How Much Does College Cost?

If you're a parent, and you don't suffer palpitations whenever the topic of paying for college comes up, congratulations: You're either unusually mellow, or unusually wealthy. Higher education is expensive, and getting more so by the year.

But how expensive? Ah, that's a trickier question. What we talk about when we talk about the price of a degree can be a bit murky, thanks to the vast variations in tuition, financial aid, and lifestyle choices that determine how much a student spends during their time on campus. For parents paying the tab, and for wonks who'd like to make higher education more affordable, it's useful to have a realistic baseline for how much a bachelor's actually runs these days.

So without further ado, let's look at the numbers.

WHY ONE YEAR OF COLLEGE = $21, 200

In the 2009-2010 school year, the sticker price of tuition, room, and board for a full-time student pursuing a four-year degree was $21, 189, or 34 percent of the median family's income. That's already 10 percentage points higher than the beginning of the decade. Here's a graph of college's sticker price as a share of a typical family's budget going back to 2000.

Thankfully, these numbers are only the beginning of the story. For one, they ignore the gap between state schools, where tuition, room, and board totaled about $15, 000 in 2009-2010, and private schools, where they were just about $33, 000 on average. Meanwhile, thanks to financial aid, mercifully few students actually pay the full sticker price.

WHY ONE YEAR OF COLLEGE = ~$15, 000

To get a more precise sense of what college costs, we need to do two things. First, we should look at "net-price of attendance, " which subtracts scholarships and financial aid from the whole cost of a year at school. This is essentially the budget that attempts to take into account the real cost of a dorm room, late night trips to White Castle, Andy Warhol posters for decorating, and beer money, along with tuition. Once we have that figure, we should break it down by family income level.

Handily enough, the graph below from the Department of Education does both using data gleaned from federal financial aid applications for the 2007-2008 school year. This is intended to tell us how much families were actually paying for school, rather than what they potentially could have paid.

College students skew wealthy, so a kid from the median American family would fall into the chart's low middle-income category.** If that kid dreams of attending a fancy private college, they're staring at $22, 700* per year tab. If they're happy going to a state school they'll pay around two-thirds that price.

There is some reason to be skeptical about the government's estimates. For most students, the most expensive part of attending college isn't tuition -- it's living expenses. To ballpark what students spend on themselves, the Department of Education uses the estimated budgets produced by school financial aid offices. As the graph below shows, those budgets are often quite measly. (For a frame of reference, the poverty line for a single adult is about $11, 000.)

WHY ONE YEAR OF COLLEGE = $14, 000

Thankfully, we can try and check the government's work. For the last several years, student lending giant Sallie Mae has run an annual survey on how students finance their educations. According to their findings, middle income families (who made between $35, 000 and $100, 000 a year) paid $20, 065 for a year of school in 2011-2012, up about $3, 000 from 2007-2008. Those numbers, however, don't account for aid.

Once you subtract scholarships and grants, the net cost comes down to $14, 171, right about in line with the government's estimates.

So it appears your average student has indeed taken a vow of poverty to keep the cost of school down.

That brings us back to the burden these costs place on the typical family. By dividing the net cost of a year at school by the median family income, we get a number I like to call "the college misery factor." Since the turn of the century, the burden of college has clearly increased at both public and private institutions, although its been more severe at the latter.

Unfortunately, the 2007-2008 figures are the most recent data the Department of Education has readily broken down in a useful way for measure. (It's most recent numbers, which cover 2008-2009, divide up institutions into even smaller classifications). But chances are that the misery factor is worse today than it was about five years ago. State schools have raised prices as legislatures have cut budgets. Families are poorer than they were at the end of housing bubble. We can safely say that, for a middle-class household, a bachelor's will cost around a quarter of their income.

大學(xué)到底花費(fèi)多少 ？

    如果你已身為父母,，當(dāng)聽到有關(guān)大學(xué)學(xué)費(fèi)的話題時(shí)并不感到心悸,，恭喜：要么你的心態(tài)非常好,，要么你很富有,。高等教育很貴,，并且今年變得更貴,。

    但是怎樣貴,？啊,，這是個(gè)棘手的問題， 關(guān)于一個(gè)學(xué)位的價(jià)格我們所討論的內(nèi)容和事件可能會(huì)有一點(diǎn)模糊,，多虧了學(xué)費(fèi),、財(cái)政援助和生活方式選擇方面的巨大改變，這些改變決定了一個(gè)大學(xué)生在他的大學(xué)時(shí) 光的花銷。對(duì)于由父母付款,，或是那些想使高等教育變得更可負(fù)擔(dān)的書呆子來說,，關(guān)于一個(gè)學(xué)士到底花費(fèi)多少有一個(gè)實(shí)際的準(zhǔn)則是非常有用的。

    所以事不宜遲,，我們來看下面的數(shù)據(jù),。

    為什么一年大學(xué)=21200美元

    在2009-2010學(xué)年，對(duì)于一個(gè)四年制全職大學(xué)生來說,，學(xué)費(fèi),、住宿費(fèi)和伙食費(fèi)的標(biāo)價(jià)是21189美元，或者說是一個(gè)中等家庭收入的34%,。這比本世紀(jì)初高10個(gè)百分點(diǎn),。這有一個(gè)圖表，從2000至今大學(xué)的花費(fèi)占一個(gè)普通家庭支出的份額,。

