Au contraire, I think if everyone with a demonstrable ability to learn and the demonstrated desire to do so was allowed to do so free of expense, society as a whole would be way better off.
"Free of expense" doesn't exist. You're talking about transferring the expense onto people who do create wealth. Maybe it makes sense for people to have an inherent right to medical treatment or housing or something, but an inherent right to study feminism and religion at the $100,000 expense of others?
I mean, we already have subsidies for people who are actually good at the humanities--tenured professorships. Philosophy's probably worthwhile that society can afford to pay for philosophers--and at this rate, we're hiring more philosophers as a society than ever in history. But what's the gain for society in training far more philosophers than we can afford to employ, or in indulging the 80%+ of philosophy undergraduates who have little to no aptitude for the subject?
I won't even get into the bigger question, which is whether religious studies or women's studies are worthwhile for society to subsidize at all.
You have a good point - my question would be why the studies of feminism and religion carry a $100K price tag. My engineering degree cost about half as much (in Canada, mind you), but is understandably pricy due to the earning potential.
Sure, there is a minimum cost to a degree that may or may not line up with its earning potential... but $100K? How in the world do schools get away with charging that much for a degree whose earning potential is so low?
This whole problem would be a lot less of an issue if degrees cost proportionally (or at least roughly proportionally) to their market value. People who want to study "useless" degrees can do so, and their costs would be likewise much lower than people who want "useful" degrees for employment. Perhaps we'd all be better off as a society this way.
100K was her total student debt, which is not entirely from tuition and fees but also from living expenses. Living expenses for 4 years in New York can easily exceed 100K on their own. If you skimp and live on campus (which in NYC is probably cheaper than living in town--not true for the rural college I go to) it's going to be less than otherwise, but then you add tuition on top of that.
The charge is based on the cost to deliver. And an unsubsidized private school must naturally pass on a greater portion of this burden to its students.
"How in the world do schools get away with charging that much for a degree whose earning potential is so low?"
They charge whatever the market will bear! Apparently there is a large intersection between "rich" and "willing to piss away four years on a nonproductive enterprise". Whodathunkit.