State and local government should follow President Donald Trump’s lead and stop funding “dead-end degrees” that leave borrowers worse off than if they had skipped college altogether, argues a think tank.
The Foundation for Government Accountability recently released an issue brief that uses a new earnings test from the “One, Big, Beautiful Bill” as a starting point for education funding reform. The think tank points specifically to the “do no harm” test, which will cut off federal financial aid for programs that regularly leave graduates with lower earnings compared to their peers who did not pursue a college degree.
Michael Greibok, the author of the paper, argues:
While the One, Big, Beautiful Bill cuts off student-level aid for dead-end degrees, states should build on this by cutting off all state and locally appropriated funds for failing degree programs.
States should prohibit any state or local funds from being used directly or indirectly on any dead-end degree program. These prohibitions should include money for individual student aid, base operational or instructional funding, separately or specially appropriated aid or grants, and capital or facilities funding.
“At a minimum, states should apply these prohibitions to programs that fail the federal government’s ‘do no harm’ test, meaning they are ineligible to receive federal student loans,” he said. “This list of programs should be reviewed and updated annually as the federal list is updated.”
He said states can take other actions, such as “prohibiting state or local funding to any program that has a negative return on investment for students.”
“Taxpayer dollars should not be required to support programs that leave students in a worse financial position than had they not pursued the degree.”
