An Argument for Free Tuition - Submitted Version

There exists that anxiety-inducing moment in every post-secondary student’s new semester where they are presented with the tuition fees.  The price of a first-year university program has gone up more than $4000 (inflation adjusted) since the 1970s and the fees keep rising.  There is a solution to this anxiety crisis; tuition-free education.  A cost-sharing universal tuition program could alleviate fees for students and allow for all to pursue post-secondary education.  Yet there exist voices of dissent on the topic.  Those in opposition of free tuition are convinced that provincial governments will not be able to meet the funding demands of the program.  They also claim free tuition will only benefit affluent students because they will be able to afford living expenses whereas disadvantaged students will still struggle.  That said, neoliberal economists are not arguing for retention of tuition fees because there is altruism to it but because keeping education financially exclusive preserves social exclusivity.

Canada is a mixed economy and regulates certain industries to protect the welfare of its citizens.  The affluent benefit from universal programs because the nature of a universal benefit program is to ensure all its citizens have equal access.  The purpose of free tuition is to open the cost barrier to a disadvantaged person seeking an education.  There is a claim that tuition costs are meager compared to the costs of living but the triple fold increase in tuition is still a significant cost barrier to disadvantaged students.  Removing tuition costs significantly reduces the burden put on those students struggling to afford the ever-increasing costs of living and allows them to allocate their income to those expenses.

Economists have recommended that changes to the student loan program be made to help disadvantaged students afford living expenses and tuition.  This debt load, however, represents an imbalance upon post-graduate finances.  The debt load from student borrowing is significant (on average $25,000 per student.)  Tuition fees on average are $5000 per semester so eliminating those fees significantly reduces the debt burden.  The debt-free graduate could allocate their new income towards savings and asset allocation almost exclusively.  This is the advantage that affluent students have, and it creates a disparity right out of the education phase.  A universal tuition program will bridge this disparity gap by producing students with significantly less or no debt to hinder their earning potential.

This debt-free wave of students is beneficial to the economy of this country.  Work ready graduates who have little to no debt burden are eager to amass savings and consume resources for the allocation of housing and family-building.  The higher population of educated working adults means the productivity of several industries will increase which raises profits which increases the taxation base for provincial and federal governments.  They key is to convince the provinces to focus on providing opportunities to young people and those requiring education instead of consistently managing taxation for the aging population (who are statistically more affluent.)

The cost-sharing structure that exists for cross-legislative programs is an adequate model for the abolition of tuition, where the federal government contributes a portion of the fees to the provinces while the provinces provide the educational institutions with majority of the funding and the legislative mandates for that funding.  The average salary of a full tenure professor is almost half that of a general practice physician (also funded by a universal government program) and tuition fees are easily calculable (X = students attending program, Y = tuition fee: xy = provincial payment to the school for that program.)  Federal and provincial funding could easily be mandated in each budget based on the projected number of graduating students and the number of post-secondary enrolled students for the previous or current budget year.

The opposition to free tuition comes from a neoliberal mindset that wants to see a return to laissez faire economics and reduced government regulation.  However, the Canadian economy experienced the fall out market capitalism during the Great Depression and then the Second World War so the shift to a social welfare state was made.  This mixed economy has fluctuated over the years, but it remains that the programs institutionalized during the 1950s have evolved in their establishment.  Canada can open further opportunities to disadvantaged citizens through providing them with easily accessible and affordable education.  This is the answer to the ever-increasing tuition anxiety and the burden that student debt poses on the disadvantaged student.  The argument against making tuition free is loud but the reality of making it free is very clear.

Sources:

Arte, B., & Arte, B. (2016, October 17). It's time for Canada to embrace free tuition. Retrieved from https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/bilan-arte/the-case-for-free-tuition_b_12516930.html

Flood, M. (2015, March 23). Should post-secondary education in Canada be free? Retrieved from https://www.therecord.com/opinion-story/5518188-should-post-secondary-education-in-canada-be-free-/

Hopper, T. (2018, February 20). Why the NDP's new 'free tuition' plan is terrible, awful, no-good policy (unless you're rich). Retrieved from https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/why-the-ndps-new-free-tuition-plan-is-terrible-awful-no-good-policy-unless-youre-rich

Phillips, M. (2016, May 15). The high price of a free college education in Sweden. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/05/the-high-price-of-a-free-college-education-in-sweden/276428/

Rankings, C. (2017, November 07). Yes, there is such a thing as free tuition in Canada. Retrieved from https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/campus-rankings/yes-there-is-such-a-thing-as-free-tuition-in-canada_a_23268498/

Sagan, A. (2014, March 11). Meet a graduate carrying Canada's average student debt load | CBC News. Retrieved from https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/average-student-debt-difficult-to-pay-off-delays-life-milestones-1.2534974

University tuition rising to record levels in Canada | CBC News. (2013, September 11). Retrieved from https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/university-tuition-rising-to-record-levels-in-canada-1.1699103

Usher, A. (2018, February 20). Ten bad arguments about free tuition in Canada. Retrieved from http://higheredstrategy.com/ten-bad-arguments-free-tuition-canada/

Yelland, T. (2015, April 28). ​Why Canada should have free university tuition, and how it could. Retrieved from https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/dpkkpx/why-canada-should-have-free-university-tuition-and-how-it-could-172