Posted by Maica Pichler on June 11, 2014 at 12:00 PM
As of November 2014, Redeeming America's Promise is now named the Campaign for Free College Tuition. American Promise scholarships are now known as National Promise scholarships.
Since 1980, the cost of attending college in the United States has risen almost 600% after adjusting for inflation, which rose 160% in the same time period. By comparison, the cost of medical care rose by only 241% in the same three decades.
As intolerable as this increase in the price of post-secondary education is, it is even more indefensible when you realize that incomes barely budged for the average American family during this time. Outside of the top 5% of family incomes, the incredible rise in the cost of college had to be absorbed by families whose income rose by at most 20% over thirty years. No wonder the cost to the country has been an explosion in student debt, which has now topped $1 trillion mark and is the single greatest source of household debt in the entire nation.
Our country is on an unsustainable path when it comes to financing and controlling the cost of higher education. We need to put in place a new policy that simultaneously provide middle and lower income families the money they need to pay for their student’s education as well as begins to bend back the ever rising cost curve of college tuition.
Our plan to create federally funded American Promise Scholarships, convert student loans to an income based repayment process, and reward service to community or country with partial loan write offs is the only credible plan out there to fully address this crisis in higher education in a fiscally responsible manner. Please review and endorse our plan today to put an end to the skyrocketing burden of a college education once and for all.
