Towards free post-secondary education?

Towards free post-secondary education? 1 RONALD W. CROWLEY* "In the conditions of modern life the rule is absolute, the race which does not value trained intelligence is doomed." - Alfred North Whitehead . Introduction Adverse reaction might have been ant1c1pated to both the Economic Council's 1970 proposal and an Ontario Commission's recent report (and subsequent Ontario government bill) calling for increased tuition fees for higher education.2 In both cases, criticism was indeed readily forthcoming. At one cynical (but perhaps accurate) extreme, no one appreciates paying substantially higher prices, however just; students in postsecondary institutions, and their families, are a significant proportion of the Canadian population. On the other hand, these proposals come as a rather abrupt policy change after a long period of stable tuition fees; there is no question that changes such as these should be subject to intense scrutiny and public debate. In this paper, I present the case for an alternative approach to higher education, the possibility of providing it tuition-free. Growth in post-secondary enrolment in Canada has been dramatic. From 1956-60 to 1969-70 the increase was from 148,000 to 490,000 full-time students or 331%. 3 Projections prepared for the Economic Council suggest that by 1980-81, full-time enrolment will be approximately 1,130,000.4 Equally dramatic has been the increased financial *Acting Director, Research Programs, Ministry of State for Urban Affairs, Ottawa. I am indebted to Stan McRoberts for assistance with some of the computations and to David Dodge of Queen's University and David Stager· of University of Toronto for many helpful comments on an eariier draft. As u~ual,' neither they nor the Ministry should be implicated in agreement with the argument that remains. This paper was initially prepared in summer , 1970 and has been only imperfectly amended since that time. Journal of Canadian Studies responsibility assumed by both the federal and provincial governments. Whereas in 1953-54 government contributed 49 % of the total revenues of universities, by 1967-68 they contributed 70 % ; in absolute terms, this growth was from $32 to $521 million.5 Numerous factors account for these changes. Education is what economists call an income-elastic good - as incomes increase the amount of education demanded increases even more rapidly. Awareness of the opportunities afforded those who have education beyond secondary school has steadily increased. With this increased awareness and an accompanying increasing social conscience, government has assumed a growing share of education costs. This subsidization has generally been justified by the argument that there are significant social returns to a better educated population and that the social goal of equal educational opportunity is a worthy one to achieve. 6 The basis on which the "correct" level of subsidization is reached (and the extent to which either justification is met) remains a subject of debate. The pressures imposed by these substantial changes, however, have also given rise to a number of critical, but largely unresolved , questions. Will universities be able to continue devoting attention to individuals or will new, more efficient processes need to be implemented? Will resort have to be made to mechanical teaching devices and/or lower teacher student ratios? Teaching is a profession in which productivity has changed slowly if at all and hence, as labour has become relatively more scarce over time, expenditures for teaching have become a larger element in the budget. 7 In 1967-68 expenditures for .instruction amounted to 62 % of university budgets.8 Equally important and related is a questio 'n that concerns all bureaucracies, but .particularly new ones. This is the problem of efficiency and accountability - the problem on which the Economic Council in its Seventh Annual Review placed greatest empha43 sis. 9 As government's role has increased, the change has been sufficiently rapid to preclude changes in the institutional arrangements . In the case of fees and gifts, the university must cater to particular groups and there exists some incentive to use funds efficiently if more are to be forthcoming. However, for government grants it has usually only to meet some stated formula. 10 Usually, the formula is one based on enrolment and hence there is an incentive for expansion if...