The warning came on the first day of a two-day investigative hearing before the Governmental Affairs Committee on the Rising Cost of College Tuition . The hearings focused on why tuition costs are so high, to what extent federal financial aid contributes to or mitigates rising tuition, and the impact of debt burden on a student s educational and career choices.
Colleges have to do more to make themselves more transparent in explaining their finances.
At the same time, the federal government needs to do a better job of looking at tuition rates that are rising faster than the cost of living. But if college becomes a luxury that an increasing percentage of the population cannot afford, the economic divide between the haves and the have-nots could undercut the American dream and stunt the nation s economic growth. Senators Thompson and Lieberman noted that the high price of a college education is an issue of growing concern for American families. Over the past twenty years, tuition has more than doubled at both public and private schools, driven in large part by an increase in schools costs. And tuition rates have risen so fast that they have outpaced grants, loans, state appropriations and other subsidies to schools, as well as aid to students and their families.