should college be free for everyone

Hung 3

Roberto Hung

Professor Dawn Garcia

ENC 1101

3 November 2019

Education should be free for everyone

People who propose to change colleges to be free, believe that it would benefit the entire nation; not just people who take advantage of it, and not only public but also private universities after all most of these are based on knowledge or people who had required advanced skills. Therefore, if college is free, it will help prevent gaps in high end jobs that are not filled due to lack of people who are prepared to do it. This would help Americas economy not to grow that fast. I will talk about what are the benefits of making colleges free and what are the consequences.

Additionally, employers who wish to hire individuals who are prepared for high-end jobs would help a bigger amount of people to earn more money in jobs that frequently go unfilled. As a possible result of more millions or even billions to America’s economy since people who have more money and less debt tend to invest more in their necessities. Making college free would also mean that the government would earn more revenue, which would allow them to cover the free public colleges. However the problem of college being free is not just economic but social and moral. Do we want anyone to take advantage of free college regardless of their social standing, or to have an equal opportunity to reach their potential? That is what a country should be about, equality, but changing from being a lower-class person to a high-class person has been hard in the past years. And without the accessibility to a good education could create a big separation of societies in America.

Lately people believe that good education is a right and everyone should have it, and they are totally correct, therefore, I will demonstrate more reasons why college education should be free: People would be free to satisfy their needs with less debts on their lives. Students would focus more on their studies rather than worrying how to pay their education, therefore they will finish college on time ready for the jobs in their communities. Most of the best high school students end not applying to the top universities, not because they do not have the potential but because they can not afford it, they usually come from a low income family, and they end up going to a less selective college, what consequently creates a gap between the societies. Even though financial aid exists they currently fail on giving the opportunity to provide an equal chance to everyone. Another reason is that most of the students graduate with debts because of the loans that they received; therefore, they have lower chances to collect wealth, getting married, having children or owning a home.

Currently people have managed to propose how to change college being free and one of the main questions is how would the government pay for it? Therefore, I am going to describe you how would it be possible. College is not really going to be free; someone is always going to pay for it, in the case of public colleges taxpayers would be the ones paying for it. Economists have proposed to “close corporate tax loopholes that allow companies to legally avoid paying their full share of taxes. To increase the tax rates for America's wealthiest millionaires and billionaires. Implementing new taxes on speculative Wall Street transactions. Diverting most of the public money currently spent on student financial aid toward making all public colleges and universities tuition-free instead, and decreasing the military budget, Cracking down on wasteful government spending” (Free College). This are some of the many reasons that I believe that the government should change colleges to be free. There are many arguments about why college should be free and why should not, that said I am also going to implement the consequences that a free college would create even though I am in favor of making colleges free.

As I implicated before college would not be free, taxpayers would be the ones paying it. Another consequence might be that the colleges would have a waiting list, motives of the high requested applications. Colleges could also decrease their quality if the government gives small cuts to each one of the public colleges. That could also close programs or not be as many as before. If colleges are free the cost of living will be higher and accordingly to Deborah Kurfiss “Unless more money is allocated by the public, the quality of the education will suffer. This could end up decreasing access to higher education rather than increasing it”(student debt relief) that it is what people who do not want to make college free say. People who debate against college being free also say that “many people feel that even if there are societal benefits to a better educated population, the people that benefit the most are those who get the degree. Therefore, they should pay” (student bet relief)