eCommerce Blog 10

In the WSJ online article Painful Choices as College Bills Wallop Families by Philip Shishkin he talks about the hardships many students and families are experiencing. Shishkin covers a wide array of ways that families are trying to curb the high college bills, the main way being filing for federal aid. Also, talked about in the article was how many families are trying to scrounge up money to just pay for their kids to finish up this school year. It seems as though a lot of these people are stuck in a bad spot because if they don't send their kids to college then they're missing out on a lot of good jobs and if they do they're having trouble finding the money and then paying off the huge loans they've accumulated. Another thing people in the article were doing was trying to find any job available to help pay for the loans which is especially difficult with the poor job market out there and has resulted in many asking relatives for loans.

This article really interested me because it's a situation that I could have been in but was lucky enough to avoid it. Although, with a lot of people including current freshman it's going to be a tough situation to avoid. The sad thing is in today's world if you don't have a college education your pretty much looked down upon when it comes to applying and getting corporate jobs. In my opinion part of the problem is the ridiculous prices these colleges are charging. I know when I first enrolled tuition was in the high 20's and now it's in the high 30's just after 4 years. I think this situation is just going to get worse with the increasing cost of college and many people knowing it's a necessity now and they have to go. This probably isn't a viable option but I think it's a start to fixing the problem of the ridiculous rising tuition costs, when students enroll they should have to pay that same cost all four years or at least a number close to it instead of a ten thousand dollar increase over four years. I know I never thought my tuition would rise that much and thought the price I started out paying was reasonable and I could handle it but now it's out of control and is going have a big impact on what I do with my money.