Why every penny counts

Some things money can’t buy . . .

MICHAEL SILICZ STAFF

No issue hits closer to the heart (and wallets) of University of Manitoba students than the perennial matter of the provincial freeze on tuition prices. Nothing on campus comes close to creating the animosity, anger, contention and debate that “the freeze” does year after year.

The freeze on the price of post-secondary tuition has been in effect since 1999 when Gary Doer’s New Democratic Party took power. Since that time, tuition fees have remained almost constant for most faculties at the U of M. Only a handful of faculties have voluntarily raised their own tuition, like pharmacy, management, law and engineering. With those faculties aside, the majority of Canadian U of M students have been paying the same rates for nearly a decade now.

However, on June 20 the Winnipeg Free Press reported that a major budget crunch has placed this streak in jeopardy. As a result of being unable to raise tuition directly, coupled with a sudden decrease in enrollment this year, the U of M has taken action to raise money through an “ancillary” fee that many see as doublespeak for a tuition increase. This new ancillary fee will have students paying $30 for each three credit hour lab they are registered for. Thus, it appears that the freeze is starting to melt under the heat of fiscal reality.

And so the debate begins again: is this small rise in ancillary tuition a good thing or a bad thing for students at the U of M? Is this a flagrant disregard for student financial well-being as UMSU insists it is? Is Garry Sran right to caution that this move “has put university and college out of the financial reach of ordinary Manitobans?” Or is this a victory for natural market forces that will solve the funding shortfall by ending inefficient government interference? Will this “free up our universities and allow them to compete,” as the Business Council of Manitoba bullishly advocates?

Both sides have their valid points, which have for years now been printed over and over again in the pages of The Manitoban. For those fighting the fee, they are right to argue that lower tuition costs help anyone gain access to school for reasons of affordability. They’re also right to argue that the provincial government should be doing as much as it can to make education accessible to all Manitobans. Then again, cheaper does not necessarily mean better, as advocates against the freeze argue. Furthermore, not allowing tuition to rise with inflation is economic folly that ignores 75 years of uncontested economic theory. But yet again, with this latest fee increase, both sides will drag out these same old tired and true points. Yet is any progress ever made in solving the issue? Is any common ground ever reached?

What this debate does reveal is the true essence underlying the tuition issue. The tuition freeze is not about economics, it’s not about social justice, and it’s not about access to university. Like so many other problems in the world, what this debate reveals is the underlying predisposition and ideological biases of those advocating each position.

Simply put, the tuition issue is not about money. It is about values.

What drives the furor behind the freeze debate is the very essence of political theory — it’s about what people think is the best option for society as a whole. Those supporting the freeze do so because they believe that egalitarianism should be enforced at the expense of the state’s purse, because if left simply to the market, they believe inequality would result. Yet those against the freeze fight it because of their different understanding of egalitarianism, whereby they view state interference in the economy as a dangerous violation of liberty that leads to authoritarianism, and think that open markets create rather than hinder equality. Quite simply, one’s understanding of society and how it should be organized, rather than simple financial issues, shape one’s disposition towards the tuition freeze.

Thus, when one claims that the $30 ancillary lab fee is either a good or bad public policy, one is, in reality, showing far more than his or her opinion on the simple issue of education costs. What a person is really showing is one’s underlying disposition towards his or her understanding of justice as fairness, as expressed between the positive freedom to affordable education, and the negative freedom from government forcing such a choice on people.

So, when you wonder why forking over four extra hours of minimum wage work for school next year is such a big deal, remember that those fighting for each side are fighting for much more than that $30. They’re fighting for their conception of the good society, and how it should be achieved. That’s why every penny counts in the battle between the anti-freeze groups fighting for freedom from government coercion, and the pro-freeze groups warring for the freedom to be sheltered from economic coercion.