Indeed. I attended a talk by one of the presidents of a local state university about a decade ago, and she showed a plot showing that the overall cost to educate a student hadn't changed in 30 years (inflation adjusted). What had changed was the state support per student. As it dwindled, the university continually increased the tuition such that the overall cost remained constant.
It's one university, so I don't know if it applies to the others, but drops in state support is often excluded from these conversations.
It's one university, so I don't know if it applies to the others, but drops in state support is often excluded from these conversations.