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What are the ethical considerations regarding mandatory class participation?
When I teach, I rely heavily on interactive methods. I don't know how else I can teach. In my experience teaching both (in-person) undergraduate courses and graduate seminars, I've encountered a new kind of situation that's becoming more and more common: I had many students showing strong resistance to verbal participation in class, even when gently encouraged.
Over the past two years, this has escalated to the point where four students have filed formal complaints, specifically citing discomfort with being called on directly in class and claiming a "right to not speak".
While I understand some students may feel anxious about speaking up, I worry that complete silence defeats the whole purpose of in-person learning. Indeed, I think the idea of "right to not speak" will be laughed at just 10~20 year ago. But maybe the cultural norm as changed...
My question is: Now, is it still ethically okay to require in-class participation? Or is there any new ethical issues we should consider?

Note: I'm not asking about any specific university's policy. I'm quite familiar with my own university's guidelines. I'm asking more about the current cultural norm.

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@Wrzlprmft Maybe that FAQ entry should be modified; it only mentions comments being moved to chat, not deleted.

The title asks about ethical considerations, but the body is sometimes asking about cultural norms.  Can you please clarify?

@Kimball What are ethics except cultural norms?

@AzorAhai-him- Cultural norms are broader than ethics: e.g., it could be normal in certain countries/schools to collect homework or never collect it, or have students present in class or not.  Doing something non-standard is not the same as acting unethically.

""right to not speak" will be laughed at just 10~20 year ago" -- it was touched on in Dead Poet's Society in 1989, "exercising the right not to walk". But admittedly not in the form of the right to remain utterly silent throughout an entire course.

What are the rules regarding audio- and videotaping of the class?  Is there a chance that student answers which get taped (whether allowed or not) could get reposted to social media?

Given the nature of many young people I know (including myself), I consider this question to be extremely important

I think it's reasonable to treat being able to participate verbally in a classroom environment as a learnable skill, and therefore the learning goals of a course that's part of a broad foundational education can include training that skill. Of course, some students may come into your course in different places or be less comfortable with learning that skill, and I think it's important to use strategies that make it smoother for students and to recognize that diversity.
I would make your expectations for participation clear in your syllabus. If students are unable to participate verbally in class, I think they need to have that documented through the relevant office at your institution at the start of your course (if no such office exists, I think there's a broader question about what to do in these cases). An accommodation might instead direct those students to write questions about the course content after class or respond to a prompt.
For everyone else, think carefully about how you are using participation and how it aligns with your learning goals for the course. If you expect students to respond individually "on the fly" some will end up spending more mental effort worrying about being called on rather than digesting what you are saying. Think about ways to facilitate participation and ease stress.
You might create groups (as small as 2) with a rotating spokesperson, where the group first discusses an answer in a smaller setting before someone reports to the group.
You might solicit brief answers from several students in succession to put less emphasis on any individual student's answer.
You might integrate electronic communication in your classroom to allow responses to some prompts anonymously.
You might create opportunities for participation where students who choose to can plan ahead, like ending one lecture with a series of questions and asking students to report at the beginning of the next class.
I would also avoid using class participation as a punishment for a student being distracted and avoid trick questions.
Lastly, if participation is important to you, I think it's worth spending some time explaining that to students and giving them an opportunity to understand your own goals and strategies. You can spell out specific techniques and strategies you plan to use along with tips to meet your expectations, they don't need to be secrets.

I believe the inclusion of this as a requirement in the syllabus is absolutely the best way to address the issue. Give it in writing to all students, call it out in day one, note the avenues to medically/reasonably necessary alternatives (with room for them to politely remind you of their exemption status if necessary), and remind them periodically throughout the semester. I recall a historical law class that mandated participation as part of showing you read the material. There is a precedent in law 'not to speak' in the US, but this was established circa 1943 in context of saluting a flag.

