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Last updated on: 7/31/2019 11:49:24 AM PST

Should Public College Be Tuition-Free?

Free college programs come in different forms but generally refer to the government picking up the tab for tuition costs, while students pay for other expenses such as room and board. There are currently around 17 million students in undergraduate programs in the United States. For more information, see our "Free College - Top 3 Pros and Cons" article.

Candidates who are in favor of any version of free college, including tuition-free community college, tuition-free four-year degrees, and two years tuition-free at a four-year school, are considered "PRO" to this question.
Pro
Joe Biden
Biden
Howie Hawkins
Hawkins

Con
Jo Jorgensen
Jorgensen
Not Clear or Not Found
Donald Trump
Trump





Pro (Yes)

Pro
Joe Biden
Biden
Democrat

"We can pay for this with the [Trump administration] tax cut that we're going to reverse as well as eliminating some of these loopholes that make no sense. Let me give you one example. I don't want to be generic about it. I want to give you an example. For example, you could send everyone in this state [New Hampshire] to a community college for free. And the entire United States for free, if they're qualified. Cutting in half the cost of... a four-year degree, because in every state you're able to transfer these community college credits to the state university, cutting in half the cost of education, a four-year education if that's what you desire. But, here's the deal, it costs six billion dollars a year. There goes that big-spending Democrat Biden, man, look at him. I can eliminate one of the 1.6 trillion dollars in loopholes. It's called stepped-up basis... If you just eliminate that one out of one trillion six hundred plus billion dollars, every single solitary kid could go to qualify to go to community college for free, cutting in half the cost of their four-year education, increasing productivity by 2/10 of one percent by most studies, as well as having eleven billion dollars to put toward the deficit."

Source: C-SPAN, "Joe Biden in Hampton, New Hampshire," c-span.org, May 13, 2019
Pro
Howie Hawkins
Hawkins
Green

"We will enact federal policies and programs to ensure that every person has equal access to high-quality, lifelong, tuition-free public education, from pre-K through university, technical, and continuing adult education. Each of us should be able to go to school as far as our interests and abilities take us."

Source: Howie Hawkins, "The Economic Bill of RIghts," howiehawkins.us (accessed June 24, 2020)
Con (No)

Con
Jo Jorgensen
Jorgensen
Libertarian

"No - federal subsidies in the form of student loans have caused college tuitions to skyrocket, and free tuition will make it worse. This takes away colleges’ incentive to provide value at a reasonable cost, and takes away students’ responsibility for shopping around for a good education with reasonable tuition rates, as well as considering the many alternatives to college that are emerging."

Source: Communication from the Jorgensen campaign to ProCon.org on Aug. 26, 2020

[Editor's Note: The Jorgensen campaign provided the same text in answer to this question and the Should Student Loan Debt Be Forgiven? question.]


Not Clearly Pro or Con
Donald Trump
Trump
Republican

"Well, there's no such thing as free education, because you know that ultimately somebody else is going to be paying for that education. And, so, as a, I can't believe I'm saying this as a politician, I'm not a politician, but as somebody that's now in politics, in the political world, I'd love to say 'free education!' but, again, if somebody gets free education, all of the people paying their rates are going to go up… You take a look at how college costs are rising and there's no reason for it. They are letting them go up and the problem is the students are getting crushed because, again, the government just keeps giving them more and more money and the students give them to the college. So it's not fair. We're going to really look into that because we have to keep it down. We have to keep it down. Some of the colleges do a good job. Many of them, I don't think they even care what the costs are because they get so much money. We're going to do something for the students. We're going to have something with extensions and lower interest rates and a lot of good things."

Source: Fox News Insider, "Trump: 'There's No Such Thing as Free Education,' Bernie," insider.foxnews.com, Apr. 3, 2016




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