Below is the text of a Letter to the Editor I sent today to The Des Moines Register:
By increasing room and board fees at state universities by 3-5% (April 29 article, "Regents OK Room, Board Increases for Fall"), the Board of Regents cited inflation as the main reason. A similar excuse was used only a month ago to justify tuition hikes for next year.
Yet using our country's most recent core measure of inflation, the March 2011 Consumer Price Index, inflation has actually risen less than 3% in the past twelve months. And excluding food and energy costs, the CPI has risen only 1.2% since March 2010.
The fact is, inflation doesn't justify increasing fees by as much as 5%. No for-profit services organization would be able to survive in this economy by raising prices like that, so why should it be OK for a non-profit, taxpayer-subsidized organization to do so?
If we want to keep higher education affordable in Iowa, we need more intellectual honesty - not to mention budget accountability - from our state academic institutions and their governing body.
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