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Massachusetts, where my college is located, used to provide percent of the college population, don’t take out any loans at all.”
80% or more of the funding for community colleges and state If you count all students, in 2012 the average debt per graduate
universities, and now that fgure ranges from 25-50% (Higher (from a public college or university) was about $14,000. To put
Education Finance Commission, 2014). that in perspective, last year the average price of a new car in
Each year, the State Higher Education Executive Ofcers America was just over $32,000–and a few years later, you still
Association (SHEEO) issues a report on the condition of higher have to buy another one.
education fnance in America. SHEEO’s State Higher Education And what about those borrowers taking out more than the cost
Finance 2013 edition notes that “constant dollar educational of your frst home? Well, the reality, according to Deresiewicz
appropriations per FTE” (that is, the amount of money spent (2014), is that less than 2% of students graduate with over
by states and counties per full-time equivalent student) reached $100,000 in debt, and most of those are coming from expensive
a high of $8,790 in 2001. By last year, it had fallen to $6,105 private schools.
(SHEEO, 2014).
Choice matters. Students who attend highly selective and
Clearly, when it comes to policy and funding, a college education expensive private schools in pursuit of careers that pay lower
these days is more ofen seen as less of a public good and more of wages may fnd themselves deeper in debt, while the larger
a personal good, with the expectation that states will pay less and number of students who attend less selective and less expensive
students will pay more. public universities and community colleges likely emerge with a
On top of this shif of college costs from the government to more manageable balance sheet.
students and families, the huge increase in overall student And what about results? Whether I’m $14,000 in debt or $100,000
loan debt is driven not just by individuals borrowing more for in debt, I will never pay it of as a barista at Starbucks, right?
college, but by more people going to college. According to the
NCES (2014), between 1991-2001, enrollment at degree-granting Poor Starbucks. To help counter the negative image they have
institutions in America increased at a moderate 11%. Ten, acquired as the last refuge of supposedly unemployable English
between 2001-2011, enrollment soared 32%, from 16 million to and Art History majors, the international cofee giant recently
21 million students. announced the “Starbucks College Achievement Plan,” a new
partnership with Arizona State University (ASU) that will help
Keep that number in mind, because when you hear about the their employees complete their college degrees: All those baristas
“average student loan debt” (which is now around $27,000), that who work at least twenty hours a week will receive 50% tuition
typically refers to the amount of debt taken out by all borrowers, for freshmen and sophomores, and a free ride for juniors and
not to debt accumulated by all 21 million students at American seniors at ASU (Starbucks, 2014).
colleges and universities. As William Deresiewicz (2014) noted
in “Te Miseducation of America,” a recent Chronicle of Higher But the reality is that even through the recent recession, the
Education column, “Forty-three percent of those who graduate college educated (including English and Art History majors)
from public colleges and universities, which account for about 70 were far better of than those without degrees, and now,

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