New National Database Challenges Common Conceptions About College Tuition

Increases in college tuition are on the minds of many parents of college-aged children. Every year, parents and students look anxiously for announcements of tuition increases at their college of choice. This fall, the average college tuition is expected to increase by 3%.

Even though tuition is an integral part of the college experience for Americans, we don't know much about the evolution of college tuition and the patterns of tuition growth from a long-term perspective. To address this gap in our knowledge, in 2021, political scientist Thomas Adam (Ph.D.'98) began to collect tuition data for colleges and universities founded before 1920. This data collection work resulted in a national database that contains tuition data in 10-year increments from 1840 to 2020 for a total of 667 private and public colleges and universities in the United States. These 667 institutions represent 64% of all colleges and universities established before 1920. This national database for the first time allows us to trace the origins of tuition and to describe patterns of tuition growth over a period of 180 years.

The data collected in this national database provided the basis for Adam's research article "The History of Tuition at American Colleges and Universities from 1840 to 2020," which has just been published in the journal History of Universities (Oxford University Press).

Taking a long-term perspective spanning almost two centuries challenges two common misconceptions in America that have dominated discussions on college affordability. First, college tuition growth began to rise not in the 1990s but much earlier-- in the 1910s. It is true that the pressure of tuition growth has been burdening American families over the last three decades. Americans, rightfully, believe that tuition growth has been out of control in recent times. From a historical perspective, however, Adam's data shows that growth in tuition since 2000 has been rather modest, especially compared to the three decades from 1960 to 1990.

The second innovative finding Adam's research shows is the mismatch between growth in tuition versus average family income.

The key reason why American families have been struggling with paying for college is not extraordinary growth in tuition but lack of sufficient growth in average family income to absorb rises in tuition.

Up until 1980, tuition growth was largely absorbed by growth in family income. In fact, up until 1980, annual college tuition amounted to no more than 14% of annual family income. Families' ability to absorb tuition increases changed dramatically after 1980 because of continued lackluster growth of family income. In 2020, annual college tuition amounted to as much as 44% of annual family income. The problem, one might argue, has not been tuition growth but the lack of commensurate family income growth.

Both Adam's journal article and his national database of college tuition have received public attention. In June, Adam wrote an article for The Conversation about the unaffordability of college because of rising tuition charges. And in July, Adam gave an interview about his research into tuition growth for WJR AM 760 in Detroit.   

Adam joined the Department of Political Science in 2020. He is an expert in the study of the economics of higher education and nonprofit and philanthropy studies.