College Costs 1992-2022

[*ochocincos*]

It's no secret that college nowadays is incredibly expensive.
Not only that, it's been ingrained in high schoolers that they need to go to college to be successful and get paid well.
As such, many take on a vast amount of college debt, really impacting them financially for 10+ years.

Let's take a look at what the average college costs were in 1992, 2002, 2012, and 2022 for an in-state, public university including room and board.
These numbers are provided from the following two sources:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/05/18/cost-of-college-the-year-you-were-born/39479153/
https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/

The reason for the 2nd link is because the first only goes up to 2018. I had to find another link to find this year's costs.
Note that the below will list inflation-adjusted amounts too, but those are listed for early 2019 inflation. The inflation-adjusted amounts would be higher using today's metrics.

1992 - $5830 per year (inflation adjusted (IA): $10,460) - $23,320 over 4 years ($41,840 IA)
2002 - $9670 per year (IA: $13,530) - $38,680 over 4 years ($53,120 IA)
2012 - $17,820 per year (IA: $19,600) - $71,280 over 4 years ($78,400 IA)
2022 - $20,617 per year - $82,468 over 4 years

Notice the incredible difference between 2002 to 2012. That's when a good amount of Millennials were going to college.
Even without any interest on loans, someone with loans from the 2002 costs would be paying roughly $325 per month over 10 years to pay off that amount.
For someone with the 2012 amount, it'd be roughly $594 per month over 10 years.
If going to college today, roughly $688 per month over 10 years.

Adding in interest on the loans typically will add another $20-50 per month on top of the above.
This is assuming most interest rates being 6% or higher, which most students have.
https://www.finder.com/federal-student-loan-interest-rates-by-year

And while some might say that people should just go to college somewhere that offers cheaper prices (especially if they live with parents and commute vs having to pay room and board), that may not always be a great option depending on the schools in the commute area.

So for anyone who wants to criticize Millennials and Gen Z about cost of college, hopefully this helps enlighten to show that college for Boomers and most of Gen X was half the cost (or even less than that) even with inflation adjustments compared to how it's been for those going to school the past 1-2 decades.