[pinkmuffinere]

That is very much a real sum of money people pay. The UC system is (I believe) 30k per year tuition if you’re in state. Add rent and you’re probably looking at 45k per year. Out of state is higher. And many systems are more expensive as well

[Coffeewine]

45k/year is excellent! If you believe business insider, U of Chicago’ll run you 100k / year. https://www.businessinsider.com/most-expensive-colleges-tuit...

Traditionally the story was that almost no one paid the sticker price, but still that’s an eye watering sum even discounted.

I’m sure in the next few years we’ll have stories of people 500k in debt or more for their schooling.

[linkregister]

The UC system is an outlier in both price and quality for public education in the United States.

The California State system, which costs $7-9 thousand per year, is far more representative.

[senordevnyc]

The UC system has about 300k students, CSU has about 475k. So more representative, yes, but I wouldn’t say far more so.

[linkregister]

Truly torturing the data to index on student body size as the relevant metric

[pinkmuffinere]

The discussion is about what the average person pays.... surely student body size _is_ the relevant metric? What else would you propose?

[linkregister]

If you look at the annual tuition rates for public schools in the United States, you will find the UC system to be an outlier. I gave a system in the same state that is closer to the national median. How much simpler can this be communicated?

[pinkmuffinere]

1. If you looked up the average tuition in the US and found the UC system is an outlier, then quoting CSU prices is a red herring — just tell us the average tuition and perhaps the standard deviation.

2. The question that started this thread was “does anyone really pay 250k for college?” Even as an outlier, the UC system price is relevant. It is an existence proof that many people _do_ pay close to that sum for undergrad.