"If you expect students to respond individually "on the fly" some will end up spending more mental effort worrying about being called on rather than digesting what you are saying." That's exactly what I was like. I wouldn't really take in anything during the times I knew the teacher could call on me, because I would be way too anxious about it. Then when it came to the point of actually being called on, I would barely know what was going on and just shut down. That teaching method certainly didn't work for me.

What are the ethical considerations regarding mandatory class participation?

There are no ethical considerations specifically with requiring students to speak in class, when such requirements are made in a sensible, thoughtful way that advances the educational goals of the class and complies with institutional policy. For example, many classes require students to give oral presentations, and demonstrating the ability to give such presentations may in fact be a degree requirement in some places. When making such requirements, instructors need to comply with relevant guidelines, such as:

For all oral presentations, students must receive clear, written guidelines for completing each assignment and they must receive written feedback from the instructor on their presentations. Clear criteria for evaluation must be established.

That being said, it's certainly possible to come up with in-class participation requirements that would be neither sensible nor thoughtful, and would not advance the educational goals of the class. In an extreme example, you might end up looking like an instructor who is abusing his authority by using his class to force the students to develop skills that are completely unrelated to the course topic, similarly to this professor. In a situation like this, yes, your behavior would be ethically (and practically, legally, etc) problematic.
As for whether there are any issues with the particular way in which you approach requiring students to participate, I don't think you've given us enough information to determine that. But when you say things like "I don't know how else I can teach", I do have a concern that you may be making some demands of your students that lie outside the norm of what is considered reasonable or acceptable. If you add more details about what you're asking of the students, maybe we can comment more on that.

I think students have a right not to be embarrassed in front of their peers. For some, say the neurodivergent, it may go (far) beyond that. Even in the more typical case, not every student is immediately ready to answer questions in public based on things they might be a bit behind on.
That doesn't mean that they have a right not to be called on, but it probably does include the right to decline with something like "Sorry, nothing to add."
But the way you phrase it and the pushback you are getting seems like you are using this as a stick. Perhaps you can turn it in to a carrot. If you can reward participation, more will be likely to participate, though not everyone. But a few points toward the grade for such things can be helpful, both in promoting participation and in pushing preparation. And, if you can encourage rather than require, some may become more comfortable with this.
I was once in an undergraduate class in which each student had to give actual lectures on the material a few times. But we were given a topic and a future date on which to give the lecture so we could prepare. It was a terrifying experience, but it taught us something and the professor, being present, kept things positive, even when we introverts were up there sweating.
One rule to keep in mind in such things is that your students aren't all alike and they learn differently. Respect that. They are also, most likely not like you unless this is a doctoral level class. In particular, some people, even some famous professionals, require time to think before answering questions. That isn't normally an option in the scenario you describe.
I would also suggest making it clear in the syllabus that the nature of the class has a participation element and the students will be asked questions as individuals. But make opt-out a possibility. And, of course, comply with special needs.
As for the face to face nature of in person classes, it is also, maybe primarily, so that students can ask questions, especially when the presentation isn't as clear as it might be. I was once fairly famous among my peers for the frequent questions I asked (and fairly infamous with my mom for the same reason).
See this post for more on the "few points" idea above. It is part of the practice of "cumulative grading".

Yes, definitely want to allow the catch-phrase "nothing to add". And have that be ok. Then we're fine.

@paulgarrett then it’s not really mandatory participation, is it? So are you saying that actually mandating participation is not okay?

@DanRomik, yes, having encountered many different personalities among math students, undergrad and grad alike, I'm strongly disinclined to insist that people be "put on the spot". If nothing else, some very capable people are not super-quick, and need to "go away and think about it". And so on...

@paulgarrett okay, I actually agree about not putting people on the spot. But there are other forms of mandatory participation, such as requiring students to give oral presentations as discussed in my answer, which is acceptable and common.

@paulgarrett. Not every class is a maths class. I was a Deaf Studies student. Yes, language classes required mandatory participation: there's no other way to learn.

