Recent economic research suggests that colleges siphon off a significant portion of federal education aid rather than lowering costs to students

With the costs of college rising, policymakers and institutional leaders have struggled to cut spending while improving student-success rates.

Just when it looked like the job market was going to rebound, recent unemployment numbers revealed a disappointing reality.

The number of schools ranked highly in guides such as Barron's Profiles of American Colleges is increasing, without any evidence that these schools' instructional quality is also increasing. Applicants and their families should be wary of letting these rankings serve as the main criteria in their college decisions.

President Barack Obama has been on a tour of college campuses touting proposals to lower student loan repayments for college graduates. He hopes to rekindle the enthusiasm of young voters, who in 2008 favored him over Sen. John McCain by more than two-to-one.

Ironically, these same young Americans...

The BA degree wreaks harm on a majority of young people, is grotesquely inefficient as a source of information for employers, and is implicated in the emergence of a class-riven America.

Community colleges are subsidized through direct state and local government appropriations and through student grant programs. Every student who drops out represents an investment loss by the taxpayers in that student's uncompleted education.

AEI education expert Mark Schneider and Lu Michelle Yin explore the harmful consequences of low community college graduation rates and propose policy solutions in the latest edition of Education Outlook.