Medical and tuition cost shifts

The good intentions of liberals to make higher education and health care available to all has had a major impact on costs for the middle class.
Why have tuition costs risen so much faster than the CPI for decades? One major reason is that the expensive, highly selective schools decided to give financial aid to bright, poor students. If you charge $40,000/year for tuition, why not increase it to $44,400 and let 10% of students come for free? It’s the same total revenue and now you’re politically correct. The egalitarian strategy soon spread to all colleges.
The same has happened to medical costs. Medicare and Medicaid pay doctors and hospitals a lot less than private insurers, so the providers shift costs. All you’re doing is squeezing a balloon at one end.
The rapid increase in government programs (now nearly 50%) has caused medical costs to rise dramatically for everyone else.
And what is Washington’s solution for rising costs? More government! (You got to talk real smooth to pull that argument off – but so far half the people are buying it.)
The system can absorb some scholarships for poor kids and some discounts for government-paid medical benefits. It’s the right thing to do in, say, 10% of cases.
But when government dominates the system, and the expectation is ‘free’, nothing good can happen. The balloon goes pop.