Is College Worth It? Part 2: Are the Sticker Price and Debt Worth the Credential?

Is College Worth It? · Here's What Questions You Should be Asking Instead.

Are the Sticker Price and Debt Worth the Credential?

There's an uncomfortable truth that's central to the is-college-worth-it question. Not all college degrees are created equal, and not all degrees have equal value. Some of these distinctions are easier to see than others—most people could see how a bachelor's degree from Western Governors University is different from a bachelor's from Yale. It's when things get a little closer that the conversation gets more uncomfortable. A bachelor's from UT Austin is also not the same as a bachelor's from Yale. Neither, quite frankly, is a bachelor's from Princeton or Harvard. I'm not even saying that Yale is the gold standard here; Yale is doing quite a bit of soul-searching these days.

Any school could be the best fit for the right student, but the resulting degree will signal different experiences, different alumni networks, and different levels of prestige. These all affect what and how students learn, and they matter on the job market. The cost of degrees also varies wildly, which should also factor into the decision.

Colleges and universities have priced themselves firmly into the category of "investment." The average cost of a four-year bachelor's degree after financial aid (including tuition, fees, and room and board) is $149,520 for a private nonprofit school and $85,360 for in-state tuition at a public school. Recent changes to loans for parents and students have made covering these high costs more challenging. Even if students are lucky enough to graduate without debt, they have still spent a tremendous amount of money that could have been spent on any number of things that are meaningful to a young adult starting out, from formative travel to the ability to take on unpaid or low-paying internships to the down payment on a house. When college is an investment, we have to confront the reality that, depending on the price and expected return, not every school is going to be worth it.

The Institution Changes the Value

Every college graduate will walk away with a bachelor's degree, but the value of that paper is not necessarily the same. The name associated with that degree can signal many things to prospective employers, from your perceived intelligence to your familiarity with the local context to associations they might have based on other people they know who attended the same school. A college graduate also leaves with the ability to leverage the alumni network from their alma mater, as well as the employer connections that come with that school. Depending on how much they have involved themselves in the community beyond school, they may also leave with meaningful connections to the region or place where that school is located.

Every school is going to offer a different combination of the above factors, and the best mix is going to depend greatly on the student. That said, schools at a certain level of prestige—the Ivies, the Ivy Plus, many of the top 30 schools—offer these benefits broadly to their graduates in every field of study while schools farther down the list may only offer the same level of benefits to graduates in certain fields of study or graduates who participate in certain programs or extracurriculars. Prospective students who already have a strong sense of what they want to study will be much better equipped to navigate these dynamics to find a school that will fit their needs. That said, about half of students go into college undeclared or plan to switch their major, which means students are likely to pick a school based on a desire to study a field that may change within their first few years. Switching from engineering to English at Princeton is not likely to dramatically shift the quality of education, but it might at a school like Embry-Riddle (even though it's one of the best places to go for aerospace engineering).

Is There a "Sure" Bet?

Super elite schools—the ones that everyone has heard of, with the strong alumni networks and the immediate brand-name recognition, those who count presidents, Supreme Court justices, Fortune 500 CEOs, and Nobel Prize winners among their graduates—are nearly always worth the cost. Why? Graduates are buying a brand name with a reputation that is so strong that they are likely to benefit from it no matter what they study.

One of the biggest things an elite school sells is its network. Networks are huge for career opportunities, especially in today's job market. A school with a strong network of alumni who will go to bat for other alums by making the introduction or putting in a good word is a huge value-add for any student who attends. For Ivy League graduates, the network pays off significantly: Their early-career median pay is nearly $30,000 higher than that of all college graduates, and by mid-career that median pay gap increases to $60,000. This income boost largely holds true for graduates in the Ivy Plus and top 30 as well, according to Department of Education College Scorecard data.

Graduates from these schools are in the best position to find jobs and opportunities that would put them in a strong position to pay off any debt that they acquire to earn the degree. And yet while these schools have staggering sticker prices—Cornell's total cost of attendance is over $100K a year—they also offer some of the most generous financial aid. (All the Ivies except for Cornell have a no-loan policy that excludes loans from any financial aid packages, with the goal of preventing students from graduating with any debt.) The net price students pay (the cost left after any grant or scholarship aid) ranges from around $15,000 (Princeton) to just over $26,000 (Cornell) a year. In practice, less than a third of Ivy League undergraduates take on any debt to cover school (at some schools, it's less than 10%). Many of these financial aid benefits also hold for schools in the Ivy Plus and private schools in the top 30. They all strive to match the standard set by the Ivies, although the number of students taking on debt for private schools roughly doubles as you go further down the list.

