Summary
College enrollment among 18-year-old freshmen fell 5% this fall, with declines most severe at public and private non-profit four-year colleges.
Experts attribute the drop to factors including declining birth rates, high tuition costs, FAFSA delays, and uncertainty over student loan relief after Supreme Court rulings against forgiveness plans.
Economic pressures, such as the need to work, also deter students.
Despite declining enrollment, applications have risen, particularly among low- and middle-income students, underscoring interest in higher education. Experts urge addressing affordability and accessibility to reverse this trend.
Education to any level should be free at the point of use. Hell I’d even go as far as to say people should be given a (non-means-tested) grant if they go into higher education. We need more smart people.
The more educated & informed a society is, the more productive, safe and free it is. No one should deny themselves the education they otherwise want because they can’t afford it.
But Trump loves the poorly educated.
Man this is the most anti capitalist way of looking at things. This is basically socialism. Not a single NA country would support this system for Europe it’s a different story tho.
Edit: you guys are idiots I’m literally telling you why it doesn’t happen and you downvote me. In my opinion USA is a third world country as long as healthcare is a for profit business. Capitalism is akin to peasants and lords all over again which is why unions form because the working class have to force it to be fair. You are living in a society that values money more than anything and therefore you are just a number they give you one as well to define your being.
They essentially described how the US primary education system works, and prerry much how secondary education worked until Regan.
That you think it’s “socialism” and therefore impossible is a reinforcement of hard-right elitist propaganda.
You say that like it’s a bad thing?
And K-12 is just an arbitrary number. Paying for college would just be extending what we already do.
Think about it: What is socialism? It’s collectively funding or working on things via the government. There’s many competing definitions but that’s basically all there is to it.
Under that definition we’re already living under socialism:
With socialism the people get a say in how such things are run. In private institutions they don’t. That’s the biggest realistic difference.
Either way people are still paying for these things. If they’re not really competitive then private industry will fleece the masses because that’s what capitalism encourages (see: Healthcare). If there’s a robust, competitive market then socialism can fall behind in things like innovation and price.
Whether or not something is funded-and-run by the government is irrelevant. What matters is the value. If government can provide a better value for a dollar than private industry it should. If the people don’t like the result they can change it or use a private alternative.
Sure, they’ll be paying extra (on top of taxes) for the private alternative but at least it’s an option. If the government isn’t providing an alternative to private institutions then there’s really no option at all. Best anyone can do is vote with their wallet but as we can all see that just doesn’t work in certain industries (in fact, entire caregories of need!) and services.
Not to mention bank and corporate bailouts. Socialism for the rich, harsh darwinism for the poor.
Republicans hate all of those but thr police and military
Yeah, and?
You sound surprised to find out that not everyone here thinks capitalism is perfect.
Genuinely baffling anyone like that would even find this place.
I live in the UK, a capitalist country.
The Scottish have this already, everyone gets free education including university, no strings. In England we only have it for people from lower economic backgrounds (via means tested grants to pay tuition), but still, we still do it for some people. It’s not a remotely absurd idea.
Hell even most pragmatic capitalists would agree that a free-at-the-point-of-use education system is generally a good investment in the labour pool. If skilled workers are rare, they have negotiating power, and we know how much capitalists just love workers that are able to negotiate from a position of power.
I love it when people participate in the Overton window right-wing ratchet and think they’re just being pragmatic.
I didn’t even know this site had enough people to downvote someone this much this quickly. You’re breaking ground with your idiocy. 👏🎉