It is a rare occasion that German higher education makes the headlines in foreign media. But last week, the scrapping of university tuition in the final German state (“Land”) stirred up the tuition discussion again. Many wonder, if this model of tuition-free higher education is a model that other countries should adapt too.

For example, Sunny Freeman of the Huffington Post Canada wonders if Canada should follow the German decision. Similar to an article of ThinkProgress, Freeman even wonders if Canadian students should learn German and pursue a post-secondary education in Germany:

If you’re tired of fretting about how to pay tuition as rates rise to record levels, you may want to consider making a move to Deutschland. Post-secondary tuition is now free across the country after fees were overturned in Lower Saxony, the last state still charging students, according to The Times of London.

Of course, her suggestion should not be taken too seriously. But it makes you wonder if the decision of the German Länder to abolish tuition fees can be a blueprint for other countries. After all, other countries—especially in Scandinavia— managed to build a high-quality system of higher education without charging tuition.

I have followed the tuition debate in Germany—both as a student and a university employee—and it appears to me that the praise that German politicians receive for their decisions to scrap tuition is premature.

In contrast to how some articles read, the debate is still not over in Germany. In fact, newly elected state governments could (theoretically) re-establish tuition fees at any time. Of course, this is very unlikely. But in times of increasing global competition in higher education, Germany needs to keep up the debate on how it wants to provide the adequate funds to its universities to keep up with foreign competition.

Like it or not, tuition fees (in some way or another) may play a role in that process. And in fact, they should. Because until now, both sides failed to acknowledge some of their flawed arguments and to focus on new ideas to increase the funding for higher education institutions.

Tuition Fees: A Social Injustice?

Germany coined the term Social market economy. Therefore, discussions like the pros and cons of tuition fees are hugely influenced by questions of social justice and sustainability.

With regard to university tuition fees, opponents claimed that they are only increasing the wealth gap by making post-secondary education only affordable to higher-income families. Student unions (“AStAs”) used this logic as their primary argument for fighting against tuition fees. They were supported by the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Greens (“Die Grünen”) who used the argument, for example, in their 2010 state election campaign for North-Rhine Westphalia. The SPD shared the view of the student unions that tuition fees should be regarded as socially injust.

“Tuition fees overly affect children from low-income and middle-class families. They discourage them to pursue a university degree and, therefore, take away career opportunities.” — NRW SPD

Of course, one could question if this is really the opinion of leading politicians in the SPD or if it just was a clever political move. Anyways, it turned out to be a quite successful strategy in order to win the 2010 state elections.

There are so many ways to argue against this logic. But let me just focus on three counterarguments:

• Yes, accessibility to post-secondary education should in no way depend on the financial situation of young students’ families. But in fact, this should not be a core argument against tuition fees since it follows a real black-and-white logic. You can have tuition fees and still make it possible for these students to afford a university education by providing adequate financial aids and grants or by making these students eligible for tuition waivers. Interestingly enough, these solutions were not really a part of the public debate.
• Talking about social injustice, some people have even turned the argument around: from a social standpoint, is it even fair to have absolutely free university education? Stefan Winter, Economics professor from Bochum, Germany, challenged the tuition opponents by asking if it was really fair that students from high-income families get a free university education even if they pursued a career in another country and therefore did not pay any taxes in Germany afterwards. Winter was not the first one to come up with this argumentation: even Karl Marx noted in his 1875 Kritik des Gothaer Programms that “free education leads to higher class families financing their costs for education from public taxes.”
• Germany is well known for its system for vocational training. Individuals who do not want to opt-in for a university degree can take up on a dual program of training and education in many different areas. In paid apprenticeships, they learn the nuts and bolts of the profession they want to learn while spending the other part of the program in vocational schools to learn the relevant theories. Although this model has proven very successful in Germany, “graduates” from these programs can usually be found in lower- and middle-class income families. In order to reach higher incomes, many take the next step of the Meisterprüfung, an additional career path which usually qualifies them to train apprentices and take up more responsible positions in companies. The Meisterprüfung, however, can cost up to a couple of thousand Euros (depending on the profession), which is not always paid for by the company. Therefore, it is a legitimate question, why future academics with a potential high income should not pay for their education while individuals in vocational trainings have to.

Why “Post-Graduate” Tuition Fees Could be a Good Solution

Of course, as a university employee I am a little bit biased. But during the time of tuition fees at my university, I saw some major improvements in the infrastructure and the operations at our institution. Therefore, for me, the debate is not over yet and I hope that people will realize that they need to invest in higher education more than they do now.

For now, the opponents of tuition fees have won in Germany. However, the abolishment of tuition fees in the final German state should not mean that there are no other funding models that should be discussed.

Sure, the overall sentiment of the opponents was that sufficient funding for institutions of higher education must be provided by the state governments. But is that enough? Can the states provide enough funding to make these institutions ready for an increasing global competition? I don’t think so.

The idea that I have always liked is the idea of a “post-graduate tuition”: students don’t pay any tuition fees while in uni, but have to pay back a certain percentage of their income once they have a job.

The model has been discussed at the University of Oregon last year and it certainly seems to have a lot of advantages:

• Students only pay for their university education if they get a job after graduation. The post-graduate tuition could be deducted from their monthly paychecks similar to other taxes and social fees. Therefore, only graduates who got a benefit from their university education would have to pay the post-graduate tuition.
• With regard to social justice, post-graduate tuition fees would perform much better than the current models of university tuition. In most of the countries where tuition fees have to be paid, many students have to take out a student loan, not knowing if they will get a job after graduation to pay it back. Also, graduates who end up in high-paying jobs will take over more responsibility than those in lower-paying jobs.
• For institutions of higher education, there would be a real incentive to make sure that their graduates get a job after graduation. Therefore, positive effects on career advising and placement services but also on the quality of degree programs could be expected.

Of course, this model is not without flaws. Similar to traditional tuition fees, there are still pitfalls that need to be addressed:

• The proposed system would come with relatively high setup-costs. Ideally, the tuition fees would be deducted from the monthly paychecks, which would also call for changes in HR systems of employers.
• Students may take on careers in other countries. This could make it difficult to collect the post-graduate tuition fees.
• It is not unusual that students change institutions (for example, after their Bachelor’s degree). This would lead to a discussion on how to allocate the funds to the different institutions they have received degrees from.
• Graduates in very low-paying jobs should be exempted from the tuition fee. Otherwise there could be a risk that they would prefer being unemployed because the social care could be as high as their wage minus the tuition fees.

Taken all the pros and cons into account, I am still convinced that a model of post-graduate tuition fees could be the solution for German (and other) higher education systems. However, for politicians, university tuition is still a delicate issue. It is very unlikely that they will initiate a new debate since they know that they risk being elected if they take a stand for it.

But how can we solve this? In my opinion, we have to educate students and society about the costs of higher education and get them to have an open debate about this.

The debate, however, cannot be about “tuition fees: yes or no?” The question should be: how can we all contribute to an adequate funding model to guarantee the competitiveness of our universities?

(Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this essay are those of the author and do not reflect the policies and/or opinions of my employer.)