“An Analysis of the Undergraduate Tuition Increases at the University of Minnesota Duluth”

Abstract

Tuition inflation in higher education has greatly outpaced other industries, leading to extremely high annual undergraduate tuition. Regression analysis was performed on 25 years worth of data treating annual undergraduate tuition at the University of Minnesota – Duluth as the dependent variable. The four explanatory variables included were state appropriations per student, academic support, instruction funds per student, and luxury services per student. All variables were then deflated to 1985 dollars to eliminate inflation. The findings from the analysis indicate that decreased real state support per student has been the main driver of the tuition increases, while the increased real instruction costs per student also plays a more diminished role.