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Obama has mentioned that he will set a price control on the college education. With the increased price of universities and colleges, students are finding it increasingly more difficult to attend college. Therefore Obama has set out to confront this problem. He proposed to make permanent the American Opportunity tax credit. Colleges have to either lower their tuition rate or accept the fact that with higher tuition rates they will have lower funding from the governments.

Education is both a public good and a private good. A public good is defined by two characteristics: non-excludability and non-rivalry. Public goods are for everyone and there is no competition for the good. Most people believe that a higher education is a pure public good but it is not. Society benefits when people get a higher. education. Statistically people with a college education tend to be more active citizens and their volunteering.with their volunteering and other activities benefiting those around them. Also statistics have shown that more new products and services are available to society because of the contributions of college graduates. These are the positive externalities of education. The negative aspect of education is  that even though the benefits of higher education are shared the costs for higher education are not shared. A higher education benefits society but the cost of a higher education proves a problem for those that want a higher education. Students themselves do reap some benefits: they are likely to be better off- both financially and otherwise-than their compatriots who do not go to college. However, students do not benefit as much as society. Therefore education is both a private and a public good.

This article says that career-oriented colleges that help students find jobs in nearby industries are much more useful than top-name universities.