UC Regents increase law rates Forum

[jetlagz28]

Those projected in state prices are INSANE!!

[pany1985]

I don't buy the "we're charging more so that we can increase our competitiveness" thing. Why would prospective students want to pay more? I think pretty much any school would rise in the rankings if they significantly lowered their tuition and gave students a better deal.

[Formerbruin]

I don't buy the "we're charging more so that we can increase our competitiveness" thing. Why would prospective students want to pay more? I think pretty much any school would rise in the rankings if they significantly lowered their tuition and gave students a better deal.

Well if you want the funds to keep top professors, to keep the career office fully staffed, to build a new building, to refurbish the old building, to build a new student center, to buy all new chairs, to increase library resources, to have 7 day/week laptop tech support... it all costs money, and if the state isn't giving it, it has to come from somewhere.

And plenty of schools are cheap, even in T3/T4. See e.g. U North Dakota and CUNY (7k/year).

Plus I think in 2011-2012, with the rate other schools have been increasing tuition, 50k/year will be about par for the course.

[pany1985]

If the increases are truly only for those purposes, I'm just curious why the cost of maintaining a college/university is going up faster than the rate of anything else.

[Formerbruin]

If the increases are truly only for those purposes, I'm just curious why the cost of maintaining a college/university is going up faster than the rate of anything else.

Besides a huge cut in state funding? I'm not sure I understand your question.

[im_blue]

you'll be able to get instate after 1l, fwiw (which may not be enough now)

I think UC's don't let you do that. IIRC, if you're there for educational reasons you don't qualify for in-state.

Can someone definitely confirm or deny this?

That's the case for undergrad, but grad students can establish residency after 1L.

[pany1985]

If the increases are truly only for those purposes, I'm just curious why the cost of maintaining a college/university is going up faster than the rate of anything else.

Besides a huge cut in state funding? I'm not sure I understand your question.

Well there's definitely that in the case of the UC's, but in colleges/universities in general (public and private), it seems like tuition rates have skyrocketed in the last ten years or so, going up much faster than inflation or wage increases. What exactly is costing these schools so much?

[Conan]

Wow. This reminds me how sweet of a deal SUNY-Buffalo Law is for in-states(~$15,000/yr).

[Formerbruin]

Just 6 years ago, Stanford was at 28k and now they're at 41k or so, and I'm sure they'll go up another $3k or so next year.

Part of Dean Edley's explanation was that schools did it because they could, due to skyrocketing associate salaries. Before 2000, you were looking at making about 80k at the top law firms out of law school. In 2000-2001, firms broke the six digit barrier. A few years later, they were at 125, and 2 years ago they moved to 160. Meanwhile, professor salaries were also increasing at rates disproportionate with the economy. Schools saw a vast source of wealth and grabbed on.

[deadatheist]

If the increases are truly only for those purposes, I'm just curious why the cost of maintaining a college/university is going up faster than the rate of anything else.

for ca it's pretty much on par with how the housing mkt and all else went over the last few years. tuitions's just still increasing, that's the only difference...

[pany1985]

Just 6 years ago, Stanford was at 28k and now they're at 41k or so, and I'm sure they'll go up another $3k or so next year.

Part of Dean Edley's explanation was that schools did it because they could, due to skyrocketing associate salaries. Before 2000, you were looking at making about 80k at the top law firms out of law school. In 2000-2001, firms broke the six digit barrier. A few years later, they were at 125, and 2 years ago they moved to 160. Meanwhile, professor salaries were also increasing at rates disproportionate with the economy. Schools saw a vast source of wealth and grabbed on.

Yeah, that's more what I have an issue with. The UC system can't really help the fact that the state is slashing their funding so I'll cut them some slack, but a lot of schools (law schools and undergrads and everything else) seem to have been raising tuition for fun and profit, which I don't think is really supposed to be the point.

[deadatheist]

it also kinda seems like they gotta hike it up to keep their ranking in world news report to in some cases increase it-----hiring new "quality" faculty and striving to keep their competitiveness----so we should all pay more so they fullfill their goals of being the "best"......* sigh *

kimins have you read about hastings "65 club" from ~50 yrs ago?

