Some Politics

From a George Will article

"Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) recently convened a discussion of how colleges and universities should be spending their endowments. Grassley, who says more than 135 institutions each have endowments of more than $500 million, says perhaps they should be required to spend 5 percent of those endowments each year. Welch has introduced legislation to require that percentage to be spent to reduce tuition and other student expenses.

This government reach for control of private resources comes even though last year colleges and universities spent, on average, 4.6 percent of their endowments. Furthermore, most endowments are too small to be a significant source of captured money.

...

So the frequently cited $700 billion sum is but a small fraction of the cost, over coming decades, of today's financial crisis. The desire of governments to extend their control over endowments and foundations is a manifestation of the metastasizing statism driven by the crisis. For now, its costs, monetary and moral, are, strictly speaking, incalculable."

While I'm not wholly against the bailout as Will seems to be - I think it's probably a necessary means on the whole - it seems to me that Will has a point. Should the government really be sticking their noses into private higher education? Lowering tuition and student costs is certainly an amiable cause but should that be a forcibly mandated burden on private educational institutions? If the government really wishes to help students in this way, shouldn't the money at least come from some other tax source instead of crippling the freedom of educational institutions to spend their endowments at a pace and aim of their own choice. Further, if the wealthy alumni of these institutions (and any other donors for that matter) are aware that their donations aren't being controlled by the college or university but by the government, they might just be less likely to give as much.


Cheers!