February 9, 2024
The Upside of the College Enrollment Downswing
Enrollment in education after high school peaked in 2010, with 21 million students enrolling in two-or four-year degree programs that fall. Since then, enrollment has steadily declined, and even projections that predict a modest increase in the coming years top out at 20 million enrollees in 2031. The steepest declines in enrollment were seen at two-year colleges,…
January 30, 2024
Democrats in the House Have a New (Old) Plan for Higher Education
Lately, it’s been Republican lawmakers who have been at the table and offering up comprehensive reform for higher education policy, but this week House Democrats got back in the game. Today, they released new legislation outlining their vision for higher education reform beyond the administration-led student loan cancellation agenda. In some sense, this marks a welcome return to normalcy,…
January 15, 2024
The Economy Is Good. Why Do Consumers Feel So Bad?
As we approach another federal election cycle, there will be a lot of talk about the state of the economy. Are Americans better off, economically speaking, than they were when President Biden took office three years ago? Despite our having lived through a pandemic and the resulting unprecedented economic shocks, it still should be a…
January 11, 2024
Biden’s Dismantling of Federal Student Loan Programs Has Inspired Republicans to Go Big
House Republicans released a new legislative package today aimed at bringing down the cost of college, holding universities accountable for the value of their diplomas, and reforming our broken federal student lending system. The College Cost Reduction Act represents the largest serious and comprehensive higher education reform package in decades and, in theory, has plenty…
December 8, 2023
A Framework for Reforming Federal Graduate Student Aid Policy
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Driven by increases in graduate enrollment and the availability of uncapped loans, graduate debt has become a growing share of federal student lending. Most of the growth in the average and overall levels of student indebtedness in the past fifteen years has been driven by graduate student debt. Despite being just 21 percent…
December 8, 2023
Graduate Student Lending in Desperate Need of Reform
Since 2005, graduate students in the United States have been able to borrow from the federal student loan programs essentially without limit. Before that, loans were available to graduate students from the US Department of Education, but they were constrained to reasonable levels. Since limitless credit became available to graduate students in 2005, graduate student…
October 26, 2023
New Report Sheds Light on Expansive Biden Student Loan Forgiveness Scheme
Last week, the Urban Institute published a new report examining, in detail, the implications of President Biden’s latest scheme to forgive as much student debt as possible before the next election cycle: the SAVE repayment plan. This report brings much needed clarity to the question of exactly how Biden’s misguided attempts to forgive student debt through executive…
October 20, 2023
Value Needs to be the Next Buzzword in Higher Education
For a long time, advocates and policymakers in the higher education space were fixated on improving “access” to higher education. As a society, we recognized that higher education was a powerful tool for promoting social mobility, and helping people born into lower-income households advance financially and pursue fulfilling careers. We also realized that higher education…
October 17, 2023
Measuring Value in Higher Education
Event Description As Republicans and Democrats on the Hill and in state legislatures nationwide seek to address the rising debt burden facing college graduates, new focus has been placed on institutions of higher learning and how well they prepare graduates for entering the workforce and paying off accrued debt. This event explores the prospect of…
October 2, 2023
Shopping for Colleges Just Got a Little Easier for Some Students
Shopping for college can be a nightmare. As the market for consumer products has gotten easier, more transparent, and faster than ever before (read: Amazon), the market for college degrees has only gotten more and more opaque. The prices listed on college websites aren’t paid by pretty much anyone, and in order to find out…