take the spot you won't pay for. Also the need that is provided is largely institutional sources, Pell Grants don't begin to cover a college education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is nothing else you buy where the price is set based on what the seller thinks you can afford.

This. People making analogies to buying houses and cars don’t get it.

[Anonymous]

My DS chose a nice public school in another state. 50K. So half of BC. We were ready to pay more, and have plenty in our 529. But this is a nice savings.

But I honestly don't know why donut hole families would pay 100k. It must be ego. There are plenty of good schools at half the price.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:People who claim donut hole and are angry that they only have 130k in an account —are you also stomping your feet that you can’t afford the 2M mansions in the other town? Do you ping away at what you cannot have? Or are you happy that you have a good home in a solid town. Because you are indeed able to afford a good education via state universities. I swear college admissions is the only area where this nonsense comes into play. For everything else in life you buy what you can afford in your budget and move one. Why do you think you are entitled to a high priced private college. You have 100s even 1000s of colleges available to you via public universities.

It’s because so many selective colleges have policies where incomes under $150k students can attend free. Or under $200k, students qualify for need-based aid, and so on.

“Donut hole” (terrible name) is this window of income that puts you above need-based aid, but not enough to save as much as you’d had hoped.

The people who use the term tend to be jerks so it’s understandable why they’re disliked so much, but so many regular people fall into this category. They are stretched with housing, retirement, elder care, college savings, inflation and on and on. And yes, our kids end up going to public colleges or community schools, and doing ok. But, as a policy matter, it does sting that someone earning just a bit less than you qualifies for aid. I know there’ll be someone who says “well then earn less!” 🙄 there’s always a rebuttal to everything, but that’s the honest answer.

It’s about lifestyle choices. Two families on the same income and one chooses a million dollar house and one chooses a $400k house. The million dollar house family with more kids should not get rewarded for their poor decisions.

We picked the 400k house. We still couldn't pay 85k/year times 2 for college. Or I guess we "could", but it would be a financially stupid decision!

Same here but I guess it makes people like the PP feel better to make these assumptions. We are not going on fancy vacations and we settled for a 2300sq ft house. Still couldn’t pay full price at privates.

2300 square feet is huge to us. We have 1000. We don’t vacation.

All that so you can pay full price for college? Not sure it’s wise actually.

How is that not wise? We will full pay for a state school and grad school. No debt. We don’t expect charity.

I thought you were paying for private college as someone living a bare bones lifestyle. That would make zero sense.

[Anonymous]

UMC begrudging the MC/poor. MC telling the UMC to suck it up. Meanwhile, no one talking about the absurd increase of getting a college education. Lack of funding for higher education, predatory loans, bloated admin costs while departments keep getting cut left and right. But yeah let’s fight each other.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There used to be a belief that higher education was a societal goods that we all had a vested interest in supporting. We believed in social mobility and having an educated populace that could compete with any nation in the world. It is why there was a GI bill, Pell Grants, etc.

You can save a lot, but tuition has been going up at a rate much greater than average income. It is more out of reach than it used to be. So people are understandably frustrated. They can’t keep up and they’ve seen higher ed shift from a common good to a luxury good.

Some of us still believe this and that is why the comparison of a degree to a BMW or a Honda is so wrong.

[Anonymous]

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Nobody is entitled to an elite education. We do have many many affordable ways to get a college education. CC to 4 year state school, in-state 4 year from start, private schools (with good merit many times), OOS schools with merit, and very expensive private schools.
You go where you can afford. Your kid will get a great education most places. Pick one within your budget and move on.

Exactly - no one is entitled to an elite education except the wealthy and poor so the wealthy can feel good about themselves. Middle and upper middle class people, please stay in your lane. Your lane being in state schools, cc to instate schools, lesser/non elite schools that give tons of merit. Don’t even think about aspiring to more. Leave elite schools to the elite. Stay in your lane. When they talk about diversity and all that stuff, just realize it is lip service and they aren’t talking about you

This is SPOT ON.

Yes, it is.

AND IT DIDN'T USED TO BE THIS WAY.

You are correct - it used to be that only rich people could afford Ivies. There were limited scholarships, but not the type and breadth of assistance they have now. How was a poor kid from Mississippi supposed to even be able to afford to travel back and forth to Boston, even if tuition was covered?

