School Days

I recently researched college costs, using my own experience.  My undergraduate and law school education from 1969 to 1976 cost (tuition + fees + board, the latter for five semesters) about $120,000 in 2022 dollars.  I looked at the current tuition + fees for the three undergraduate institutions (state university; community college; small liberal-arts college) and the law school I attended and that same education would cost $430,000 today.  These costs rose more than 3 1/2 times the rate of inflation, which is in line with other studies I've seen.

I think most of this rise is attributable to the increased emphasis on as many students as possible going to college, thus increasing demand, and the availability of increasing amounts of loan dollars to fund such education.  The result is reported to be a large number of graduates with useless degrees, huge debt, and poor paying jobs.

What to do about student loans is a topic of discussion over the past couple of years.  There is merit to the argument not to give any relief, as well as to the argument for some relief limited in amount and with an income cap to any such relief.  However, the worst of all worlds would be to give relief and not address underlying causes, which would just be absolving colleges and universities for their responsibilities for this mess, and give them further incentive to continue to raise costs at rates in significant excess of inflation.  In effect, student debt relief without associated reforms to prevent this from happening again would be a gift to academia.

Why not make institutions responsible for 50% of the defaulted debt of any student incurred during the time they attended the institution?

Perhaps, if the government continues to run the loan program, restrictions should be placed on the types of courses or degree programs or educational institutions eligible for loans, with an eye towards those likely to be of most value to the student after graduation, and the country.

Maybe a tax on endowments above $1 billion to help fund defaults or provide backing for loans (Harvard and Yale alone have endowments totaling $73 billion)?

Update: I forgot to add one other reform - allowing college loan debt to be discharged in bankruptcy, like most other debt, which would also help determine legitimate financial distress.

A more radical solution would be for the government to exit the loan program altogether.  In 2010, the federal government took over the direct loan program.  The argument to do so was based on (1) ending alleged high-interest private bank loans, and (2) that the program would actually make money for the government.  Outstanding student loans were $811 million in 2010; today they amount to $1.7 trillion, and are running at a loss to the government.

I'm sure there are other good ideas out there and I'm open to them.  The only thing I'm 100% against is relief without reform.  And this is separate from the reforms desperately needed to address other issues in K-12, undergraduate, and graduate education.