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Although the graph is interesting people are treating it like it’s some nefarious plot. There are far more students in the 60-99% income range applying to college than below 60%. And for the top 1%, there’s not that many of them and they apply mainly to the legacy institution, so of course they have a higher rate.

Basic statistics people…

I just looked it up and 15% of Harvards class is from the top 1%.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/college-mobility/harvard-university

That also says that 52% of Harvard students are between 80 and 99th %ile and 4.5% are between 0 and 20th. But somehow DCUM's take away is that the people in the 80th %ile are disadvantaged over the poor people.

+1

Always amazes me at the DCUM people complaining that they make $175K and how terrible it is that they can't afford college, when there are plenty of people living on $65-75K. If college is important to you, then you can find a way to save. If you were making $100K 10 years ago and now make $175K, then you could have been saving that extra amount each year and not let your lifestyle increase. Instead you played keeping up with the Joneses.

Or maybe they started finally saving for their retirement after paying for day care and their own student loans?

Once again, life is all about choices. If you choose to take $200K in student/parent loans for your own education, then you need a plan to pay them off before you have kids. Or at least delay having kids by 3-4 years while you go gazelle intense on getting rid of debt---keep driving that college beater and living in a college style apartment and not taking vacations.
You dont' just get to live the fancy adult life without a worry for your debt you took on. Or if you choose to have kids before the debt is paid down, then you live in a smaller, less costly home that you can afford. And by afford I mean continue to pay off the principal on your loans, pay all expenses/mortgage and still save for retirement.

I cannot fathom taking a trip to Hawaii or Jamaica if I was not saving for retirement or college at a decent level. I would not own anything beyond a basic vehicle until I was able to do that saving either. I got married and we paid off all our student loans and saved for our first house in a 5 year timeframe. We bought a house we could afford with only 1 of our salaries, so we could still save the 2nd salary. Worked towards saving for future cars so that we would need only a small loan or no loan---that meant driving them for 7-8 years and saving the monthly payments after the first 3 years and the car was paid off. Then we waited 3 more years before having kids.
Basically, you need to learn to define needs and wants in a truthful manner. Then you do not get wants until you have fully funded all needs---and in my book retirement and college savings are needs, so we prioritize them over vacations and the like.

Fact is, if you were living on $100K 10 years ago, you can still be living on only $110K anything extra could be put towards savings---but most don't do that

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Anonymous wrote:There is an interesting article by the New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/07/24/upshot/ivy-league-elite-college-admissions.html

Look at the graph. Small preference for the poor, large preference for the 0.1%. At the cost of the 60th to 99th percentile.

that's you DCUM.

Disagree. This chart seems to show the 70th to 95th being the issue.

The 99th is advantaged (just not as much as the 99.9). The 98/97/96 look ok, about average.

What income range is the 70th to 95th?

The 400k to 600k families with private school kids seem to complain the most. Even though that income and private seem to both be advantageous.

It’s the 100k - 300k families that go missing at these schools based on the data. They are discriminated against. That also corresponds nicely to what a mid level 2-income household would make. Two blue collar workers at the lower end to two mid level professionals at the higher end.

How are they "discriminated" against? There are still families in that range who manage to send their kids to $80K universities? How? Ones who have made it a priority and have saved for it. And others who don't care, smartly realizing that it does NOT matter where their kid attends so they save to pay for state schools and put the rest into retirement for themselves. But if you are making $150K, you could choose to live like you make $75K (plenty around you do, in fact most do) and save the rest. But you Chose not to do that. You need to get your head out of your ass and realize that you are much more privileged than most people. Most living on $75K or less per year would do almost anything to be making $150-200K.

You need to read the article, they are clearly discriminated against. They are talking about admission rates for students with the same profiles, with the only variable being family income. This is not about choosing to attend/pay.