These days, elite schools have generous assistance for truly poor/LMC kids, and so now the parents of the UMC kids are whining. If your kid gets into Harvard, they pay nothing if your income is less than $85k, if your income is between $85k and $150k, you'll pay less than 10% of your annual income, and they offer financial assistance to some people above $150k. If you make more than $200k a year, and you want your kid to go to a "top" college, save money for that (and by the way, you are *not* "middle class"). If you saved $500 a month since the kid was born, you'd have $265k in their college fund. If your kid has Ivy-level stats, they'll be granted all kinds of merit aid to go to the majority of the top 100 academic institutions in this country. Yes, there are a small number of "elite" colleges that don't have generous financial aid for people making $150k and don't give merit aid. If your kid can't go to Vanderbilt for free, your kid can go to go to a virtually indistinguishable college in another town that does offer merit aid. Life isn't fair. I, for one, am happy that "elite" colleges try to make life a little fairer by providing aid to kids that are truly disadvantaged. That group, however, does not include UMC kids whose parents chose not to save money for their college education.

Perfectly said.

Except that it is not accurate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:UMC begrudging the MC/poor. MC telling the UMC to suck it up. Meanwhile, no one talking about the absurd increase of getting a college education. Lack of funding for higher education, predatory loans, bloated admin costs while departments keep getting cut left and right. But yeah let’s fight each other.

Actually it's UMC bemoaning the absurd increase of getting a college education, the lack of funding for higher education, predatory loans, bloated admin costs, and the cutting of departments left and right.

At least, that's what my complaint relates to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UMC begrudging the MC/poor. MC telling the UMC to suck it up. Meanwhile, no one talking about the absurd increase of getting a college education. Lack of funding for higher education, predatory loans, bloated admin costs while departments keep getting cut left and right. But yeah let’s fight each other.

Actually it's UMC bemoaning the absurd increase of getting a college education, the lack of funding for higher education, predatory loans, bloated admin costs, and the cutting of departments left and right.

At least, that's what my complaint relates to.

One can get a college education for a pretty low cost by making use of community colleges or ROTC scholarship. You’ve just decided you don’t like the most affordable options.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is nothing else you buy where the price is set based on what the seller thinks you can afford.

Hello there, Mr.-Have-Never-Studied-Economics!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ok I’ll bite. I make $193,000.00 as a government attorney. However the first 20 years I was paying student loans. I paid them off. I didn’t get student loan forgiveness. Then and only then did I have one child but if course it took years and now I’m an older mom. I have been saving in a 529 for 8 years now but I will never reach the numbers required to pay tuition at the school I attended. Maybe I’ll just retire the year before I have to fill out the FASFA as it’s the only way I will get any aid. I also had medical bills and sent money to my mother. But sure I’m UMC.

Yep. People are very out of touch with reality.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:There is nothing else you buy where the price is set based on what the seller thinks you can afford.

Hello there, Mr.-Have-Never-Studied-Economics!

At these prices, who can afford it?!

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:UMC begrudging the MC/poor. MC telling the UMC to suck it up. Meanwhile, no one talking about the absurd increase of getting a college education. Lack of funding for higher education, predatory loans, bloated admin costs while departments keep getting cut left and right. But yeah let’s fight each other.

Actually it's UMC bemoaning the absurd increase of getting a college education, the lack of funding for higher education, predatory loans, bloated admin costs, and the cutting of departments left and right.

At least, that's what my complaint relates to.

One can get a college education for a pretty low cost by making use of community colleges or ROTC scholarship. You’ve just decided you don’t like the most affordable options.

But I want my child to go to an elite college that others cannot go to, so that my child can be rich.

Is that too much to ask?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My god— my niece paid $100k freshmen year to attend Boston College.

It’s not very different from Georgetown or any of the SLACs.

My child has been accepted to some very adjective universities (5-6%%) acceptance rate—but paying $70k more per year over the very good VA public university seems ludicrous.

This is the point we have come to in higher education. A $400k undergrad degree?

what does this mean? donut hole?

[Anonymous]

This whole thread is useless without laying out how much total income family has, going back/forward 10 years of more.

There's no reason to expect private college should be easily affordable from current income. It's a 4 years in a lifetime experience.