3 Proposals for Funding Public Higher Education

PHENOM belongs to the Campaign for the Future of Higher Education (CFHE) .  At a recent news briefing, three scholars representing faculty across the U.S. strongly advocated for a change in state and federal funding of public higher ed. Their request— stop capitulating to a dysfunctional NEW NORMAL — was directed at politicians and administrative leaders with the power to change a funding system that longer works for most Americans.  You can see the three proposals.

The three scholars—Professors Samuels, Fichtenbaum and Glantz—presented different common-sense solutions for funding public higher education based on tax reforms or spending state and federal dollars more wisely.  All proposals attempt to reverse the privatization trend in public higher education that shifts the expense from the state and federal government onto the most vulnerable families and individuals.  These scholars share the concern that a failure to fund quality public higher education equally for every American gradually leads to a diminished democracy with a two-tiered class system.  It is past time to rethink this problem and take action to correct it.

  • Bob Samuels in “Making All Public Higher Education Free” argues for reallocating monies used for state and government education subsidies. According to his research, the cost for free undergraduate public education in 2009-10 was $127 billion.   The total amount of state and government dollars currently allocated to college-saving programs, grants, subsidies and student loan expenses would cover this cost AND stop the horrendous problem of  student debt.
  • Rudy Fichtenbaum in “How to Invest in Higher Education: A Financial Speculation Tax” proposes a responsibly administered, modest tax of no more than .5% on speculative financial transactions.   The U.S. had a small financial transactions tax from 1914 to 1966.  Its diminished relative now supports the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.  Many other nations— Great Britain, Singapore, France and Finland, for example— have a financial speculation tax with the subsidiary benefit of reducing speculation while providing funding for public projects.
  • Stanton Glantz in  “Financial Options for Restoring Quality and Access to Public Higher Education in California: 2012/13” suggests we reset student fees to the 2001 level.  Glantz provides an analysis to show that a $48 tax per median California taxpayer would restore the state to that 2001 level.  Otherwise, the offloading of public higher education costs to private individuals will continue to make education less affordable to the public.  A tax like this in each state would return public education to the status of a public good.

Thanks to Teri Yamada, Prof. of Asian Studies, California State University Long Beach