Baby boomers - Northwestern U is now 70k / year...what do you have to say for yourselves?

The reason NW is $70k per year is because they have the green light to charge whatever they want. In this country, we are conditioned to believe that whatever is the most expensive is the best. The top tier colleges could charge $150k per year, and thousands of kids would still apply. The wealthiest families would continue to subsidize the majority of the student body population...hey...that sounds like America!

The reality of the ever-rising cost of education is that it is an arms race. In the 60s, 70s, 80s, schools did not have state of the art gymnasiums and cafeterias for their students. Just ask your parents about how lousy their food was. Now at certain schools, kids can eat lobster tails a few times a month if they want. Schools are also getting further away from the real point of a college, which is to educate the work force, and are spending millions of dollars on research and labs.

It is really ridiculous, though. I went to Lafayette College, and their endowment is somewhere in the neighborhood of $800 million. Northwestern's is $10 billion for Christ's sake. You can't even spend all of that money if you tried, let alone justify charging that much for tuition. Put into perspective, they could spend $100 million a year for 100 years before running through that endowment, not even accounting for the fact that in a conservative portfolio they could bank $400-500 million in interest alone per year.

alwayss be closing wrote:

Should young people just pull themselves up by their own bootstraps? Work a summer job to pay tuition? Nevermind that Northwestern was $3500/year in 1970, the same rules apply, right?

Nail meet hammer! Man, you nailed this one bro. I am so sick of Boomers (aka the entitlement generation, aka the worst generation, aka those who have destroyed the American Dream) denying the fact that they have seriously f$&ked this country up beyond recognition.

Boomers are a worthless generation that has done nothing but destroy this country and continually take credit for things they did not do. They have run BOTH political parties into the ground and are responsible for running the economy into the ground and creating a mountain of debt by consistently voting for generous entitlements for themselves while simultaneously refusing to pay (i.e. Raise taxes) for those entitlements.

When confronted with the objective economic data about how they have ruined they country, they will often claim they have benefited us all by giving us cultural gifts--by starting movements that gave us equal rights for blacks, women, gay folks, by giving us modern music (like rock & roll) through their pioneering efforts, by giving us modern computer science, and through things like iconic movies.

But a closer look at even these claims reveals their lies. As a starting point, please take note that it is widely agreed that Boomers were born 1946-1964. This means that the oldest members of this pathetic generation turned 30 in 1976 and, thus, they have essentially been running the show in the US since the the late 1970s. Let's look at the reality of some of their claims....

The major civil rights leaders for black equal rights in the 60s (Martin Luther King, Jr., Medger Evers, Rosa Parks, Ceaser Chavez, Fred Shuttlesworth, Jon Lewis, Malcom X, and many more) were all born in the 20s to early 40s. But you know who is a boomer? Al Sharpton.

The major players in the second wave feminist movement (Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan, Mary King, Alice Rossi) of the 60s were all born in 20s - early 40s as well. Of course, this means the women who fought for basic equal rights (like the right to vote) were even older. These brave women were not boomers. But Boomers are the leaders of the disgusting mess that is third wave feminism...

The folks that were the pioneers in equal rights for gay people (Harvey Milk, Del Martin, Phyllis Lyon) also not Boomers.

Who is widely acknowledged to be the father of modern computer science? Alan Turing. A gay non-Boomer.

Let's examine the music claims...Jimmi Hendrix? Jim Morrison? The Beatles? The Rolling Stones? Bob Dylan? Yup, all non-Boomers.

How about movies, directors, actors, etc?... Stanley Kubrick? Harrison Ford? George Lucas? Robert De Niro? Al Pacino? Robert Duval? Martin Scorsese? Clint Eastwood? George Romero? Francis Ford Coppala? Chevy Chase? Steve Martin? J.J. Abrams? The entire Monty Python crew? Yup, all non-boomers.

So, Boomers frequently claim--when confronted with objective economic data--that their generation has contributed to society as, "we are the ones responsible for major cultural and art movements"....but it's totally not true. Boomers are parasites and leeches....and I am assume some are good people. We should build a wall on our southern boarder, strip the boomers of their il-gotten entitlements, and ship them down to old Mexico. All of our problems would be solved. Let's make America great again!

That's quite a cracking yarn, Baron Munchausen.

https://5607e8bc33e09184b2c2-d14e815979f5d1c7c1cbde04061a7107.ssl.cf3.rackcdn.com/film__3536-the-adventures-of-baron-munchausen--detail.jpg

Mommy, turn on the basement lights. I can't see.

