Taxes and Tuition

For FY 2010, the amount for state and local taxes per capita for Washington State was $4,011.

This is where the taxes come from:
Retail Sales/Use Tax: 45.3%
Selective Sales Taxes: 7.1%
B&O Tax: 21.1%
Property: 12.5%
Real Estate: 2.7%
Utility Taxes: 2.5%
All other state taxes: 15.9%

This is the distribution of those taxes once the state receives them:
Human Services: 37%
Higher Education: 7.8%
Government Operations: 2.6%
Natural Resources: .9%
Debt Service/Other: 7.5%
Public Schools: 44.2%

That means that if you paid $4,011 in state taxes, this is where your money went:

My Point:
I have heard this too many times:
"I've been a taxpayer for 20 years. There's no reason for tuition to be that high when I've paid into the system!"

Let's assume that this person is an average tax payer and paid the $4,011 in taxes every single year for 20 years, with the same allocation of funding in the state budget. Squishy math and oversimplified logic notwithstanding, that still means that they would have only put $6,257.20 into public colleges and universities in this state. That's over the entire 20 years they claim to have paid taxes. Seriously. These people are just saying, "I've put in just over $6 grand into public education over the past twenty years/roughly $300 annually. Why do I have to pay such high tuition for my kid?"

I am SO over people claiming that they think that public universities are charging such high tuition rates when they don't stop to think about how little they actually pay towards keeping those same institutions of learning open and operational.

In the early 1990's, the state contributed more than $9,000 per student to public research institutions. By 2011, that number had dropped to less than $6,000 per student. During that same time period, the tuition revenue at public research institutions went from just under $2,000 to just over $5,000. Note that taxes that went towards benefitting college students dropped by roughly $3,000 and the cost of tuition went up...by roughly $3,000.

Conclusion:
There are a number of options that I suggest are worth pursuing:

1. Stop complaining about tuition and instead support an increase in state taxes
2. For those parents that are able, start setting money aside for college now because it's going to really suck when your kids finally reach college age
3. Stop blaming public colleges and universities and instead let the state legislature know that higher education funding needs to become a top priority for the state

Sources:

A Citizen's Guide to the Washington State Budget 2013

Current Higher EducationFunding Structure and State Funding Cycles