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Free College Cost Benefit Analysis

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Free college? Exposing the possibility of free tuitions in the US.

“The benefits of post secondary education are well documented and have major implications for economic growth, equality, and social mobility” (Dominguez). This was reported by the white house on January 2014. Many others can agree education is the key to a healthier economy. But lately, students throughout the United States have been struggling to pay the expensive tuition fees that tag along with having a college education. These expensive college costs have been largely debated and constantly listed as a national concern for middle class families all around the US. Many believe free tuition is the solution to our country’s trillion debt problem, but with our economy on the …show more content…

After all, education in the great equalizer in our nation, it can bridge social, economic, racial, and geographic divides like no other force. It can mean the difference between an open door and a dead end. And nowhere is this truer than in a higher education” (Mckeon). No one could have said it better than Representative Mckeon. According to him, if we had free college, millions of students around the country would focus less on working to pay tuition, and instead entirely on their studies. It would distract the students less, and allow them to concentrate on what they’re being taught. Because of these short budgets and stressful environments, most students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds often tend to try and complete their studies quicker than students from high income families. The low income students will generally choose fields of studies that are more directly linked to the professions, like marketing or human resources, while the wealthy students study long term professions, like law and medicine. This creates a gap between wealthy and poor families, losing valuable opportunities for hundreds bright students …show more content…

“Calling something free doesn’t make it free, it’s simply a matter of who pays the costs” (Leukbe). College can’t be possible without someone paying the expenses. Yes, making college free for students will spare them lots of struggle. But then, the money will still need to be made up for one way or another. If we make college free, states will struggle to pay and Taxpayers will be forced to pay for what the students don’t. “We will come into a situation where, just like in any downtown there will be problems for the states to keep up the funding for the universities, or raise it”, as Professor Woessmann clearly states, free tuitions could also mean the downfall of of our country’s economy. A perfect example of a situation like this would be in the state of California, where college costs were decreased drastically, and as a result ended up putting the state in debt. Unable to raise incomes, the colleges were forced to turn away more 600,000 students

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