Wah, wah, wah

Q.E.D.

Boomers done here. And will always be remembered as the generation that destroyed America.

The only two problems I have with boomers' response to our current college tuition problem are exemplified by the above, which misses the real issue.

First:

In 1970, you could work 42 hours at minimum wage to afford an expensive Northwestern education. This is too much to balance for most people, so the response is that they went to a good state school that they had to work hard to afford. The average cost of a 4 year public university was $478 in 1970 (see link below), so this comes out to working 6 hours per week (if you factor in the cost of living, this goes up of course, but the cost of living is comparably higher now when adjusting for inflation, so leaving this out is more favorable for a boomer arguing their point and less work for me).

In 2016, an expensive private university costs $70,000. This is insane, so the argument goes that they should go to a good public university and not be entitled, just like the baby boomers. But "according to the college board, the average cost of tuition and fees for the 2016–2017 school year was $9,650 for state residents at public colleges," which comes out to 26 hours of work per week. A millennial paying for their own college who took the cheaper but still acceptable option prescribed by baby boomers is still working 4 times longer as they were just to pay for tuition. You can say working 30+ hours per week to pay for tuition and living expenses is doable, but baby boomers talk about how hard it was for them to work half as much.

Second:

It makes no sense to argue that this has nothing to do with the baby boomers for exactly the reason HRE gave.

Baby boomers are the ones

-in charge of universities increasing tuition

-in charge of the government that both encourages these increases through giving loans and does nothing to stop the colleges from increasing tuition

-in charge of the banks giving non federal loans

-paying for their children to go to these inflated schools

-telling their children they'll never get a job without an education

Sure, some millennials are at fault for continuing to seek loans, but they have nothing to do with the reasons they need those loans to go to college in the first place.

sbeefyk1 wrote:

alwayss be closing wrote:

Should young people just pull themselves up by their own bootstraps? Work a summer job to pay tuition? Nevermind that Northwestern was $3500/year in 1970, the same rules apply, right?

This is kind of funny. They'll take out $70k/yr in student loans and they'll have to wait 5-10 years before they work their way into a job that pays $70k/yr.

But in all seriousness, who cares. Congress will be forgiving ALL student loans while overhauling the financial aid system to keep this disaster from happening again. So might as well take out the loans while you can and get them forgiven.

There's too much research now proving that student loans are costing the economy 1%+/yr. When Trump hears this he will make the tough decision to forgive all current loans and overhaul the system.

I hope not! I worked my butt off for my education and I don't want to support some free-loaders.

If you're just applying online and that's it, you're going to have to apply to much more than 60 jobs. Online resume submission is a black hole. My job search took 9 months since I spent most of my time doing this. After a while I started contacting people directly in the industry. Straight up cold emails. Most people did not respond, some said they'd forward my resume to HR. Finally 1 or 2 people took pity on me and said thanks for the interest, they'd keep me in mind the next time an opening came along. Sure enough a few weeks after that an opening came along and I got an interview, then the job.

It's luck and timing. But you have to hustle in order to put yourself in a position to benefit from the luck. I tried other things too during these 9 months, and none of them panned out but I was at least trying things. Cold emailing happened to work, but it could have been one of the other methods that lead to the breakthrough.

Was your brother hustling? Was he open geographically? It's tough out there, nothing is handed to anyone.

system of lies wrote:

Don't you DARE tell me that you can still do fine with a non-Ivy degree. Don't you DARE tell me that the opportunities are the same for a non-Ivy degree. If you did well at all with a non-Ivy degree in the 2000's, I immediately want to know your state, type of work, and firm, as I believe it's specific to said combination.

If you desperately want to go into finance, then you're better off going to an ivy. Probably one of the big 3. Or go to Duke or Williams or something along those lines. If you don't, you'll have to work a lot harder to break in.

If you desperately want to do management consulting, Northwestern might be worth the 70k/year price tag--it'll get you into McK/Bain/BCG as or more easily than anywhere bar Harvard/Yale/Princeton/Stanford.

Otherwise the ivy/NU/other elite institutions are costing you a lot with limited added benefit. A kid who goes into engineering from an ivy isn't going to do markedly better than an engineer from UCSB/Colorado/UDub/etc. A kid wanting to pursue graduate study will have a slight bump in admissions if s/he attended an elite undergrad institution, but GRE scores, GPA, and research experience will play a dramatically bigger role.