[feeblemiles]

So will tuition drop accordingly if those 160k jobs fall back to earth as the economy sorts itself out?

[pany1985]

So will tuition drop accordingly if those 160k jobs fall back to earth as the economy sorts itself out?

[deadatheist]

So will tuition drop accordingly if those 160k jobs fall back to earth as the economy sorts itself out?

i'd love to hear an economist's short term and long term answers to this.

[heyyitskatie]

kinda sucks for those of us whose families have been paying CA taxes for 60+ plus years... apparently at the end of all this, in state is supposed to be about 10% less than out of state...but I think the idea is that it's supposed to look and feel like a private school...I guess if I'm getting absolutely everything at Boalt that I'd get at Penn (which I'm taking as the private school that's probably closest to a peer) it's fine just in that I'd have to pay it to go to any comparable institution.

Aren't UVA and Michigan already priced similarly? Seems more like it's unfortunately just a matter of time rather than something super radical.

[UCInfo]

Aren't UVA and Michigan already priced similarly? Seems more like it's unfortunately just a matter of time rather than something super radical.

UVA and Michigan have a similar model, but both of those schools come from a stronger financial position. In Michigan's case, for instance, the state only provides 2-3 percent of funding, so Michigan does not have to compensate as much as the UCs do if the state cuts its allocation. I think UC and the state of California picked an unfortunate time to move their professional schools to this model. This would have been understandable under the previous economy, but not now, considering that firms are revising their pay structures and associates are finding it harder to get market-rate jobs. The bubble burst in the economy, but not in the UC law school tuition structure.

UVA, Michigan, Berkeley and UCLA might be able to justify this public school-private tuition model if students generally graduate into high-paying jobs, as someone said before when referring to Edley's explanation. But it would be difficult to see how one could pay sticker at Davis and Irvine unless their students begin to secure big firm jobs in the same proportion that T14 students do.

[UCInfo]

This is very interesting, as well as unsettling. Do you think Hastings will just copy whatever Davis does?

Hastings is quoting students 2009-10 rates of $32,244 for in-state and $43,469 for out-of-state: --LinkRemoved--

I haven't seen any documents on what they propose to do beyond that, and it'd be hard to speculate without knowing whether they have a large endowment or reserve. Hastings has the advantage of having more students and having been established the longest, so perhaps it has a stronger financial position. But if it relied as much on state funds as the other schools and if it wants to keep pace with the other schools, it probably can't go too long without raising rates at the same pace.

[OperaAttorney]

47K/year? I'm glad Berkeley dinged me.

[worldtraveler]

Ouch . I'm hoping my need based grant goes up with the tuition. Ouchie ouchi ouchi boalt

[misteranthro]

Does anyone know if there is a difference in rates for incoming versus continuing students? I know that at least this year, the 2Ls and 3Ls are paying less than incoming 1Ls at UCLA. I am hoping that continuing students will have less dramatic increases in 2010 and 2011, but I don't know how that will pan out.

[djshack]

Damn. Now in-state is not much cheaper than private schools, and out-of-state is downright absurd. All the UCs are headed straight to the top of ILRG's most expensive law schools list.

[worldtraveler]

Aren't UVA and Michigan already priced similarly? Seems more like it's unfortunately just a matter of time rather than something super radical.

Not really. The out of state price for Berkeley this year is ridiculously insane (48k) and the future in-state price is crazy. Michigan is 44k out of state this coming year while UVA is 38k in-state and about 44k out of state this coming year. Not to mention both Mich and UVA also have much lower COL than Berkeley.

COL isn't THAT different. You also don't need a car at Berkeley, at all. I'm paying the same for the ihouse at Berk as I would have for the LC at Michigan.

[irishman86]

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[im_blue]

UVA, Michigan, Berkeley and UCLA might be able to justify this public school-private tuition model if students generally graduate into high-paying jobs, as someone said before when referring to Edley's explanation. But it would be difficult to see how one could pay sticker at Davis and Irvine unless their students begin to secure big firm jobs in the same proportion that T14 students do.

Why not? There are plenty of private TTTs that charge just as much as the top privates, so why can't Davis and Irvine charge as much as Berkeley and Michigan?