How do Americans afford to go to uni?

[Snickersnack1]

I’ve just been reading this: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/student/advice/finding-your-university-uk-versus-us

It says:

Students apply to 6-8 colleges, with each application costing up to $75. So you could easily be looking at $400+ in fees just to apply.

Their college courses last 4 years, and can cost over $30,000 per year!! And there is no student finance, they have to organise their own loans, so with interest rates etc.

HOW is any student from an average home finding £120,000 to pay for uni? And that’s just undergraduate, it’s more again if you do postgrad, which is a must for professions like medicine or law etc.

I know that our students here leave with high levels of ‘debt’ but it is atypical debt that you don’t have to pay if you’re not earning and is written off eventually.

Imagine over £100,000 of actual debt upon graduation, before you’ve even started your career. How do American graduates even afford to live? How do they manage to save and buy a home?

I know it must be possible, but I just don’t see how?

Starting salaries for grads in tech roles 5+ years ago was over $100k. Trying to convince grads to accept our offer of £25k against offers in the US was impossible.

It's also not unusual for students to have 3 jobs, plus studying.

There are different levels of unis in America. Most people go locally to a State College where I suspect the fees are lower and they can live at home. Also, many colleges offer sports scholarships

Just from books, tv etc it seems normal for families to save a "college fund" for their kids from birth.

Debt is totally normal there. They get student loans.

I am aware of an American couple with just under $1mill in uni debt when combined.

They both have very high paying jobs and that isn’t an unusual amount of debt.

Loans. My sister's monthly college loan payment was more than her (very expensive) rent. And you have to start paying within 1 month of graduation, regardless of income.

I went to a 'cheaper' state school that was probably equivalent to a UK student loan, except again you have to make repayments straight away even if you're not earning

We have a lot of family in America. They start college funds as soon as they have kids. I think this is the norm for middle class parents.

Oh and my friends kid is going to his local uni this year. $80,000 per year.

America is a country where people go bankrupt for medical reasons too so I suspect that their attitude to debt is very different. College students often have multiple jobs in tv and film.

People begin college funds or get loans when attending college. A lot of middle class families either get loans for their children and help them pay, or have the child help pay the payment. Many adults have to pay in their college loans after graduating. Some are fortunate enough, as mentioned, to have their parents be able to pay for college due to saving from the time of birth for college.
It is common to have debt in the US. In fact, it is unusual NOT to have any type of debt if you are considered middle class, which many are.

Student loans are federal thing, not wildly dissimilar to UK student loans. More debt and more expensive though.
If you go to university in your State it's cheaper, and many offers work study programmes, basically working in the canteen or library or something for free in exchange for discounts on tuition.
And your local junior or community college will offer degrees and be way cheaper again.

Thanks for replying. I had seen that the ‘college fund’ is a big thing in US TV, but there’s savings… and then there’s savings! What if you have multiple kids?! And they also have to save a lot for their pensions and for their medical care (although I gather many get that through their jobs - imagine if you lost your job or became too ill to work).

Living in America seems so stressful to me.

A 529 college saving plan. They know they will have to pay for college one way or another so a lot start to save at least something. There also seems to be no limit on how long you can do a course for so some work a bit, pay for some college courses, work a bit more, more college. It isn't like our system as far as I can tell.

Debt and especially consumer debt is seen as normal in the US. There are lots of financial audit style clips on youtube with mad car loan amounts.

wow. What is he studying?!

A friend who moved to The US years ago is currently looking at Unis for her DD, we were discussing this last week so from what she told me
Its cheaper to do a degree in The UK even with accommodation so many come here instead
There are lots of scholarships
There is much more awareness of the need to save for college from birth
You get your child into a sport from a very early age and push them very hard in it to get a sports scholarship

I was just in the US. The commercials on the television are wild. One of them was about a kid getting a college acceptance and it was offering remortgage deals to pay for it. I was aghast at my DP who was like ‘it’s totally normal’.

The way things work in America is quite different. It is very stressful!