"a few points toward the grade for such things can be helpful" - in this context you might have to be a bit careful, though. You have four students formally complaining about being repeatedly called on in class to speak, in what you identify as a "stick-like" way, and you double down on that by introducing the "carrot" that if they (or their successors next year) don't contribute, there are points towards the grade that they cannot score. I don't like the legal liability if you lose the existing formal complaints!

I think any situation in which you are making people do something they do not want to do has ethical considerations, and in this case there is also a clear differential in the impact on different students. More anxious students may find the experience much more harrowing that others, for example. In any such situation it is right to consider the impact on your students, and whether that impact is justified.
Whether it is ethically justified depends on whether it provides sufficient benefits to offset the impact on students. As I understand it - and I should say this is not an area I'm any kind of expert on - the research is very clear that your approach of mandatory participation improves learning and even increases the likelihood that students will ask questions in class and become more comfortable with class discussion. It also seems clear to me that becoming comfortable with answering questions on the spot is itself a valuable life skill. By my judgement such benefits are a clear ethical justification for any discomfort the students feel, YMMV.
There is also research into the best and worst ways to manage "cold calling" (as it is referred to in the literature) and if you are using this technique then I think that it is appropriate to learn from this best practice knowledge. I won't pretend to have sufficient grasp myself to tell you what that is.

Obviously, none of the above applies in the situation where you have a student with a diagnosed condition excusing them from such participation which has been recognised through whatever system your university has for managing such things.

"More anxious students may find the experience much more harrowing than others" -- further, more anxious students will be distracted from their studies even if you don't actually call on them that day, simply because they know you might at any time. Obviously there's more ways to address anxiety than just to avoid the proximate cause of stress. But mitigating stressors does actually help, especially if measures are underway to help students become comfortable contributing other than by ad hoc "confrontation therapy".

... that is, even if the student doesn't have a diagnosed condition then I'd expect some first-year undergraduates to need, and I hope they'd get, a bit more slack, and some personal support with the common elements of university education. Not every class needs to have them out of their comfort zone on day 1. This compared with someone who has signed up for graduate seminars (not lectures), who you think maybe would already know what to expect.

@SteveJessop Please read the paper I linked. Cold calling students makes them more comfortable with participation in class not less.


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How to acknowledge a crappy supervisor at the start of my PhD thesis?
I have 3 supervisors, two of whom have been very helpful and supportive throughout my PhD.
The third (technically my secondary) has been pretty unhelpful and absent over the years (doesn't come to meetings, provides little feedback on my writing outside of affirming with what the others have said, completely checks out of discussions regarding the methodological details of my work, largely unsupportive/uninterested in the project, etc).
In my acknowledgements I would like to include a personalised and heartfelt thank you to my 2 engaged supervisors, but it is difficult to do this without also having to include some disingenuous thank you to my crappy supervisor.
As I am nearly done with the thesis it would be silly to kick up a fuss about the quality of supervision now. Should I just include a generic thank you to all three supervisors as a collective?

It's a different situation, but the answers to Leaving out unhelpful advisor from acknowledgements? may still be relevant.

Do you have any idea why they didn't interact more? You might be misjudging them. I can think of several valid reasons for "taking a back seat". I can also think of several reasons not to seem to insult some particular faculty member. Do you have any evidence they tried to subvert you? Any evidence about what went on in the background among the three supervisors outside your view?

Yes, it would be silly and possibly self destructive to "kick up a fuss" unless you have complete information and making it public can be dangerous even if you do have such information.

@Buffy Not being helpful is a good enough reason to be less acknowledged in an acknowledgement section than a helpful person. Also "do you have any evidence" is a weird thing to write after you have just read a long list of specific complaints by the op (them not attending meetings, etc). One can discuss if it will harm the op in the long run, but there is no need to say that it is "silly". Bad advisors exist.

Lots of people have thanked people that they didn't really want to; this is quite normal.  Usually, one adds extra praise so that it looks ridiculously over-thankful.

