[zoolily]

Heavy government involvement with public universities in the form of subsidies once made public education free in some states and low tuition everywhere. As government subsidies have decreased, tuition costs have risen to compensate. The state paid 75% of the costs to educate a student in the closest university to me in 2005, but paid less than 25% of those costs in 2020.

Lower subsidies led to a reduction in tenured positions to reduce educational costs as well as to a rapid expansion of administrators whose job it is to obtain funds from donations, grants, and corporations. Unfunded government mandates like Title IX and so forth have also led to the expansion of the administration and increasing education costs.