Reply to ok, don't crucify me.. question about financial aid.

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am starting to feel like most financial aid is actually a disservice.  It encourages families who cannot truly afford the luxury of private school to spend whatever they can set aside, instead of saving for college, retirement and paying off their mortgage.  Because they have not saved for college, the cycle repeats with these families expecting taxpayers, full pay families and endowments to fund most college expenses.  Undoubtedly, their children will still end up with large student loans AND parents who are unprepared for retirement.  Why should private schools promote this irresponsible path? And guilt trip other parents who don't support it?  We just have a really warped view of needs vs. wants in our society.[/quote]

I  know some people aren't going to like this , but:

[b]We save aggressively for retirement and also receive a lot of FA  (60%[/b]).  My older DH's account is being fully funded, and mine nearly so. At our income level, that's probably unusual.   We do it by living within our means, with "our means" being what's left over after paying tuition and paying into retirement.  We have a townhouse in a part of town most people here probably  don't live in, one car, and buy our clothes at thrift stores.  No regrets  – our kid  is getting a superb education, while at our crappy public school a teacher was recently arrested for punching a child. No thanks.

It is true that we are saving a zero for college, but our kid is just going to have to be smart about choosing which college to go to. I'm OK with that.  We have the substantial sum we've  been paying towards his private school tuition can add in, and beyond that we'll figure it out. [/quote]

Your post really bothers me. Your savings for retirement should be going to your kids tuition if it's that important to you. You basically want someone else to supplement your kids education so you can retire. [/quote]

Yeah, I knew it would bother some people. But financial aid offices don't expect or want people to neglect their retirement for tuition. I am 100% honest on my FA forms.  I was responding to the person above who thought that FA just encourages financial irresponsibly. And indeed it would, if parents were expected to save $0 for retirement.

But they aren't.  FA offices actually encourage financial  responsibility by allowing relatively large retirement contributions.  [/quote]

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