If you get a degree in something really soft--most humanities majors, communications, econ (w/ only basic calc), even biology--then you'll do much better on the job market coming from an Ivy/NU/etc. Kids with majors in engineering, statistics, applied math, CS, applied physics, and the like will have plenty of opportunities.

In my area, recruiters' takes on Cal/UCLA/UCSD/UCD tech/math kids vs. Stanford/Harvard/Yale tech/math kids are generally as follows: both sets have similar skillsets, but the kids at the UCs worked a hell of a lot harder--their courses were curved to Cs, the ivy kids had courses curved to A-minuses.

It cost me around $3,000 a year to go to a Pennsylvania state college from 1970-74. I came out with around $8,000 in loan debt.I don't know where they got $478 for an annual cost. Yes, college costs are out of hand. I was a "Bernie" guy in the last election, totally agreed with his free tuition. If Europeans can do it we can and should as well. I also agree completely that the idea of making enough to be a full time student with a part time or summer job is impossible anymore even at a public college. I think that's another reason why the minimum wage should be at least $15 an hour.

And yes, baby boomers are the people who have for the most part created the policies that have allowed costs to inflate as they have. But those people represent a small percentage of their generation. The rest of the generation, as I said before, are probably more "victimized" by the situation than their kids are because mostly they, not their kids, have to pay for their kids' college.

Let's start at the bottom of your list. Do you think a good parent would tell their kids not to worry about getting an education because they can get good jobs without one? Would you do that? The idea that education is the great equalizer has been part of our culture for decades now. I'd have been a pretty crappy parent if I'd told my kids not to worry about being educated and that going to college didn't matter because they could do just fine without.

Once you recognize that your kid should go to college you're caught in the dilemma of choosing to do what seems best in your individual situation and doing what might be best for a much larger population. If you live in Michigan and suspect that your kid might do better in life if s/he goes to Northwestern than to Northern Michigan do you send him/her to Northern Michigan because you don't want to contribute to the process which is inflating college costs so badly? Because that's the dilemma many, maybe most, boomer parents have to resolve.

I don't know how old you are but I'd really like to know what you think parents of the last couple decades should have done about the cost of college? If your kid got into Princeton but with little or no aid package and you can't just reach into your piggy bank each year and come up with $60k for tuition and board do you tell him to forget it and go to the local community college for a couple years and then transfer to a state school instead?

YES that is EXACTLY what you tell them. Sometimes you have to make hard decisions and of you can't afford something don't buy it.....life is not fair

Your kid can get a perfectly good education at good schools that cost a lot less than Northwestern - as a bonus a few of them won't indoctrinate her to have contempt for the society that raised her. If you don't mind the indoctrination you can save a lot of money by shopping the best schools in Canada (e.g. University of Toronto - not too far from Northwestern). The quality of undergraduate education at the "elite" American schools is way overrated - the job market prestige of the diploma from those schools can be offset by doing well and demonstrating character at "lesser" institutions.

alwayss be closing wrote:

Should young people just pull themselves up by their own bootstraps? Work a summer job to pay tuition? Nevermind that Northwestern was $3500/year in 1970, the same rules apply, right?

1) Is this even true or are you comparing tuition in 1970 vs a fully loaded tuition/housing/meals? The tuition is 50k, you don't need a 19/week meal plan all four years, the 70k includes estimates for 2.5k in personal expenses. I highly doubt you're comparing apples to apples.

2) hardly anyone who isn't rich pays full cost. Try stating the amount of cost they pay or borrow on average compared to 1970. It won't look nearly as bad. Costs keep going up but so do aid/scholarships you don't have to pay back.

Mrr82 wrote:

alwayss be closing wrote:

Should young people just pull themselves up by their own bootstraps? Work a summer job to pay tuition? Nevermind that Northwestern was $3500/year in 1970, the same rules apply, right?

1) Is this even true or are you comparing tuition in 1970 vs a fully loaded tuition/housing/meals? The tuition is 50k, you don't need a 19/week meal plan all four years, the 70k includes estimates for 2.5k in personal expenses. I highly doubt you're comparing apples to apples.

2) hardly anyone who isn't rich pays full cost. Try stating the amount of cost they pay or borrow on average compared to 1970. It won't look nearly as bad. Costs keep going up but so do aid/scholarships you don't have to pay back.

