Originally Posted by Val
It's like Bostonian said: they go analyze your income, assets (except your primary residence these days) and savings to see how much they can gouge you.

Well, that's because the schools are caught up in an arms race of their own. They're willing to pay for certain students from the endowment, because they'll raise the academic rankings of the school. For the rest, they have to gouge them so they can continue building new buildings, unnecessary amenities, etc., in order to compete in the recruiting race.

So basically, rankings is how college got ruined for everyone.

Yay competition.