Republican policies push higher education further out of reach for middle class

Average college tuition in Michigan has now crossed the $10,000 mark, weighing in at $10,416. Add to that number a $10,000 for living expenses, and the average college expense costs $20,416 per year. How's that for putting college ever further out of reach for low income families? Not exactly in line with reinventing Michigan, is it?

All this after years of stagnant middle class incomes.

Thank the Michigan legislature for slashing state aid to colleges every year for a decade, balancing the state budget on the backs of our future...

...and of course Governor Rick Snyder just slashed state funding to universities by ANOTHER 15%, but ONLY if the school promises not to raise tuition by more than 7%. If a school raises its tuition by more than 7.1% it will see even MORE cuts of up to 22%.

On June 21, 2011, Governor Rick Snyder signed HB 4325 (PA 62 of 2011) into law. It contains a 15 percent across-the-board cut in state operating support for Michigan’s 15 public universities, provided the universities keep FY 2011–12 tuition/fee increases to 7.1% or less. Those universities that fail to meet the tuition restraint requirements will see cuts ranging from 19 percent to 22 percent.

This sort of garbage is going on all over America.

The latest tuition increases are one example. While incomes have largely stagnated around America and in California for the past decade, CSU now costs about twice what it did just four years ago, in 2007.

Sure, the CSU increase represents "only" about $2,500 per year, but that's more than $10,000 over four years. That's enough to put college out of reach for many of the students the system was designed to educate.

I guess I thought the purpose was to make America MORE competitive nationwide. Seems the goal is to make sure the middle class sinks.