Free Public College Education

[skrs (Alan J. Cohen)]

In England, not only college but medical school education was free (with a stipend for room and board) when I did rotations there in 1975-76. Pay was accordingly lower after leaving school but no one left with $160,000 in debt or chose sub-specialties with procedures to help pay off their loans. College graduates are paid on average two or three times what those without college degrees get. Our national productivity depends upon adequate training. By pricing college out of reach of a large part of the population and placing many more in crushing debt, we are limiting our productivity, increasing inequality, and damaging lives.