EDUCATION AND INCOME 
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Chart VIII. 
X. The Cost of Education 
The cost of education in the United States has increased tremendously in 
the past fifty years. Incidentally, so also have increased the costs of clothing, 
of housing, of travel, of church maintenance, of government—and indeed, of 
nearly everything that affects human life. But there are many who feel that 
public education, provided at public cost, is costing today more than it is worth, 
or at least more than the public can afford. They point to an increase from 
L890 to 1925, of from $141,000,000 to $1,946,000,000; that is, some 770 per 
cent, while the increase in population has been only about 80 per cent in the 
same time, and the increase in national wealth about 400 per cent. 
In defense or explanation of the present grade of expenditures, the Na- 
tional Industrial Conference Board has published some interesting figures.* 
After considering the great decrease in purchasing power of the dollar— 
a factor which accounts for more than one-half the present costs—it is 
shown that more children are being educated by the schools (more in pro- 
bortion to the population), that these children remain in school longer and re- 
*Conference Board Bulletin for September, 1927. 
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