...That could choke off the flows of overseas tuition dollars and research funding that now power many local economies in the Midwest and South.
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Unlike local students, the international kids usually pay full sticker price -- about $13,000 in 2014, compared with an in-state price of about $4,500. That means foreign students aren’t taking away spots from the locals; they’re actually subsidizing their education, by tens of millions of dollars a year. Rich parents in places such as China and India, anxious for their kids to get an American degree, pay big bucks to send them to places like Fort Hays State. That money helps local Kansas kids get a good education for much less than they otherwise would. Most of those overseas students eventually go home, and the Kansas kids get a lifetime earnings boost.
And even more importantly, the local economy gains. It benefits from the dollars that those international students spend on meals, clothes and movies. It benefits from all the services the university buys from electricians, plumbers and construction companies. That’s why places where the U.S. government established land grant universities long ago have a big economic advantage today.
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As economist Adam Ozimek points out, educating international students is an export industry that brings in tens of billions of dollars a year. Want to decrease the U.S. trade deficit? Recruit more international students for U.S. colleges. Want to save the economies of places in the Rust Belt, and boost the growth of small cities and towns outside the thriving coasts? Attract international students. Want to help Trump’s small-town working-class voter base? Get more international students.
