The Affordability Gap: Why are Many Public Colleges Beyond Low-Income Students’ Reach?

A surprising new National College Attainment Network (NCAN) analysis finds that many public four-year and community colleges remain financially out of reach for students from low-and moderate-income families.

Using a transparent affordability test that compares the total cost of attendance (COA) to the mix of available funding resources, NCAN reports widespread unmet needs across several states.

There are several surprising aspects to these findings, but two in particular stand out:

• Consistency over time: In the wealthiest nation in the world, NCAN’s assessment of unmet college student needs has hardly changed during the past 10 years. The only time these levels dropped was during the pandemic—and then, only at community colleges.
• Community colleges are more expensive: Two-year public institutions are not necessarily more affordable than four-year state schools.

NCAN’s sample includes 1,137 public institutions, including 537 public bachelor’s-granting schools and 600 community colleges. These schools all reported price, grant, and student loan data to IPEDS, the U.S. Department of Education’s Integrated Postsecondary Educational Data Service.

The study counts an institution as “affordable” only when all available aid to a typical student exceeds the student’s total cost of attendance plus a $300 emergency buffer. NCAN includes on-campus housing costs for schools that grant bachelor’s degrees and off-campus housing costs for community colleges.

Financial aid includes grants, federal loans, federal work study, a proxy for the expected contribution (EFC) from that student’s family, and estimated summer wages from a 40-hour-per-week job in their state paying minimum wage. When costs exceed those resources, the remainder amounts to the study’s “affordability gap.”

For the average institution in NCAN’s sample during 2022-23:

• Only about a third—35 percent—of public baccalaureate-granting institutions met NCAN’s affordability threshold.
• In the study’s huge surprise, fewer than half (48 percent) of community colleges met the standard, even though most community colleges are widely assumed to be economical alternatives to flagship and regional state universities.
• The average affordability gap at public bachelor’s-granting colleges was about $1,555. But the average affordability gap at community colleges was far less, at $486.
• Overall, NCAN only rated about 42 percent of the sample, or 473 institutions, as affordable. In other words, NCAN considers almost 60 percent of American colleges to be unaffordable.

The report lists 14 states where no public bachelor’s-granting institution met the affordability benchmark. Those states include Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Kansas, North Dakota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wisconsin. The affordability gaps were largest in New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.

On the community-college side, five states (Hawaii, North Dakota, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Utah) had zero affordable community colleges in the sample.

By contrast, a small number of states showed much stronger coverage: Connecticut, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Minnesota, and Vermont had all of their sampled community colleges meet the affordability test.

So why the mixed picture? NCAN’s analysis points to several factors pulling the two educational sectors in different directions. For example, a one-time $400 increase to the maximum Pell Grant subsidy for the 2022–23 award year (bringing the maximum to $6,895) helped ease unmet need at many public four-year institutions. That was particularly true in certain regions where students are more likely to enroll full-time and face higher tuition prices.

But meanwhile, community colleges fared worse on average. NCAN attributes that decline primarily to the loss of pandemic emergency funding provided by the CARES Act’s Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund (HEERF). Those funds provided substantial direct support to students and helped defray rising housing and living costs, which increased cost-of-attendance calculations for students living off campus.

The report also documents changes over time. Community colleges are now slightly less affordable than they were ten years ago in the 2015–16 academic year, when about 50 percent were affordable. Meanwhile, the average affordability gap at community colleges soared from $246 to $486—a 98 percent increase.

For public bachelor’s-granting institutions, the share considered affordable rose relative to prior years, and the average gap edged down slightly—positive trends NCAN attributes to the Pell increase and differing pandemic funding impacts across geographic regions.

NCAN’s comments also emphasize that the “size” of the nation’s affordability problem depends on how one measures it. For example, the group says focusing on raw counts instead of percentage shares yields different impressions in states with few institutions. In other words, as a practical matter, rural and online education students can still face financial access barriers even in states with a higher share of ostensibly “affordable” campuses.

Opinions related to NCAN’s results are also showing up in recent surveys. For example, a 2024 Inside Higher Ed/Generation Lab survey of 5,065 undergraduates across America found that 68 percent believe colleges charge too much, and 41 percent say their institution’s sticker price is too high.

That’s potentially at odds with the data, because we know from Dr. Phillip Levine’s work at Wellesley College that college net prices—the true prices students actually pay after grant aid—have plummeted nationwide over the past 18 years. In fact, in a recent report here on OnlineEducation, we wrote:

Sensationalist stories all over the mainstream media repeatedly tell us that college costs are skyrocketing. After all, that’s what CNN says, and so does CNBC.

In fact, that’s a preposterous assertion. Not only are college costs not out of control, but they are actually much more affordable than typically presented in public discussions and the mainstream media. Prospective students thinking about enrolling in online or on-campus programs deserve a clear and concise explanation of this discrepancy, like the one that follows.

See our recent report College Affordability: Why College Costs Aren’t Skyrocketing for more about this analysis.

Nevertheless, consider this: in the same Inside Higher Ed/Generation Lab survey mentioned above, 9 percent of respondents said an unexpected expense of $300 or less could threaten their ability to remain enrolled. That startling result explains NCAN’s inclusion of a $300 emergency line item buffer in their affordability model.

One of the most insightful portions of this report appears in the conclusion. That section warns that recent cuts to federal health and nutrition safety-net programs like Medicare and SNAP in the 2025 Budget Reconciliation Bill will prompt state budget adjustments that will further widen affordability gaps.

How does that relationship work? Often, when federal spending is shifted to states, the states will raid higher education budgets to make up shortfalls. That means students often pay for such cost-shifting deficits through higher tuition.

Instead, NCAN argues that states need to boost their spending for need-based financial aid programs and operational support for public colleges. Here’s that concluding passage:

With the largest cut to federal safety-net programs in decades signed into law in the recent budget reconciliation bill, additional funding is needed at the state level to protect access and support for postsecondary education. State-level higher education funding is often slashed in the wake of significant cuts to federal spending on programs like Medicaid and SNAP, as states face downstream pressure from the loss of federal support.

Instead of diminishing state-level education spending to fill other budgetary gaps, now is the time for states to bolster their investments in need-based financial aid programs and operational support for public colleges. Further cuts to these programs will only widen affordability gaps for low- and moderate-income students across the country, limiting their ability to pursue and attain postsecondary education, and prepare to enter our nation’s skilled workforce.