Rising Costs of Higher Education Research Paper

Rising Costs of Higher Education - Research Paper Example The assistance has led to an increase in demand for higher education and the students have greatly enrolled for courses in the universities. The universities have taken an advantage of this and have increased the fees that students should pay for higher education with an argument that these students have money from these funds. Government funding to the institutions have also declined but the universities have not reduced their budgets. This means that the money will be extended to the students in terms of tuition and fees. Another issue is the lack of market discipline. Different departments in the institutions bloat their budgets so that they gain more power and get their work done. This has again led to the rise in the cost of higher education. Ineffective price competition among the institutions has also made a major contribution to the rise in the cost of higher education. Competition is also there where each institution wants the best lecturers and that means that they have to pay more. There are also government regulations that require the universities to pay some amounts of money to people like workers who construct buildings in the universities and pay some other fees in relation to research. This increases the costs of running the universities and eventually leads to increased fees on the part of the student. This paper will seek to analyze the different factors that have led to the rising costs of higher education. This research was done to identify the various factors that have led to the rising costs of higher education. In conducting the research, the following questions were put into consideration. What are the major causes of the rising costs on higher education What role do the universities play in the rising costs of higher education Does the government play any role in promoting the rise in the costs of higher education In answering these research questions, both primary and secondary sources have been chosen. One of the primary sources chosen is the book: Going Broke by Degree: Why College Costs too Much by Richard K. Vedder. This book tries to discuss different aspects of the reasons as to why the costs of higher education have risen. Some of the ideas that have been discussed here are the issues of government and other third-party provider funding where fees have been increased because the students are getting some funding from the government and other third-party providers. Competition issues have also been discussed where institutions are competing with their peers in terms of development and the money needed for development is extended to student fees. Government regulations have also been identified as a factor that leads to the rise in the costs of higher education in that the government regulations require the school to pay some money in areas such as research, construction, etc. The other issue discussed is the lack of market discipline where departments and deans will bloat their budgets so that they have some power and resources required to do their job. The other source used is a print PDF: Books and Manuals Application Briefs that identifies the factors that affect the rising cost of higher education. Some of the factors identified include: declining government funding where the government does not fund the education of students in universities fully and also does not support all the students who join these institutions, fierce