The authors of this opinion piece want the NESCAC to lead in eliminating admissions preferences for athletes: https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/views/2023/07/24/end-admissions-preferences-athletes-opinion

I think the coaches need to do a better job recruiting from a variety of places and looking for potential versus the best as a junior or senior in high school but eliminating any preference when at least certain sports are key parts of campus community life is extreme.

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Anonymous wrote:I just read this article. Super interesting. It said athletic preferences tend to pull in rich kids because many sports are only played by rich kids.

Nah. The vast majority of athletes are certainly in the un-preferred 60th to 99th income percentile.

Coaches have a limited number of athletes they can ask for admissions preference. They hate using a roster slot to make an offer and then the kid doesn't attend. If athletes tend to be "richer" it is because coaches are more willing to extend offers to kids who are sure to be able to afford attending. A college making an ED admission offer and then the parents say "oops we actually can't afford this" is a thing that can happen even for non-athletes.

This is just false. The vast majority of college athletes play lacrosse, golf, squash, swimming, fencing, sailing, etc... The number of football and basketball players is smaller when you combine the other categories.

Wrong. Your ignorance is stunning and hilarious.

The vast majority (85%) of male college athletes play baseball, basketball, football, soccer, cross country / track, and wrestling. These are not rich kid sports. Lacrosse, Golf, Hockey, Tennis, Volleyball, Water Polo etc. are only 15%. And I don't even agree you have to be wealthy to play lacrosse (which is most of the 15%) so that's being generous to your argument.

The number of athletes in "very expensive" sports is totally trivial. Fencing (about 1,400 men and women), Sailing (about 1,600 men and women), Equestrian (about 2,000 men and women), Squash (about 1,000 men and women).

https://scholarshipstats.com/varsityodds

Also a number of those sports are "rich kid sports." Soccer, baseball, and XC are just from your list. The first two have unfortunate pay-to-play models in the US. Both sports do have a number of programs to try to improve though.

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Anonymous wrote:hat said the challenge is finding high income students who are absolutely committed to staying the full four years as well as academically willing to put in the effort to satisfy the graduation requirements that are tied to the university ranking. This is no trivial challenge, finding high income students who are also studious.

That's not a challenge at all. The paper shows there are plenty of kids in the parental income 97-100% range who have high test scores and high GPA (i.e. they are studious). The trope that rich kids are lazy and stupid is simply false.

Nobody is implying rich kids are lazy and stupid.

From a university point of view, finding high income and studious is a challenge.

Financial aid is the carrot the university offers to make a low income student to do one thing: 1) stay committed for full four years and graduate. Whereas the university is asking a high income student do two things: 1) go ask your parents or get a loan but pay full tuition 2) please stay here for four years and put in the effort to graduate. Within the high income student pool, the legacy students bring in the additional attribute of emotional commitment which may or may not be present in a random high income student.

If these colleges weren't so stupidly expensive, then they wouldn't have to worry about #2. UMC could afford full pay without loans if they lowered the cost, but like expensive cars, the colleges like to keep it expensive to create a "in the club" experience.

why shouldn't a for profit university raise prices if it can still keep demand?

Apple's iPhone is celebrated as an all American business success every time it raises prices, and everyone - high income as well as low income happily pay $1400+ for owning it over time. Same with other branded luxuries, resort vacations, etc... As long as everyone pays the same, no one complains. Imagine what would happen if Apple changes its phone sales to something like half of their phone purchases to lower half will be funded by the upper half based on family income, color of their skin or some other social factor?

The colleges mentioned in the article are NONprofits with tremendous tax benefits although they act like for-profits.

they are nonprofit, but Private. all non-profit means profits made should be reinvested back into the college. There is no law that says non-profits should not maximize profits.

Sure, but all this talk of "oh we have to charge that much so that we can cover the non rich kids" is BS. If they lowered the costs, more people could afford to pay for it without taking out stupid sized loans.

