Education: Cost of college education dropping since 2010

Indeed, while the average published tuition at four-year colleges (public and private combined) was around $21,000 per year in 2024, the average student received nearly $15,000 in grants and other forms of aid from federal and state governments and the colleges themselves, as well as tax benefits. Taking this financial aid into consideration, the average net price of college, assuming it takes four years to earn a degree, totaled about $30,000 in 2024, as shown in the chart below. Indeed, after increasing through the mid-2010s, the direct out-of-pocket costs of college have come down as tuition has actually been falling in recent years after adjusting for inflation.

Is College Still Worth It? – Liberty Street Economics

Real wages for both groups have generally been rising over the past decade, as tight labor markets benefited high school graduates and college graduates. Indeed, median wages for college graduates increased more, rising 7 percent compared to 5 percent for high school graduates. This increase was a noteworthy change for high school graduates, who saw their median wages stagnate from 1994 to 2014, though it represented a continuing trend for college graduates, whose wages have been trending upward for three decades.

And separately:

even when paying average costs, we find that a college degree does not appear to have paid off for at least a quarter of college graduates in recent decades. In this post, we consider when college might not be worth it and explore differences in the return to college by major.

….While most students finish their bachelor’s degrees in four years, many take longer. It turns out that taking an extra year or two to finish school adds considerably to the cost, in large part because of higher opportunity costs.

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As we’ve shown before, for at least a quarter of college graduates, college does not appear to pay off.

However, as many as a quarter of college graduates appear to end up in relatively low-paying jobs, and for them, a college degree may not be worth it, at least in terms of the economic payoff. What are some of the things that affect where graduates end up in the earnings distribution? While some of it may come down to choices people make for the jobs they wish to have, one significant consideration is college major, something over which students have direct control. Indeed, majors such as engineering, math and computers, business and economics, and health sciences tend to earn returns well above average.

When College Might Not Be Worth It – Liberty Street Economics

Many students seem unaware of their Return on Investment decisions – disconnected between their choice of field, education investment, and their earnings potential. Here is an example that appeared in Business Insider:

In my mid-30s, I still couldn’t afford to live alone in the US. I was sharing an 1,800-square-foot, two-bedroom, two-bath house in Nevada with a roommate, spending $3,300 to $5,000 on my monthly bills.

As a writer and university adjunct English professor, I earned less than $2,000 a month and cleaned houses in my spare time to cover the rest. This left little time to realize my dream of writing a book.

I downsized from a house in Nevada to a 104-square-foot studio outside of Paris. It helped me focus on what matters in life.

Her lifestyle “improvement” comes from a change in lifestyle (1800 sq ft shared house to a 104 sq ft studio apartment) and has little do with her move to Paris. She has an expansive, international education for a field that generally pays poorly (for most).

The author has a BA in creative writing from the University of Florida, an MA in Creative Writing from the University of London (in England), an MA in playwriting and screenwriting from the University of London, and additional post graduate studies in creative writing, from the University of Cambridge. In the U.S., she earned “less than $2,000 a month”.