For what it's worth, all freshmen are required to have a meal plan (basic 13 meals/week is around $6000/year) and starting with the class of 2021, kids are required to live on campus for two years. Housing minimum is about $7000/year for a triple in Hinman/Fairchildren/other shitty dorms. Standard doubles in Elder/Allison/Bobb/Plex, which have the highest housing capacities, costs around $8500/year. Singles in Allison, Slivka, and other nice dorms are around $10k/year.

So all freshmen are looking at a minimum $13k and a max of $17k mandatory feels. Starting with the class of 2021, sophomores will have to pay these fees as well.

For (2), you can definitely get hit with the whole cost even if your family isn't exceptionally wealthy. Boomer parents who bought 250k houses in certain parts of California, New York, etc. now own homes that are worth 1.5 million. If they are comfortable with their lives and don't want to sell, all the price of that home does is inflate their assets on FAFSA and CSS filings. Families living in areas with higher costs of living are also penalized by the current financial aid system. Two families that both make 200k/year will receive the same financial aid ($0), but the cost of tuition will be a much greater burden for the family in the area with a higher cost of living.

I agree with most of what you said in this post, especially about it being an issue that a select part of the boomer generation caused and that this causes a dilemma for parents and is bad for the rest of that generation. I was pointing out my major problem with boomers that complain about how whiny millenials are and not necessarily trying to comment on what boomer parents should have done about their children's education.

On the other hand, your "Oddly,I didn't blame my parents' generation for that. I did what people traditionally do when they can't afford something they want. I didn't "buy" it and went to a state school that I sort of could afford .Even that was a reach. If Northwestern's too pricey for you go somewhere cheaper" statement reads like a "lazy/whiny mellenials just need to work as hard as us" comment and without more context doesn't suggest the views you express above.

And the $478 per year average cost comes from the National Center for Educational Statistics website linked to in my initial post. Specifically, it came out of the row labeled "public institutions 1970-1971" row and the "universities" subsection of the "Tuition and required fees (in-state for public institutions)" column. So this is only the tuition price for a specific type of public institution ignoring living expenses, like housing and board. To make sure I'm not just reading the table incorrectly, a different website (link below) says "In 1970, the average yearly tuition was $358 for public four-year institutions." (The discrepancy comes from the fact that I only looked at universities, so this wouldn't include many colleges).

To be fair, even today PA has 4 of the 10 most expensive in state tuitions in the country. PA families have it especially rough.

Forgot the link:

http://www.deltacostproject.org/sites/default/files/products/Delta-Cost-Not-Your-Moms-Crisis_0.pdf

mussabini wrote:

YES that is EXACTLY what you tell them. Sometimes you have to make hard decisions and of you can't afford something don't buy it.....life is not fair

The thing about taking out a loan for college, any college, is that you don't know what you're going to be able to afford. It's not like taking a loan for a car or a condo where you know what you're making and how much you can afford to borrow. Even when I was borrowing my $8k I wasn't sure how big a deal paying it back would be. It turned out to be quite a deal for a while but I never regretted doing it.

I'm not totally sold on the idea that you get a big advantage in life by going to a pricey, elite school. But I'm not convinced it can't happen so if there are ways someone who needs to stretch financially to send your kid to such a place there is justification for doing it as there is for not doing it.

Are there really kids out there paying more than 50% of the advertised cost of tuition?? If a kid is paying for school with a minimum wage job, they need to negotiate that tuition down. My kids both got great private school degrees and I talked the price down significantly. And my wife and I make a good living. Of course, students need to deliver the grades in high school and beyond. But if they can't do that, perhaps a costly school isn't in the cards anyway.

I would never write about "lazy/whiny millennials" because I don't ever label a group of people on the basis of something that a single person or even a fraction of that group does. I might characterize the OP as whiny or entitled but I'd never do it for an entire generation even though that's what the OP is doing about boomers. And I wouldn't even characterize his post as whiny or entitled because as I've said here more than once, I agree that college costs have gotten out of hand. It's a legitimate complaint.

My objections are that he's blaming millions of people, many of whom are struggling with the situation as much or more than he is, for a problem created by hundreds or at most thousands of people and that he seems to think the problem of colleges being unaffordable didn't exist for previous generations.

I do know where you got that $478 number. I'm not questioning it. It's just so much less than I needed to pay that I wanted to point out that not all of us from those days got off so cheaply even if we went the cheap route.