Opportunity for Sale: State Disinvestment in Higher Education and the Rise of For-Profit College Enrollments

• In Event: 4249 - Institutional Change in Higher Education

Abstract

Declining opportunities for a good job without a college degree lead many to seek a postsecondary education to secure a decent standard of living and a measure of security in 21st century America. There has been particularly fast growth in institutions targeting disadvantaged student populations, including especially public two-year colleges and for-profit universities. While enrolling similar populations, the mission, methods, and models of public community colleges and for-profit institutions significantly diverge, however, and most for-profits are far more expensive with significantly lower graduation rates and smaller wage returns on education than are their public counterparts. How has the model of for-profit institutions thrived despite the downsides? In this article, we study cross-state variation in the growth of for-profits over time in order to evaluate the association between state investments in higher education and for-profit enrollment. We develop a unique dataset of variation in state institutions and higher educational institutions over more than two decades from the late 20th century into the first two decades of the 21st century. We find that states with declining investments in public higher education saw increasing enrollments in for-profit institutions. We argue these dynamics in the higher-education sector to a broader set of political-economy dynamics in in the 2000s period of neoliberalism, austerity politics, and polarized economic growth. We contribute to broader questions of the growth of extractive markets in America, by considering the for-profit higher education sector as a distinctive and important case of opportunity for sale.

Authors

• Rachel E. Dwyer, Ohio State University

• Jason N. Houle, Dartmouth College

• Erica Phillips, Ohio State University