The Dismantling of Higher Education

Two major problems confronting higher education to day are higher costs and increasing government con trol. Last summer the College Board reported that outlays for resident students at private four-year colleges and uni versities will be $6,082.la In 1977, the Oakland Financial Group of Charlottesville, Virginia predicted that parents with a one-year-old child whom they plan to send to a four-year university in the 1990s would have to save $2,750 per year to finance the expected $82,830 four-year cost of the average private college and save $1,570 per year to finance the expected $47,740 cost of a state uni versity. The estimates assume an after-tax return on savings of five percent and an annual inflation rate of six percent in college costs, which include tuition, room, board, travel, and other incidentals.2 The middle class will find it difficult to pay so much for college education.23 Increased government assistance cannot solve the problem, because the middle class would bear the brunt of the necessary taxes. Furthermore, government assistance threatens the inde pendence of universities. In the state university, there has always been a tension between academic independence and government control, but federal assistance has now become ubiquitous at state and private universities alike. Because virtually all colleges would find it difficult or im possible to forego federal aid, they are forced to comply with the increasing number of regulations imposed on recipients of federal largesse. My solution to these two problems is quite radical. The overwhelming majority of colleges presently tie together