IMHO Add something brief and polite. Even if you're bitter about it, it would be virtuous to try to add something specific to that person, even if it is noticeably modest. You don't have to go on and on, toot their horn, or give the heartfelt thanks you want to give the others. Probably few will read it anyway, and for those who do I would try not to hide any daggers in there that would set up a relationship to proceed negatively in the future.

"I thank Dr. X for giving me the freedom to do research in my own way".

To clarify, you have 3 joint PhD advisors?  What was the original purpose of the 3rd advisor?  Did they do anything such as provide funding/lab space/equipment that you can thank them form?

"The best way to avoid burning bridges is to make sure you don't bring a fire anywhere near one. Dancing 'really carefully' near one (let alone on one) while waving around a massive fire torch with your hands is a risky and silly thing to do, no matter how safely you intend to dance." ... shamelessly paraphrased from here: https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/158759/how-can-you-say-you-dont-trust-your-current-employers-counteroffer#comment514987_158762 . So my answer to "How to acknowledge a crappy supervisor at the start of my PhD thesis?" would simply be "Professionally."

I understand your situation because I had both an exceptional advisor and a very uninterested one (whom I'll call X). Of course I wanted to write a real thank you paragraph for the former, and as you I felt awkward when I needed to write one for X. I didn't really know what to thank him for! He attended some meetings where he contributed little to none to the discussion. I even tried to involve him asking him for advice on how to implement an algorithm, and he suggested me to google it.
I didn't want to exclude him completely from the acknowledgment section, so I just wrote something in the lines of "thank you to Dr. X for his valuable input". Writing more than a generic thank you for him would make me feel as if I was actually mocking X, and I didn't want to keep thinking about it since, after all, he already got what he wanted (adding my dissertation to his CV; he was extending it in order to get a grant). My actual thank you for him was adding his name to the cover.
My suggestion is to add a little, polite acknowledgement for your third advisor. I would advise against using a generic thank you for your two other advisors though. You are free to express your sincere positive feelings and gratitude on paper towards the ones that deserve it. As long as you are respectful with everybody, the fact that someone gets offended if his/her thank you paragraph is shorter than others is not your problem, so you should not worry about that.

Since the purpose of an advisor is to help you become a researcher and is not to give you answers, suggesting you google (i.e. find your own answer) might be the most valuable advice you ever got.  It need not imply disassociation, but could imply making you more self reliant.

@Buffy my main advisor also asked me to first try to figure out stuff by myself, and I was fine with that, but here I meant that, since X was not getting involved, I actively tried to find something for X to help me with! Since his background is computer science and I was having troubles understanding an algorithm, I asked him specific questions on how to implement it, but he didn't give any idea at all and just wanted me to google it (when I already did).

@Buffy Come on, are you serious? PhD students are not children and they know how to work for themselves. When they ask then they need help.

@Nico, yes, very serious. I'm not the first to observe.

@Buffy Other people observed that telling people to go learn to bake ("let them eat cake") is a good way to get a head in a guillotine. We can play dueling aphorisms all day, but telling people to Google "how to fish" is not what people at jobs helping the homeless are paid to do, for good reason.

It's certainly true that sometimes students (even smart PhD students!) need to be told "figure it out yourself!" OP's description of this third supervisor (unhelpful, unprepared, uninterested, and absent) does not really seem consistent with the theory of a supportive advisor who is wisely hands-off at times, however.

@Buffy At PhD level, students are far beyond the point where you need to teach them that Google exists.

I think I need to clarify I'm not a graduate student yet, but my dissertation project was (at least according to my main advisor) at the master level (and indeed initially he was looking for a master student, not an undergrad). I added the google part on my answer to show the lack of interest of my second advisor, how instead of giving even a little of guidance (like pointing out a book/web page or giving practical advice) he just replied with a short "google it". But I fully agree with the fact that every student needs to learn to figure out stuff alone.

Add a sentence "Thank you to supervisor B for serving as my supervisor." A and C can get more detailed thank you sentences.

Factually, this is correct.
You needed the number of supervisors.
It does neither mock B nor the helpful supervisors A and C.