That's like saying if disneyland lowered its ticket prices more people would enjoy the experience. Well, that would be a different experience at a cheaper price, no different than a local random amusement park. Given there are many amusement parks on the thousand mile journey from home to florida, why the craving for disneyland, is what one should ask themselves? If disneyland wants more visitors, they will lower the price on their terms, not when public says it should. Disneyland has figured out a businessmodel to offer a certain level of experience for a lofty ticket price, and still maintain demand. Why should they change their model, because public far away with access to local amusement parks are crying sour grapes?

only a dumb person would equate going to Disneyland with going to a top rated college.

Also, Disneyland is a for profit entity; college are not -- since you or a PP mentioned the non profit angle.

Non-profit colleges are not public universities. they just mean all the profit has to be reinvested back into the business, but like anyother business can and do operate like any other business. a non-profit's goal is to maximize profit, reinvest, and grow the business in this case university business. They owe nothing to the taxpayer unlike a public or state owned university, and taxpayers and government dont get to say how a nonprofit should operate. Business serves and responds to its customers.

That said, the question falls back on the customers. Why are you going to a business that you cannot afford? And why moan about the miniscule number of customers who are willing to pay that high price? Every city has expensive lobster and steakhouse restaurant that a few customers dont mind paying to eat at often. Just because 99% of the city population cant afford to eat there daily, should they be shunned for their fine dining business model?

There are 4000 total US universities and just 8 of them are in the ivy leagues (0.2%) Elite universities just like luxury business have come up with a business model to serve a certain customer base. Prudent public would like across the spectrum of 4000 - 8 = 3992 universities and make choices of what suits their educational needs and what they can afford, instead of grouching and grumbling about how few people on the other end of town are always eating at the stakehouse.

THIS^^^^

People need to recognize they are NOT Entitled to an Elite/T25 education. Just like most things in life, there will be plenty of things you can't afford or are unable to do. Life is about choices. Luckily with college, there are literally over 4000 universities in this country, many many many of them are affordable to most people. SO the great news is anyone who wants it can get a good education.
VA has over 10 great public universities, all but 3 (W&M, UVA, VATech) of them are accessible to most good students and many excellent CC that can be an extremely affordable path towards a 4 year degree.

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:There is an interesting article by the New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/07/24/upshot/ivy-league-elite-college-admissions.html

Look at the graph. Small preference for the poor, large preference for the 0.1%. At the cost of the 60th to 99th percentile.

that's you DCUM.

Disagree. This chart seems to show the 70th to 95th being the issue.

The 99th is advantaged (just not as much as the 99.9). The 98/97/96 look ok, about average.

What income range is the 70th to 95th?

The 400k to 600k families with private school kids seem to complain the most. Even though that income and private seem to both be advantageous.

It’s the 100k - 300k families that go missing at these schools based on the data. They are discriminated against. That also corresponds nicely to what a mid level 2-income household would make. Two blue collar workers at the lower end to two mid level professionals at the higher end.

How are they "discriminated" against? There are still families in that range who manage to send their kids to $80K universities? How? Ones who have made it a priority and have saved for it. And others who don't care, smartly realizing that it does NOT matter where their kid attends so they save to pay for state schools and put the rest into retirement for themselves. But if you are making $150K, you could choose to live like you make $75K (plenty around you do, in fact most do) and save the rest. But you Chose not to do that. You need to get your head out of your ass and realize that you are much more privileged than most people. Most living on $75K or less per year would do almost anything to be making $150-200K.

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Although the graph is interesting people are treating it like it’s some nefarious plot. There are far more students in the 60-99% income range applying to college than below 60%. And for the top 1%, there’s not that many of them and they apply mainly to the legacy institution, so of course they have a higher rate.

Basic statistics people…

I just looked it up and 15% of Harvards class is from the top 1%.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/college-mobility/harvard-university

That also says that 52% of Harvard students are between 80 and 99th %ile and 4.5% are between 0 and 20th. But somehow DCUM's take away is that the people in the 80th %ile are disadvantaged over the poor people.

