Yes, Bernie’s Plan to Make College Free Would Be a Gift to Rich Kids. That Doesn’t Make It a Bad Idea.
By Jordan Weissmann, Slate
(Friday, April 22, 2016 5:37 pm) — Nobody would ever accuse Bernie Sanders of trying to coddle the rich. But some certainly think his plan to abolish tuition at public colleges would end up wasting a whole lot of money on them. Hillary Clinton, for her part, likes to say she’s “not in favor of making college free for Donald Trump’s kids.”1 This week, meanwhile, a new report from Brookings confirms that getting rid of tuition entirely at state schools would disproportionately benefit upper-income students.
Does that really mean abolishing tuition at State U. is a terrible idea? Not necessarily. The fact that free college would benefit everyone from Trump to the people who clean his towers might actually be an argument in its favor.