You needed the number of supervisors. - I'm not sure about this.  You may need certain numbers for dissertation committees, but I have never heard of 3 supervisors being required.

@Kimball It is possible that "supervisor" simply means "committee member".

@XanderHenderson You are right, in this case it would be better to write it explicitly as "Thank you to supervisor B for serving as committee member (for my thesis)."

@XanderHenderson possible, but from the OP's description I think they mean 3 joint PhD advisors

@Kimball Hard to say and, in my experience, a lot of PhD candidates don't really understand the role of all of the people on their committee, nor all of the titles and roles.  This is often compounded by not speaking English natively.  This really doesn't seem like something to quibble about---the asker mentions that they are required to have three supervisors.  Who are we to question that, if it is not vital to understanding the question, nor how to move forward?

@Kimball I wonder if they technically needed two supervisors, which is fairly common - partly to deal with situations here one is unhelpful.  They would be the first, and the second, unhelpful, one.  Then the third could have been helpful but not qualified (lacking a permanent position, for example)

I have been in the same situation and thought long and hard about this. In the end, I decided against a large distinction, primarily because I didn't want to be reminded of this situation whenever I open the thesis (or whenever someone else does). I still stand by the decision, and just expressed my thanks in a heartfelt email to the 'real' supervisors. Hope that helps!

I think the most professional response would be to thank them for the few things that they did (or should have done).

"Thank you to supervisor X for their thoughtful feedback and
consistent support throughout these years, which elevated the
methodological approaches in this work."

Is it accurate? Likely not. But realize advisors' work are constantly spread thin, and assume best intentions. This way, you can still elaborate in depth about thanking your other advisors without excluding the lackluster advisor. I think any alternative where your frustration with the advisor is made rather obvious is a no go. Best to take the high-road and move on.

@Trunk I think it's best to avoid causing a fuss unless there was obvious neglect or malice at play. As others have mentioned, the advisor may have been doing work behind the scenes or providing other help that wasn't obviously apparent. If you really wanted to, you could very subtly put in some doublespeak (e.g. "Thank you to X for their consistent feedback and support through these years, which constantly encouraged me to improve myself as a researcher,"—technically, they did, by making you do stuff yourself and thereby be more independent) but I would be very careful about that.

I never got my masters, but I have been the 'go-to' guy for people with technical questions. I'd like to offer a slight defense of professor X.
Questions are like baseball pitches, if a question is not in my zone of expertise (for want of demonstrating that you did your own work first - too low or by dint of being too technical and outside my area - too high), I can't really connect with it, even when I'm quite willing to do so. If you're not a sports fan, you can swap in a Goldilocks metaphor without a great loss of content.
As for your question directly, as I got older I learned that if you're going to err, it's better to do so to the side of generosity. You can and should be more direct with people who contact you directly for advice. But TBH, I am not sure how much weight people place on individual student feedback (he said - University said), even at the grad student level. I think you're more likely to come off as a vinegar-drinker without really having any positive impact for your courage.

Just write the same thanks for everyone.
At this stage of your career you do not see some "invisible" stuff that is very important nonetheless.
Sometimes this third supervisor is actually the person who did all the paperwork necessary to keep the lab running and the group funded. Or the one responsible for administrative tasks that actually allowed your other two supervisors to work. Or the guy that prepares most projects for funding agencies to keep the projects running.

I would avoid saying anything negative as your work will stay on the internet for life, and you don't know when you will need help in the future.
They might read your work and learn that you were trying to be sarcastic and that might cause a problem for you. Just be mature when your answer, acknowledge everyone, and don't burn bridges as you do not know what is happening behind the scenes that made your third supervisor act the way he did.

Your answer is correct but does not offer concrete advice. So it does not sufficiently answer the queston.

Just thank all of them and move on with life.

