Right now, parents and taxpayers are getting skinned off of defaulted student loans and rising tuition. Economist Richard Vedder points out, in an article in Forbes that universities and even students could assume more risk, and maybe even act more responsibly. “The graduation rates are higher at private schools that on average are more expensive than at lower cost public schools,” he points out. “As a general proposition, where students have more skin in the game, they have greater incentives to graduate in a timely manner, four years instead of five or six years – or not at all. .”
“One of the problems with free tuition proposals is that by largely removing skin in the game for students, they dull incentives to excel academically.”
