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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP here. So I mentioned this to DH, who has worked in higher ed. He said the number one thing that will stop all of this is to get rid of private student loans entirely. He said as soon as students can only take out loans up to the federal limit, "tuition will crater back down immediately."

Similarly to what some of you have said, he said the biggest driver of tuition increases is the ability for students to borrow a ton of money. He also said that if you can discharge loans in bankruptcy, that will reduce banks' incentive to give out these loans like candy. [/quote]

And then the top schools will be populated only by the wealthy instead of mostly by the wealthy.

Logic is faulty and there is a reason no one suggests this for other markets that rely on debt, such as housing.[/quote]

Nope. If students can't take out private loans, tuition will go down, making it more accessible to everyone. [/quote]

You have no evidence of that at all.  Sure it will go down some places -- just as not all colleges charge the same now.  Do you think the top 50 schools will be forced to lower their prices? Don't you think they can fill their cohorts with full pay-no loans now?

Also, you can't stop all forms of debt, so eliminating one has little effect.  Mortgages and other forms of debt will fill the void.

One last polite suggestion: simply repeating your assertion is not a sound way of proving your assertion.
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It's just common sense.

Why can schools charge so much tuition now? Because they can fill their classes with people who can give them the money. However, most people can't give them full-price from their own personal accounts. So they take out loans and the schools get some combination of parents' money and the bank's money.

What happens if the bank's money disappears? The parents' money isn't going to replace that difference, so schools HAVE to reduce tuition or give out a crapton more financial aid. Why? Because they aren't going to be able to fill their classes with people who can pay $70K+/year.

It's really not that difficult. [/quote]
Private loans are exceedingly rare at the top colleges, and graduates of them, on average, have among the lowest levels of indebtedness of all schools.[/quote]

Why do people think that basic economics doesn’t work for colleges? Supply and demand.  More students (demographics), and more students with $$ (loans) = higher prices.  It will be interesting to see what happens when covid dries up the full pay international student pipeline.  We’ll see how fixed those tuition costs really are (or schools will lower their standards to get students with $$.)[/quote]

Uhhh... Because "colleges" aren't a commodity...

... and because there's already more supply than demand now... way more...

Stop spouting off page 1 of economics for dummies like you have it all figured out.  You don't.

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