Who should pay for students to attend college?
Wolf: A combination of students and government—though government’s primary role should be in underwriting loans and making sure that people don’t stay away from college because they are worried that they might not be able to repay a loan if they get ill, are unemployed, etc. Nemko: In the same way that shifting medical costs to insurers makes patients cavalier about whether to demand fancy tests and procedures, even when not cost-effective, the more the government and private donors (alumni, private scholarships) pay of the college tab, the less responsibly the student and family need to determine college’s cost-effectiveness. Also, every time the government increases financial aid or a private scholarship is set up, it merely allows colleges to raise their sticker prices more. Yankelovich: I think we should put ideology aside and use good old American pragmatism. The combination of inexorably rising higher-education costs and lower state subsidies is a disaster for low-income families
