Should College Tuition Be Free?

Some of the newest controversy in the United States is whether college tuition should have a price tag or not. Not everybody knows what free in this scenario means. Once they realize that it would be coming out of their pockets, in tax form, they would start wanting to take advantage of what college education has to offer and its benefits. This would create opportunists of all kinds of studying habits to enroll in school. Thus, making the already low success rates of graduating with a degree even lower. Some countries also partake in free college education in which is compared to why would not work economically in the United States. Therefore, Opportunists who have no promise in being successful in their studies would take advantage of the
ability to go to college for free. This would result in clogging the classrooms, sinking graduation rates, and the value of a degree would be worthless impacting the students who have a bright future. Some people believe that if the federal government made college free in the United States (U.S.), tuition would just disappear. Unfortunately, people must pay for everything. The money would have to come from somewhere. If the student who is attending college does not ultimately have to pay for their tuition on their own, where does it come from? Rumor has it the taxpayer’s pocket. Anya Kamenetz, who has written several books about education and its future, stated in an article about Hillary Clinton’s proposal on Free Education, “Currently, the federal government spends $31 billion on federal grants and work-study to all institutions, not just four-year public schools. So the cost of eliminating tuition would be around double that (maybe less, since some of that grant money already goes to tuition). The Sanders campaign had previously estimated the cost of free college for all at $75 billion and proposed a tax on Wall Street transactions to pay for it.” This means that the federal government already chips in a portion of the funding. Not all of it comes from the students’ pocket. By eliminating the student portion of the cost; this creates more money the government would have to compensate for. The taxpayers would have to pay in a certain amount; therefore, your taxes will increase. If college tuition were to go to the taxpayers, and not the student interested in the degree many would take advantage of the opportunity because they would be paying whether they liked the idea or not. This would over- populate the classrooms affecting students who take their education more seriously. When taxpayers realize that they would be paying for people to go to school, they would most definitely start considering taking part in the education themselves. The article, “Tuition Is Not the Main Obstacle to Student Success”, mentioned that a community college in Texas dropped $1,000 in price and enrollment rates increased. This is because the price dropped and people started considering the option. This is like a product in a store; once the price goes down more people start to invest in the product regardless of being interested prior. But when more people enroll, especially ones who probably failed in their Kindergarten through 12th grade year, they would sacrifice the ones who have taken their education seriously. An article about trade schools, colleges, and universities confirmed, “With more people choosing to attend public colleges because of their tuition- free status, many schools might have to create wait lists or expand the ones they already have” (Should College Be Free? Pros, Cons, and Alternatives). There can only be a certain number of people in a class at a time. The opportunists would fill the classes expanding the waitlist. Those who want to complete the last few credits for their degree, getting into those classes are detrimental. Putting the ones who have goals and ambitions for their future farther off track. People would become less invested in their studies if college was free. They would procrastinate and slack off because there is no investment for the student, according to a Washington University Political Review article. Money and finance make people sweat, especially a young college students who is trying to make their mark in the world, and begin their journey into adulthood. They spent most of their lives cramming for tests and the only repercussion was a bad grade that would only impact them slightly. If the students were to pay for their college tuition, they would be more invested in their studies. Failing a class would mean they would have to put more to lose personally. If it were in the taxpayer’s hands, failing a class would mean nothing to all students. All in all, tuition should remain the way it is because it would affect those who want a degree. When college tuition is present, college success rates are already low. If we were to put people in the student position who don’t necessarily have the ability to study and focus in a classroom it would only bring down the success rates even more. One article from National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) states, “less than 40% of students who start at a public two-year college complete a degree or certificate within six years” Opportunists seeking education for free would only bring down these rates. Washington University Political Review mentions, “Worst of all, a mere 50 of more than 580 public four-year institutions graduate a majority of their full-time students on time— that’s only 8.6 percent. As a result of these low graduation rates, a free college tuition initiative could leave the U.S. with billions in wasted taxpayer dollars.” This means that if we gave college education for free, and the statistics stayed the same or lowered, it would be a wasteful tax. The only people who would be wasting their own money is the serious students if they didn’t succeed and not the taxpayers. Having the opportunity to have free college would attract many people of different study habits, making the college degree less valuable.
The article, “Should College Be Free? Pros, Cons, and Alternatives” noted, “If a lot more people are able to earn college degrees, then the value of those degrees could decrease. And that could lead to a rising number of workers who are underemployed based on their qualifications.” This is equivalent to High School Diplomas, less than a century ago jobs did not require one in the hiring process. Nowadays, most entry level jobs require you to have a high school diploma or equivalent since a majority has such degree. Therefore, if everybody were to have a college degree, it would become similar to a high school diploma, thus having to create a new way to validate skills and learning styles. An author and professor at Arizona State University wrote on The Washington Post, “Eventually, as fewer people pay the sticker price of a college, the very definition of it will lose all meaning. After all, if everyone is getting a deal on tuition, is anyone actually getting a deal?” Anybody would take advantage of a free opportunity for education and thus the degree would be worthless. If this were to happen, it would be frustrating for the scholarly students. Would such professions where precise skill and knowledge is required become less valuable if everybody could obtain the same
degree? Other countries are attempting the free college education, but there are differences to why it would not work in the United States in comparison to them.
For example, “in Finland, the average college student loan amounts to $1,200, which is used mostly for living expenses while in school. In Norway, the average student loan is worth $9,381. But that is still less than the U.S. average, which is $15,510” (Should College Be Free? Pros, Cons, and Alternatives). This means that the average of student loans taken out per student is way higher in the United States than other countries such as Finland and Norway. Because tuition is expensive here in comparison to Finland and Norway. But if we eliminated college tuition and put it in the hands of taxpayers and the government, we would still end up being responsible for that amount. The same article mentions that the European countries spend about the equivalent amount of money on their education system as the U.S. in their Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the total representation in dollar value of all goods and services produced over a specific time period. (definition according to Investopedia.com) The U.S. spends 1.36 percent and other countries such as, Finland, Norway, and Germany (countries that partake in free education) spend about 1.4 to 2% (Should College Be Free? Pros, Cons, and Alternatives). In the end, other countries can afford to pay for free college. It would be affordable for the U.S. government to handle.
Adding in the student’s compensation making it more costly. Graduation rates would go down and the value of the degree would be insignificant to getting a higher paying job because people who would see opportunity in free education would clog the classroom affecting the students who have worked all their lives to obtain such privilege. Sometimes it is better to let the people pay for what they are interested in and not put the fault into everybody else’s hands. People learn from an early age that school is not their forte. They would feel obligated to take advantage of something their money is going into, and bringing down those people who do want the education and have the skills to succeed.