+1

Always amazes me at the DCUM people complaining that they make $175K and how terrible it is that they can't afford college, when there are plenty of people living on $65-75K. If college is important to you, then you can find a way to save. If you were making $100K 10 years ago and now make $175K, then you could have been saving that extra amount each year and not let your lifestyle increase. Instead you played keeping up with the Joneses.

Or maybe they started finally saving for their retirement after paying for day care and their own student loans?

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Although the graph is interesting people are treating it like it’s some nefarious plot. There are far more students in the 60-99% income range applying to college than below 60%. And for the top 1%, there’s not that many of them and they apply mainly to the legacy institution, so of course they have a higher rate.

Basic statistics people…

I just looked it up and 15% of Harvards class is from the top 1%.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/college-mobility/harvard-university

That also says that 52% of Harvard students are between 80 and 99th %ile and 4.5% are between 0 and 20th. But somehow DCUM's take away is that the people in the 80th %ile are disadvantaged over the poor people.

+1

Always amazes me at the DCUM people complaining that they make $175K and how terrible it is that they can't afford college, when there are plenty of people living on $65-75K. If college is important to you, then you can find a way to save. If you were making $100K 10 years ago and now make $175K, then you could have been saving that extra amount each year and not let your lifestyle increase. Instead you played keeping up with the Joneses.

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Anonymous wrote:hat said the challenge is finding high income students who are absolutely committed to staying the full four years as well as academically willing to put in the effort to satisfy the graduation requirements that are tied to the university ranking. This is no trivial challenge, finding high income students who are also studious.

That's not a challenge at all. The paper shows there are plenty of kids in the parental income 97-100% range who have high test scores and high GPA (i.e. they are studious). The trope that rich kids are lazy and stupid is simply false.

Nobody is implying rich kids are lazy and stupid.

From a university point of view, finding high income and studious is a challenge.

Financial aid is the carrot the university offers to make a low income student to do one thing: 1) stay committed for full four years and graduate. Whereas the university is asking a high income student do two things: 1) go ask your parents or get a loan but pay full tuition 2) please stay here for four years and put in the effort to graduate. Within the high income student pool, the legacy students bring in the additional attribute of emotional commitment which may or may not be present in a random high income student.

If these colleges weren't so stupidly expensive, then they wouldn't have to worry about #2. UMC could afford full pay without loans if they lowered the cost, but like expensive cars, the colleges like to keep it expensive to create a "in the club" experience.

why shouldn't a for profit university raise prices if it can still keep demand?

Apple's iPhone is celebrated as an all American business success every time it raises prices, and everyone - high income as well as low income happily pay $1400+ for owning it over time. Same with other branded luxuries, resort vacations, etc... As long as everyone pays the same, no one complains. Imagine what would happen if Apple changes its phone sales to something like half of their phone purchases to lower half will be funded by the upper half based on family income, color of their skin or some other social factor?

The colleges mentioned in the article are NONprofits with tremendous tax benefits although they act like for-profits.

they are nonprofit, but Private. all non-profit means profits made should be reinvested back into the college. There is no law that says non-profits should not maximize profits.

Sure, but all this talk of "oh we have to charge that much so that we can cover the non rich kids" is BS. If they lowered the costs, more people could afford to pay for it without taking out stupid sized loans.

So what exactly do you propose a university eliminate or reduce to charge lower tuition? Most 80k+ schools have smaller class sizes---so would you prefer your kid sit in lectures with 300-500 kids for most of their classes? That way they can fire 1/3 of the professors. Let's go back to 1 cafeteria on campus for the 6K undergrads and make it just a normal college cafeteria like we had 30+ years ago.....2 entrees, salad bar, cereal and 1 dessert option for each dinner. No specialty dining or options because those truly cost money and it's much cheaper to run a basic cafeteria in one place everyone just has to walk 20 mins to get to.

