Government funding of universities is a broad topic that affects many people in Canada and throughout the world. I am going to specifically focus on how reduced government funding negatively impacts students financially. The inverse relationship between government funding and tuition cost has drastically changed over the past 50 years. I will explore the issues presented to students in regard to government funding throughout this issue paper.
Increasing numbers of students are having a difficult time attending post-secondary institutions because of rising tuition. As government funding decreases, tuition increases. This means that more students have to work while they are in university, so they can pay their student loans and general living costs. Many students are plunged into crippling debt before they even finish their undergrad. Many people are choosing not to go to university because it is simply too expensive. This has long-term negative effects on our country as a whole and as individuals.
Before I delve into the issue, there are a few key concepts that must be understood to gain more insight into this issue. The first term is one that was discussed in one of my other classes, but is pertinent to this issue as well: credentialization. As I understand it, credentialization is the process that our society is going through, where you need credentials to get ahead in life. To be employed anywhere that you hope to make more than minimum wage, more likely than not you will need some form of post-secondary education. It is difficult for people coming from a lower socioeconomic background to get the credentials they need because tuition is staggeringly high. A university degree is (now, more so than ever) the passport to the Canadian middle class life. Demand for education is high, classroom seats in good schools are in limited supply, and so prices tend to go up (Shpancer).
Another notable term is neoliberalism. Neoliberalism is “a set of governing practices… resulting in the reorganization of capitalist states and social life around the idea of markets as the most efficient and moral mechanisms for allocating social goods and shaping individual and collective behaviour,” (Brock et al: 363). Applied to the context of students and rising tuition costs, we see the government stepping back (not “interfering” with the market) to let the individual take care of himself or herself. Individual fiscal responsibility may also be referred to as responsibilization, “a form of neoliberal governance that is the process of affirming and constructing people as responsible, self-managing moral agents” (Brock et al: 237).
The Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada (hereto referred to as the AUCC) is a non-governmental, not for profit organization that represents Canadian universities and colleges. Their priorities are to increase funding for universities’ operating and capital costs, research, and international programs. The AUCC participates in the development of public policy to find solution to the economic and social challenges facing Canada. The AUCC is a useful resource in this issue because they contain a number of statistics on tuition, enrollment, and job trends (AUCC: About Us).
Another useful resource is Canadian Association of University Teachers (hereto referred to as the CAUT). In Canada, government funding as a share of university operating revenue has decreased substantially in the past 40 years. Funding dropped from 81% in 1979, to 77% in 1989, to its current rate of 47.6%. Inversely, the cost of tuition as a percentage of university operating budget has increased: 15% in 1979, to 22% in 1989, to its current rate of 41.3% (CAUT: Government Funding and Tuition).
There are certainly some people who are more affected by this issue than others. People from lower socioeconomic status are most greatly affected by the increase of tuition as a result of decreased government funding. People from lower socioeconomic statuses will be burdened with more debt, as it is likely they will need to borrow money in the form of a student loan. We did an exercise in my Principles of Social Theory class that indicated that approximately 95% of the class worked for money while in school. It was also indicated that more than 60% of the class was in debt. Might I add that the 5% of students who didn’t have to work for money also weren’t in debt. This is indicative of the socioeconomic gap in student life, when there are some students working 40 hours/week just to get by, and other students who don’t have to work and get by quite easily.
The implications for Canadian society could be catastrophic. If funding for post-secondary education continues to rise, it will perpetuate the social elite, creating a large gap in the structure of our economy. As the middle class shrinks, the lower class grows to a disproportional amount, so we have a model that has an enormous lower class population, a small middle class population, and a medium sized upper class. A healthy economy has the largest percentage of its population being middle class. With the majority being lower class, not having the credentials required to obtain a sustainable job, money will not flow freely into the economy and we may see a recession worse than when the housing bubble burst in 2008.
Some other, less catastrophic implications would be increased debt load and more loans for people coming out of university. Since there would be an increase in debt, we would see behaviours change as a result of money owed. More people would have to work longer, and may not retire until they are over 65-years-old. In addition to people holding off on retirement, people who own houses might have to take out a mortgage or even a second mortgage to pay off debts.
A possible solution for this problem is to follow some of the European country models and provide free (or at least substantially subsidised) university for students. Our country would become more educated as a whole and individuals within the population would gain insight into a variety of useful areas of study. Relating back to credentialization, if more people were to be educated, more people will be appropriate candidates for jobs that require skilled labour or specific fields of knowledge. Those jobs typically pay more than say, McDonalds, where unskilled labour sings to the tune of minimum wage. Those individuals that are more educated will have a higher paying job, thus being able to contribute to the economy by being a valued consumer, therefore improving the stability of our economy.
This is an issue that requires further examination. It is an important area in the lives of not only students in Canada, but Canada as a nation. Drastic reorganization of social thought on the ways in which post-secondary institutions are organized must occur in order for us to remedy the inequalities suffered by students at the hands of rising tuition due to reduced government funding.
Sources
AUCC. About Us. Accessed: 01/10/2012. http://www.aucc.ca/about-us/
Brock, Deborah; R. Raby; M.P. Thomas. Power and Everyday Practices. Nelson Education: Toronto. 2012. Print.
CAUT. Government Funding and Tuition as Share of University Operating Revenue, Canada. Accessed: 01/10/2012. http://www.caut.ca/pages.asp?page=517
Shpancer, Noam. Student Debt as a Moral Issue. Psychology Today, 2012. Accessed: 01/10/2012. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/insight-therapy/201208/student-debt-moral-issue
Useful Links
Student Debt as a Moral Issue http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/insight-therapy/201208/student-debt-moral-issue Psychological examination of student debt as a moral issue by Noam Shpancer, Ph.D. in Insight Therapy.
Tuition fees rising faster than incomes and inflation, report warns http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/tuition-fees-rising-faster-than-incomes-and-inflation-report-warns/article4535869/ Facts and figures on tuition in Canada by Julian Beltrame, Globe and Mail.
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