Reply to Are top private colleges mainly for poor people now?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I don't understand the premise of this thread.  Folks keep pulling opinions out of their A** when numerous people have posted links to various studies indicating that like 70%+ of the students at the top schools are from families in the top 20% of income.  Peel the onion a bit and 14% are from the top 1%, so 56% of students are in the 2%-19% of top incomes.

Top 20% income is ~$150,000/year per person, so $300,000 HHI.

So, 56% of students come from $300,000 HHI, 14% of students come from $800,000+ HHI.

None of this leads me to believe that top private colleges are only for poor people.[/quote]

Ok, so let's not use the word "poor" and instead say "people of modest means" which I think accurately describes anyone who qualifies for financial aid.  The majority of the students at these schools are receiving (usually very robust, on average) financial aid.  Those who do not, for various reasons, skew heavily towards being very well off.  One of the ways we know this is that the people who are paying full price are paying full price!  You can't swing $80k/yr if you are a 200k ish family.  You just can't.  So there is a very big hole in between qualifying for aid and being able to comfortably pay for $80k/yr for undergrad.  The majority now receive aid--in this sense these schools are "mainly" for the poor.  Poor being a term of art.  The next sentence of the subject could be, with some but not a lot of exaggeration, "And those who aren't poor are rich."[/quote]

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