ASUM forum considers costs of higher education
Published Oct. 26, 2007
To address the mounting costs of higher education, the Associated Students for the University of Missouri sponsored a forum on Tuesday with two Missouri economic experts. ASUM is a legislative lobbying group that represents all four UM system campuses.
Michael Podgursky is a professor in the Department of Economics and the director of the Show-Me Institute, a fiscally conservative think tank. Tom Kruckemeyer works with the Missouri Budget Project and was formerly a chief economist in the Budget and Planning Division of the Division of the Office of Administration.
Kruckemeyer said part of the issue surrounding mounting higher education cost is the lack of funding from higher education.
"2002 was a period of very weak economic growth," Kruckemeyer said. "One of the areas that suffered most egregiously is state aid for higher education."
But Podgursky instead focused on the benefits of having a college education.
"Whatever you're paying for the university's education now, you're going to more than make up for it with lifetime earnings," Podgursky said.
He also said the reality of the higher education system in the United States is some people will not be able to afford it.
Although Kruckemeyer said he agreed a college education has value over time, he also stressed state budgetary concerns as part of the reason college education costs couldn't be lower. He said beginning in the 2002 fiscal year, there has been an "unprecedented decline" in state revenues.
"The problem is that the growth hasn't been sufficient to return higher education revenue growth to where it needs to be," he said. "We will see a lot of growth in state revenue over the last three or four years that will make a significant change in this very likely."
ASUM Ambassador Julie Terry asked about the effect of federal higher education funding on teacher salaries and cited speculation that MU has some of the lowest teaching salaries in the Big 12.
"With the Big 12 pay, the University of Texas and Texas A&M are different animals," Podgursky said. "If you compare us to the rest of the group, then maybe the disparity isn't quite so great. People, when they feel underpaid, either quit working or move. You guys lose, in essence."
Kruckemeyer extended issues with retaining faculty to other areas of education, including the number of classes offered at a given university. He said although universities sometimes "offer fewer classes" to adjust, they are "happy to readjust when the funding string is available."
Former Rep. Vicki Riback Wilson, D-Columbia, who moderated the debate with Stevenson, stressed that although the process of funding higher education is an economic process, the political process is more important.
"It is ultimately a political process, and therefore it requires that each of you who is concerned about state funding versus other sources of funding get involved in the political process and find a way to affect that," she said.