Many work and go to college at the same time. While there is no “time limit”, it is expected that once once begins a program, say a four year program, that you would graduate within that time frame (within a semester or two at the most). Once someone has their initial associates or bachelors degree, then one can take just one or two classes a semester at their leisure to further their education.
My niece is beginning at a university in the fall and it’s $60,000 up front for one year. Times that times four for her four year degree, wow!

"...and can cost over $30,000 per year!!" [emphasis added]

Yes, they can, but most aren't anywhere near that sort of level, especially if students study instate.

Take California for example, tuition fees at California State University (CSU) next year are $6,084 (£4,515) for in-state students - rather less than the tuition fee in England.

For those at the University of California (UC) it is rather higher, at typically $14,934 (£11,084) but it does vary by campus.

In addition, UC offers a lot of financial aid and, they say, that 53% of UC students who are Californian residents do not pay any tuition.
.

Or somewhere like Texas you will see similar things. Texas A&M University has tuition fees around $6,200 (£4,600) and the University of Texas has tuition fees from $8,700 - $10,900.

Now, of course, these are just tuition fees (the same as in the UK) and living expenses, rent, books etc are all on top.

Adding up all these extra living costs will very likely get you to $30k (the US is a lot more expensive than the UK).
.

So how do students pay for their loans?

Well, there is something called "Federal Student Aid" (FAFSA). This works in a very similar way to the Student Loans Company in the UK.

The only real difference is that the amount of the loan takes no account of the parents income and the loan is repaid like a normal loan rather than how it is here now which is effectively an extra income tax.

In addition to this, many universities offer financial aid to local students so that they don't have to pay tuition fees.

The US has loads of grants and scholarships. Way more than we do, and lots of them are pretty easy/low requirements or even automatically granted to eligible students. This funding happens at university level, state level, and federal level so students will often have large chunks of money credited to their tuition from multiple sources. Anything leftover is given directly to the student to use as needed (so housing, books, new laptop, iPad, whatever).

I taught at both a UC and a CSU in California and was extremely impressed at how many students were essentially getting paid to attend. At the UC there were quite a few students that were Mexican citizens that were also receiving fully free education.

For Ds.
He got scholarship from a local association
He got a discount from the Uni for living where we did and having gone K-12 in the same school district
He had financial aid from the Uni
He filled out the FAFSA that gave him access to federal student loans and it told us our expected contribution, based on our income.
He worked in the student shop as closing manager for the last two years and in the restaurant for the first two.
He ended the four years at a private Uni with loans totalling less than one year of Uni/books/accommodations
Our contribution added up to the same as his loans

You do realise student loans here attract compound interest too though?

If they go to a uni in their own state it is cheaper. There are more scholarships available for various things My US nephew had everything paid for plus a uni job because he was talented in a certain area.

People have college funds investments from birth.

Students work during high school to subsidise college. School days start earlier than here and often finish by lunchtime meaning it is easier to go to school and work.

Thanks, that’s really interesting. Roughly how long does he expect it will take him to repay the outstanding amount?

I’d say a good university is more like $80k a year. Or more. Take something like Boston University, which is huge. Tuition for coming year is just under $70k. Dorms (mostly shared rooms): $12,750. Food (meal plans as usually no or basic kitchens): $7k. So about $90k per year.
To fund this there is university specific financial aid (needs based)
Merit Scholarships
Federal loans
Federal work study loans (where you work X amount on campus, like in the dining hall).
Families start saving for university pretty much as soon as their kids are born, if they can.
All student I know who went to uni in the US (including me) had term time jobs, summer jobs and saved hard.
The US is huge though with thousands of universities. State ones are much cheaper. But the Ivies and other prestigious ones are very expensive (though tend to have more generous financial aid).

College fund started at birth
Community college where they stay at home
Bursarys for academic or sport, often including a meal plan. College sport is huge in the US, most athlets are on a bursary.
loans taken out by the parents
student loans
working while still in high school to save up and then during college

Thanks. Yes I know about the interest on UK student finance, but nobody is going to end up in a debt spiral or bankrupt or homeless because of a UK student loan.

The impression I’m getting is that work simply pays better in America, and there are more options and ways to get to where you want to be according to your means and circumstances.