News outlets over the past few months have been concentrating on articles showcasing the rising cost of college tuition. The latest piece in CNNMoney shows that over 20 years tuition has risen 439%! Much more than healthcare or energy costs. Unfortunately for many, this news has been old news for quite some time. While pieces like these up the hit count or sell more papers, the reality is that schools have been raising tuition continuously for years.

An interesting finding from the CNNMoney piece is that when colleges raise their tuition, they actually receive more applicants. For example, Hendrix College in Arkansas increased tuition 29% in 2005 and has seen an increase in applicants over time. It appears that students are, wrongly, equating cost with quality.

Tuition increases are usually explained by schools as necessary due to increased operating costs, subsidizing graduate student tuition (where a large chunk goes), and paying for numerous professorships, scholarships, etc. However, since competition among schools has heated up, they have been moving their resources towards building swanky buildings by starchitects, gourmet food, and palatial dorms.

Adding to the backlash, while economy has been struggling, college endowments keep going up. Harvard is at 35 billion, Yale at 23 billion, and about 75 more colleges with endowments totaling more than a billion dollars. While Harvard and Yale can offer ample aid to their students, other schools cannot...or just don't want to.

Schools usually spend 2-3 percent of their endowment per year, but their return (how much the endowment makes over a year) is often much more. That's why lawmakers in Washington are pressuring schools with big endowments to spend at least 5 percent per year and use the extra money to subsidize tuition.

In Harvard's case, if they could spend 5 percent of their endowment every year on subsidizing tuition, it would be free. Of course, most of colleges in America have endowments a fraction of Harvard's and would be hard pressed to do the same. Yet, many colleges could spend a bit more of their endowments and cut tuition substantially.

The schools themselves are opposed to such a measure, viewing endowments as 'safety nets' for hard times. Yet with endowments in the multi-billions, that argument is starting to wear thin. Tuition will keep rising as long as people are willing to pay. But there will be a ceiling where the cost of college outweighs the benefit. For now, according to the CNNMoney, a B.A. gives you a greater chance of being in top 20 percent of income earners. How long that will be the case is unknown.