How Did College Education Become So Ridiculously Expensive?

[Sancho]

10. The biggest problem is change in state support for college.

Conservative legislatures for about 30 years, and particularly in the last 10 years, have cut support for higher-education. All public colleges (community, state universities, etc.) in the 50's would pay for the majority of costs - up to 80%! In the 60's and 70's, colleges also generated lots more money with two "new" areas: research grants (usually an expanding federal investment) and athletics (TV revenue). Both of those dried up in the 80's.

Motivated to make colleges "privatized" and also to use tax money for pet projects instead of education, many states reduced the proportion of support for college. Many colleges now get the majority of funding from tuition and fees, where it used to be provided by an appropriation from your state government.

Private colleges have always depended on tuition and whatever foundation accounts they can create, but the cost of private college is usually 3 to 4 times the cost of public universities.

In real dollars, faculty salaries are no better than several decades ago, and actually have decreased for many professors. Administrators and coaches have done better than the faculty.