So What Is Worth the Investment?

Of course, the top 30 schools are notoriously selective, making the opportunities they offer out of reach for the majority of prospective college students. This is why most students should be carefully weighing the prestige of an institution and resulting value it unlocks against the cost that they will be paying.

Let's remove the top 30 schools from the equation. If those schools aren't on the table, then I'd argue that if you can get a college degree for free—and truly for free, including not going into any debt to cover things like living costs—then that offer is probably always going to be worth it. You will benefit from the earnings boost for bachelor's degree holders—an average of $86,806 15 years after graduation. Even if you shift into a different field or decide to pursue another degree at a different point in your life, you're only out the opportunity cost of your time.

If you are taking on debt to go to a non-elite school, the question becomes more complex. Institutions have, to date, circumvented this calculus with conversations about fit and finding the right school for you, all while promising generous financial aid to facilitate this heartfelt selection. And if college were free, then yes, fit above prestige any day. Find the school that speaks to you, where you feel like you'll fit in, where you can study what's interesting to you, and that's probably going to be the best fit. But when hundreds of thousands of dollars are on the line, prestige matters. And when you're going into debt, you should absolutely be considering whether and when you will be in a position to pay off that debt.

The Do No Harm earnings test provides one way to understand whether the debt is worthwhile: Will your earnings with your degree exceed those of workers with high school diplomas? This is a good starting point, but to really determine value, prospective students should dive deeper. They should also consider whether starting salaries in the target field will make it possible to cover living expenses and monthly debt payments. They should also consider the career and earnings prospects over time; a degree may look like a bad financial choice a few years out, but earnings could catch up over the long term. There are also factors to consider that are not directly related to salary, like the quality of education, the student experience, family history or connections to the school, or the opportunities the school presents to work in a specific region.

Prestige, Value, and Debt

There is a point—and this is a personal debt-to-opportunity cost calculus for each student and potentially their family—where the degree just isn't worth the debt. I'm not going to guess at what that point is since it will be highly individualized for each student and family. While academic reputation and the potential to secure a good job after graduation remain the two highest drivers in college selection, the cost of college, including available financial aid, is also a very important decision point for over 50% of first-year college students. Sallie Mae research also found that 79% of families eliminated at least one school purely on the basis of cost.

The good news? No matter where you choose, it's likely that, by the time you graduate, you'll think your degree was worth pursuing. About three-quarters of college graduates say their degree has been "critical" or "important" to their career success. But by that time, you have about a 50% chance of being nearly $30,000 in debt, if not more, and that's why the investment question is such an important piece of the conversation.

Sources

• American Academy of Arts & Sciences / Humanities Indicators — "Matriculation to Completion: How College Students Move Between Majors" (September 2025). amacad.org
• Brookings Institution — "How OBBBA Reshapes Student Lending" (2026). brookings.edu
• College Board — Trends in College Pricing and Student Aid 2025 (November 2025). collegeboard.org
• College Board Newsroom — "Trends in College Pricing and Student Aid Report" (2025). newsroom.collegeboard.org
• College Transitions — "Average Student Debt by School Type" (n.d.). collegetransitions.com
• Cornell Daily Sun — "Financial Gymnastics: Cornell's Cost of Attendance Surpasses $100K" (September 2025). cornellsun.com
• ERIC / Sallie Mae — "How America Pays for College" (2024). eric.ed.gov
• Higher Education Research Institute (HERI) / American Council on Education — "The American Freshman: National Norms" (2024). acenet.edu
• Lumina Foundation — The College Reality Check (February 2026). luminafoundation.org
• Postsecondary Commission / Mathematica — Texas Statewide Study of Postsecondary Value-Added Earnings (2026). texas-psc.org
• US Department of Education — College Scorecard Data (updated regularly). collegescorecard.ed.gov
• US News & World Report — "How Much Is an Ivy League Degree Worth?" (2025). usnews.com
• US News & World Report — "Best National Universities Rankings" (2026). usnews.com