    當(dāng)然這些數(shù)據(jù)僅僅是故事的開始,。有一點(diǎn)，他們忽略了公立學(xué)校和私立學(xué)校的區(qū)別,，在公立學(xué)校,，在2009——2010年學(xué)費(fèi)、住宿費(fèi)和伙食費(fèi)共15000美元,，而在私立學(xué)校平均是33000美元。同時(shí),，多虧了財(cái)政援助,。只有少數(shù)學(xué)生才支付全額。

    為什么一年大學(xué)=15000美元

    為了對(duì)于大學(xué)花費(fèi)有一個(gè)更精確的認(rèn) 識(shí),，我們要做兩件事,。首先，我們應(yīng)看看“實(shí)際的凈價(jià)格”,，是指從一年學(xué)校的全部花費(fèi)中出去獎(jiǎng)學(xué)金和助學(xué)金,。除學(xué)費(fèi)以外，本質(zhì)上預(yù)算還應(yīng)試圖考慮住宿費(fèi),，深 夜前往白色城堡,，安迪安迪·沃霍爾的裝飾海報(bào)和啤酒錢。一旦我們有了這些數(shù)據(jù),，我們就應(yīng)根據(jù)家庭收入水平將它分解,。

    輕松地，下面來源于教育部的圖表使用了2007—2009學(xué)年由聯(lián)邦財(cái)政援助提供的數(shù)據(jù),。這試圖想告訴我們家庭實(shí)際為大學(xué)花費(fèi)了多少,，而不是他們潛在上應(yīng)付多少。

    財(cái)富使大學(xué)生傾斜，所以一個(gè)來自中等家庭的孩子將會(huì)掉為這張表中的低等收入家庭類,。如果這個(gè)孩子夢(mèng)想進(jìn)入私立學(xué)校,，他們會(huì)對(duì)每年22700的費(fèi)用凝視很久。如果他們樂意去公立學(xué)校,，他們只用支付那個(gè)價(jià)格的三分之二,。

    關(guān)于政府的估計(jì)有幾點(diǎn)原因值得懷疑。 對(duì)于大多數(shù)學(xué)生,，入學(xué)最貴的部分不是學(xué)費(fèi)——而是生活費(fèi),。為了估計(jì)學(xué)生花在自身上的錢，教育部用了由學(xué)校財(cái)政援助部門統(tǒng)計(jì)的估計(jì)預(yù)算,。正如下表顯示,，這些 預(yù)算相當(dāng)可憐。（對(duì)于一個(gè)參照系,，一個(gè)單身成年人的貧窮線是11000美元,。）

    為什么一年大學(xué)=14000美元

    多虧我們可以嘗試和檢查政府的工作。 對(duì)于近幾年,，學(xué)生貸款巨頭 Sallie Mae已經(jīng)發(fā)起一個(gè)關(guān)于學(xué)生如何對(duì)自身的教育投入資金的年度調(diào)查,。根據(jù)他們的結(jié)論，在2011——2012年中等收入家庭（每年賺35000到 100000美元的家庭）為每年的學(xué)費(fèi)付20065美元,。但是這些數(shù)據(jù)并不占援助,。

    一旦你除去獎(jiǎng)學(xué)金和捐贈(zèng)，凈花費(fèi)將會(huì)降至14171美元,，剛好在政府預(yù)計(jì)的內(nèi),。

    所以呈現(xiàn)給大家的是學(xué)生的確為了使學(xué)校花費(fèi)降低而貧窮,。

    現(xiàn)狀：學(xué)校的痛苦因素

    那將我們帶回到對(duì)于一個(gè)普通家庭這些花費(fèi)所帶來的負(fù)擔(dān),。將中等家庭收入除以在學(xué)校的凈花費(fèi)，我們得到一個(gè)數(shù)據(jù)我愿意把它稱為“學(xué)校痛苦因素”,，世紀(jì)之交以來,，在公共和私立機(jī)構(gòu)學(xué)校的負(fù)擔(dān)顯著增加了，盡管后者更為嚴(yán)重,。

    不幸的是,，2007——2008年的 數(shù)據(jù)是教育部最容易用來以一種有利于政策的方法分解的數(shù)據(jù)。（他的最近數(shù)據(jù)包括2008——2009年,，將機(jī)構(gòu)分解為更小的分類）,，但是機(jī)會(huì)是痛苦因子比 五年前更糟了。隨著立法部門切去預(yù)算,，公立學(xué)校已經(jīng)提高價(jià)格,。家庭比他們?cè)诜康禺a(chǎn)泡沫結(jié)束時(shí)更貧窮，我們可以肯定的說，對(duì)于一個(gè)中產(chǎn)家庭,，一個(gè)學(xué)士將會(huì)花 費(fèi)他們收入的四分之一,。