In a bold move, President Obama has signaled his next big push for America is to offer free access to Community College to qualified individuals for two years.
This is yet another “universal” push. Like healthcare, Obama believes college should be a universal benefit to Americans.
Details of the plan are obscure until delivered during the State of the Union Address on January 20th.
However, Obama has hinted details of the program by saying, “Put simply, what I’d like to do is to see the first two years of community college free for anybody who’s willing to work for it.”
Obama’s plan appears to combine two years of free college with a work program similar to the Job Corps, which is a program for low-income students looking to earn a high school diploma or GED.
The Job Corps program, started by Lyndon Johnson, cost taxpayers $1.7 billion in 2014. The program serves only 60,000 youths per year at a cost of $28,000 per student – inline with the annual tuition of many top private schools.
The President’s daughters attend Sidwell Friends, an elite private school in Washington D.C. with an annual tuition of $36,264.
The average annual cost of just tuition and fees for a two-year community college is $3,347, however, like the Job Corps, the government will inflate those numbers significantly along with increasing the cost of education for students who would not qualify for the government assistance.
As a recent example, insurance premiums have increased by as much as 78% due to Obamacare.
Like many of President Obama’s proposals, those who benefit the most from these programs also have the highest propensity to vote Democrat. Critics of the presidents have called this blatant vote-buying.
In 2012, 63% of voters with family income under $30,000 voted for Obama. An additional 57% of those who earn between $30k and $50k also voted democrat.
In 2008, only 51% of “low income” voters cast a ballot for democrats.
If the President’s strategy is to lock in the loyalty of this demographic, the strategy is working.