Forget the new chemistry labs---kids can squeeze 100 into the lab space for their Orgo Chem lab instead of 25---more partners, less learning for you to do hands on.

I suppose I lived without shuttle busses on my campus 30+ years ago, so kids can just walk the 1.5 miles from one end to the other even at -5 degrees and 11pm, same for the campus security/safe walk---we lived without it, kids can today as well.

Yes they can cut some administration salaries, but the fact is universities cost a lot to run. Dorms cost more than apartments because they are not cheap---the RAs/RHD/services provided to help kids on campus cost money. Maintaining old dorms is expensive as well.

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:hat said the challenge is finding high income students who are absolutely committed to staying the full four years as well as academically willing to put in the effort to satisfy the graduation requirements that are tied to the university ranking. This is no trivial challenge, finding high income students who are also studious.

That's not a challenge at all. The paper shows there are plenty of kids in the parental income 97-100% range who have high test scores and high GPA (i.e. they are studious). The trope that rich kids are lazy and stupid is simply false.

Nobody is implying rich kids are lazy and stupid.

From a university point of view, finding high income and studious is a challenge.

Except it isn't.

http://www.studentaidpolicy.com/who-pays-full-sticker-price-for-a-college-education.html

Look at the Ivy League schools - roughly 50% of freshmen pay full price. You will also note that in colleges with a <10% acceptance rate (the most selective) 47% of the freshmen pay full price. There are clearly a lot of high-income, studious kids. And I dare say if these institutions didn't make a point of admitting a certain number of low-income kids just for appearance's sake, those full-pay percentages would be even higher. Maybe even 100%.

+1000

Yes, the notion that full pay students are not "super smart and studious" is wrong. There are plenty of really smart, studious, motivated high income students. Most have grown up in a place of privilege and have had tutoring and outside help the moment they show any signs of a struggle. They get SAT/ACT tutoring before they take the first real test. They also have grown up expecting that the natural path after 12th grade is to enter a 4 year university, often times dreaming of their families various alma maters.
Sure there are rich kids who are not that smart and who coast thru life on the family coattails, but that is not the norm.
And yes, universities would find it much easier to not go after as many first gen/low income students....it is a lot of work to ensure that those students succeed at college and graduate in 4 years....when the kids have no influence at home that can help them understand what college is about and the kids are truly struggling with how to buy books or ensure they have enough money for food.

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Anonymous wrote:I just read this article. Super interesting. It said athletic preferences tend to pull in rich kids because many sports are only played by rich kids.

Nah. The vast majority of athletes are certainly in the un-preferred 60th to 99th income percentile.

Coaches have a limited number of athletes they can ask for admissions preference. They hate using a roster slot to make an offer and then the kid doesn't attend. If athletes tend to be "richer" it is because coaches are more willing to extend offers to kids who are sure to be able to afford attending. A college making an ED admission offer and then the parents say "oops we actually can't afford this" is a thing that can happen even for non-athletes.

This is just false. The vast majority of college athletes play lacrosse, golf, squash, swimming, fencing, sailing, etc... The number of football and basketball players is smaller when you combine the other categories.

Wrong. Your ignorance is stunning and hilarious.

The vast majority (85%) of male college athletes play baseball, basketball, football, soccer, cross country / track, and wrestling. These are not rich kid sports. Lacrosse, Golf, Hockey, Tennis, Volleyball, Water Polo etc. are only 15%. And I don't even agree you have to be wealthy to play lacrosse (which is most of the 15%) so that's being generous to your argument.

The number of athletes in "very expensive" sports is totally trivial. Fencing (about 1,400 men and women), Sailing (about 1,600 men and women), Equestrian (about 2,000 men and women), Squash (about 1,000 men and women).

https://scholarshipstats.com/varsityodds

Your stats don’t appear to be limited to the highly selective colleges we’re discussing. We’re talking about the Ivy League, not the SEC.

