Benefits of Sanders’s College Plan Bigger for Wealthy, Analysis Finds
The analysis undercuts a central theme of Mr. Sanders’s Democratic presidential campaign, which has called for shifting tax benefits from the rich to the beleaguered middle class and poor. Brookings contributor Matthew Chingos says the Sanders plan would actually be tilted toward the wealthy, a charge that has been made by the senator’s chief rival, Hillary Clinton.
Specifically, dependent students from households in the top half of U.S. earners would get $16.8 billion in tuition relief under the free-college plan, Mr. Chingos concludes. Students from households in the bottom half would get $13.5 billion.
The Sanders campaign called the analysis deeply flawed, saying that under its own analysis, 70% of the benefits would go to those making less than $100,000 a year. “Unlike, the Clinton plan, Senator Sanders is clear on who will benefit from his plan: everyone who has the ability and the desire to receive a higher education,” Warren Gunnels, the campaign’s policy director, said in an email. Mrs. Clinton has proposed allowing making college debt-free for students, rather than tuition-free.
Mr. Chingos’s explanation is simple. The Sanders plan would relieve students of paying any tuition at public colleges and universities, both at more-selective schools that tend to be more expensive, and less-selective schools that tend to be cheaper. (Mr. Sanders would levy a tax on Wall Street trading to pay for it.) “At public four-year colleges, dependent students from higher-income families tend to attend more expensive institutions,” he writes. As a result, they would get most of the aid if college tuition were free.
Lower-income students tend to go community colleges and less-expensive public schools, and thus would receive less aid.
Mr. Chingos points out that making college tuition-free would still leave students on the hook for rent, transportation and books, which often comprise the biggest costs for students.
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2016/04/21/benefits-of-bernie-sanderss-free-college-plan-bigger-for-wealthy-analysis-finds/
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