Free Tuition
Free Tuition
Carter Ross
The average Canadian pays over $6,500 in tuition for post-secondary education, with some students paying up to $20,000 depending on the field in which they study. In Canada, the minimum wage is $12.65 per hour, meaning that even when working full time, which is already difficult to manage while attending school full time, the average Canadian student is spending a quarter of their yearly income on tuition when working at minimum wage. As the cost of rent continues to rise throughout British Columbia, it is becoming more difficult each year for young adults to pursue a further education.
A solution for this problem is to make college and university tuition free in the province of British Columbia. This idea is not new, it has been a topic of large debate over the past few years, especially during the recent political race over in America. In 2017, US Senator Bernie Sanders detailed his plan to remove tuition and fees at public colleges and universities, an idea that Sanders had gained popularity for during his run for president in 2016. This plan would make tuition free for all students whose families made less than $125,000 a year, and community college tuition free for students of all economic backgrounds. This plan would benefit students who come from low-income families and allow them to pursue higher paying jobs, and would be funded by tax payer money. This same idea has been discussed by other American democrats such as Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and most recently Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
While it has not yet been implemented in the United States or Canada, the idea of free tuition is not purely theoretical. In August of 2018, New York University made tuition free for all medical students saying that “it is important to offer students choice.” This change would save NYU medical students over $55,000 a year. Free tuition is also popular around the world, such as in European countries like Sweden, Norway, or Finland. It is important to note that while students would be saving money by attending these tuition free programs, the cost of living in these locations is very high and students still often end up in debt.
One way to allocate more tax money to pay for free tuition would be to create more tax-brackets. Currently in British Columbia, tax payers who earned $150,000 a year pay the same amount of tax that someone who makes $10,000,000 does. Creating more tax brackets would allow for higher income tax for higher earning payers. The idea of increasing income tax for the wealthy has been heavily debated as of recent, as US representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been stirring pots with her suggestion of a 70% income tax for all income after the 10 millionth dollar. This kind of change would benefit both Canada and the United States and would allow for free tuition.
I think that free tuition would be a good idea and would only benefit both the economy and the students themselves.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/08/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-70-percent-tax-rich
https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/taxes/income-taxes/personal/tax-rates
Very well researched article! I really appreciate the detail and statistics presented. Most importantly, you pointed out that although some European countries have successfully adopted free tuition, a lot of students still manage to end up in debt. It would definitely do more good in the long run for a huge number of people.
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