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Anonymous wrote:Well duh. The 0.1% are probably either highly connected or donors (or both).

right. but they are not the interesting part. what do you think of the results for the 60-99%?

Given the above, as well as a known preference for admitting 1st generation and minorities, I'm not surprised the 60-99% gets the shaft.

Yes, focus on that, not the fact they are not overrepresented unlike the other groups the article talks about.

Nice very nice, keep them fight amongst each other and not focus on us.

Exactly. The narrative is to suggest URMs are the preferred groups but this study shows the wealthy are.

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Anonymous wrote:I just read this article. Super interesting. It said athletic preferences tend to pull in rich kids because many sports are only played by rich kids.

Nah. The vast majority of athletes are certainly in the un-preferred 60th to 99th income percentile.

Coaches have a limited number of athletes they can ask for admissions preference. They hate using a roster slot to make an offer and then the kid doesn't attend. If athletes tend to be "richer" it is because coaches are more willing to extend offers to kids who are sure to be able to afford attending. A college making an ED admission offer and then the parents say "oops we actually can't afford this" is a thing that can happen even for non-athletes.

This is just false. The vast majority of college athletes play lacrosse, golf, squash, swimming, fencing, sailing, etc... The number of football and basketball players is smaller when you combine the other categories.

Wrong. Your ignorance is stunning and hilarious.

The vast majority (85%) of male college athletes play baseball, basketball, football, soccer, cross country / track, and wrestling. These are not rich kid sports. Lacrosse, Golf, Hockey, Tennis, Volleyball, Water Polo etc. are only 15%. And I don't even agree you have to be wealthy to play lacrosse (which is most of the 15%) so that's being generous to your argument.

The number of athletes in "very expensive" sports is totally trivial. Fencing (about 1,400 men and women), Sailing (about 1,600 men and women), Equestrian (about 2,000 men and women), Squash (about 1,000 men and women).

https://scholarshipstats.com/varsityodds

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Anonymous wrote:There is an interesting article by the New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/07/24/upshot/ivy-league-elite-college-admissions.html

Look at the graph. Small preference for the poor, large preference for the 0.1%. At the cost of the 60th to 99th percentile.

that's you DCUM.

Disagree. This chart seems to show the 70th to 95th being the issue.

The 99th is advantaged (just not as much as the 99.9). The 98/97/96 look ok, about average.

What income range is the 70th to 95th?

The 400k to 600k families with private school kids seem to complain the most. Even though that income and private seem to both be advantageous.

It’s the 100k - 300k families that go missing at these schools based on the data. They are discriminated against. That also corresponds nicely to what a mid level 2-income household would make. Two blue collar workers at the lower end to two mid level professionals at the higher end.

Do you have evidence to support that there are fewer 100K to 300K families than families under 100K?

Ummm….read the article. There are not fewer in total, but they have a lower likelihood of admission with the same grades/scores. That’s what the whole article was about, they controlled for various factors.

I quoted a post that said those kids are the ones missing, which would imply there are fewer of them.

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is an interesting article by the New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/07/24/upshot/ivy-league-elite-college-admissions.html

Look at the graph. Small preference for the poor, large preference for the 0.1%. At the cost of the 60th to 99th percentile.

that's you DCUM.

Disagree. This chart seems to show the 70th to 95th being the issue.

The 99th is advantaged (just not as much as the 99.9). The 98/97/96 look ok, about average.

What income range is the 70th to 95th?

The 400k to 600k families with private school kids seem to complain the most. Even though that income and private seem to both be advantageous.

It’s the 100k - 300k families that go missing at these schools based on the data. They are discriminated against. That also corresponds nicely to what a mid level 2-income household would make. Two blue collar workers at the lower end to two mid level professionals at the higher end.

Do you have evidence to support that there are fewer 100K to 300K families than families under 100K?

Ummm….read the article. There are not fewer in total, but they have a lower likelihood of admission with the same grades/scores. That’s what the whole article was about, they controlled for various factors.