President Obama’s free community college initiative would cost all states combined about $4 billion a year, according to a new paper from the conservative American Action Forum.
The cost would vary depending on the state. In low-population Vermont, the cost would be $7.4 million a year. In relatively crowded New York, free community college would cost $350 million a year.
In proportional terms, both New Hampshire and Oregon would have to increase their state budgets by 12 percent or more to afford the program. The average state would have to boost its budget by more than five percent.
That’s in addition to billions of federal tax dollars required to support the program.
The free community college funds would be available to states that opt in, but researchers predict states would hesitate to agree to the costs. Since the recession began, a majority of states have cut their per-student higher education funding by more than one-fifth.
“The proposals do nothing to actually lower the cost of college, but merely subsidize today’s expensive tuition rates,” researchers wrote. “Free in this context does not attempt to drive down the cost of providing education, but instead shifts the burden of paying for higher education away from students and onto taxpayers.”
Instead, researchers suggest spending more on existing federal programs, such as the Pell Grant program.
The study was conducted by Carlo Salerno, Chad Miller and Doudou Zhang.
“Not every student would benefit from these proposals and not every state will be willing or able to participate,” researchers concluded. “Where public resources are scarce, the fact that so many students start college but never finish raises important questions about whether existing funding could be more efficiently allocated to achieve more favorable outcomes.”
Jason Russell is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
