In this SeeThruEdu piece, Cato Institute’s Neal McCluskey takes a look at the proposals Senator Marco Rubio has put forth for changing federal high education policy. He is not much impressed. Yes, Rubio has a potentially useful idea about income share agreements and he gets it that the current accreditation system inhibits new competitors. Nice little tinkering concepts.

The big problem is that Rubio doesn’t come to grips with the monstrous problem of federal subsidies. Apparently, he’s the typical Republican who can’t bring himself to criticize the root causes of our problems, in education and elsewhere. As Neal writes, “Post-secondary education needs to be loosened up so it can much more effectively meet rapidly changing needs. But massive federal subsidies underlie most of higher ed’s problems and Rubio does not appear to seriously target them.”

Will any candidate have the guts to say that the feds have no constitutional role in higher education and that the way we’ve subsidized it for decades has had bad consequences on cost and quality?