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What is considered plagiarism when writing a literature review paper
Taking someone else's experimental data and passing it for your own is objectively wrong. I would not argue with that. But what about when you are writing a review paper about some topic that doesn't claim to have any new experimental data?
Is taking someone else's review on this matter and rephrasing it count as plagiarism? What if you take several similar reviews and stitch them together..?
What if you take someone's review and publish it as your own in another language... having added and removed some parts and after a little bit of restructuring to your liking? It would be rephrased simply due to the fact that it would be translated and I don't see any possibility of the writers of the original paper even noticing it since they don't know my language.
Would you consider that plagiarism?

Just because someone doesn't notice what you have been doing doesn't make you any less wrong - a crime you don't get caught for is still a crime after all.

We need to establish if what I am proposing is even wrong in the first place.

How would translating someone elses work and passing it of as your own not be plagiarism??

So what wouldn't be considered plagiarism then? If one is working with an established body of knowledge then anything one says has been said before.

And if you take several papers, cut and stitch them together  and translate that? That would be a totally new paper.

The point of a review paper is to collect existing knowlegde for a certain topic (with proper citation) and subsequently interpreting the knowlegde and drawing conclusions and or needs for further research. The original controbution from you ist the mostly the latter part. If that exact thing has been done before by others and you cannot contribute anything else, don't do it any find another area where there is still new discovery to be made.

would you plan on properly citing and referencing each of those papers? Because it kind of feels like you are not. As soon as you don't properly cite and reference, you plagiarize.

I see no reason not to sight them. Of course I would sight the "original" paper (or papers, if I am combining several). From my point of view I am doing nothing wrong, as the text is totally different (being in another language), so there is no reason yo hide the original.

Plagiarism is the act of taking somebody else's ideas and passing them off as your own. An exact sequence of words is an idea. But the exact sequence of words is not the only idea contained in text.  Rephrasing things generally isn't enough to avoid plagerism, as they will contain ideas about: what things need to be explained, what order they are explained in,  the best way to explain this things, the best combination of evidence evidence to demonstrate those points. All these things and more are ideas that morally belong to the original writer.
This rephrasing, translating, rearranging, these things are all plagiarism of the original is not acknowledged.

I see no reason not to cite the original paper. Of course I would include it in my list of links

If you cite the original paper,  not just in a list of links,  but making it clear to the reader what parts come from the original (One would usually do this by in text citation,  but if its the whole thing there are probably more efficient ways) then this is not plagerism. However,  if the reader is aware then you are not likely to get that much credit.  You'll get some,  because translation is hard,  and when people cite papers in translation, they cut the original and the translator. Also beware IANAL but there might be copywrite implications for unauthorised translations.

How would anyone be able to tell which parts come from the original and which aren't? If I do a good job translating, editing out parts I don't like, and expanding some other parts from other sources (like if I want to expand a certain part, I might go to the provided link and translate directly from there)...if I do all that the result would be almost unrecognisable. How would anyone even go about proving that what I did is plagiarism. It would take a person familiar with both my article and the original in different languages to even suspect it...

@IamCleaver the whole idea is for you to only receive the credit for things you came up with.  A good time of thumb is that if at any point you feel you've managed to find a way to tricked people into giving you credit for something,  then you've plagerised. If you wouldn't be comfortable writing "this is mostly based on a translation of blogs et al" at the top,  then the only reason is you are probably doing something wrong.

@IamCleaver whether or not you would be caught is immaterial. Plagerism is a moral infraction, not a criminal one. We don't do it because it is wrong,  but because it might get caught.  However,  in the odd occasion you are caught,  the punishment for plagerism (in the academy) is harsh for what night seem a minor offense - generally the end of your career - because it is so hard to detect, people must take things in trust,  and you will have violated that.

If you don't mind me asking, do you actually, personally, consider this "highly hypothetical" scenario morally wrong? Wrong as in "lying to your boss that you are sick when you are actually at a friend's birthday" type wrong, or wrong as in "you should be ashamed of yourself" wrong?

Wrong in the sense that if you were a moral person you would not do that. What more do you need?

@IamCleaver - yes, if you were trying to pass off, or at least give the impression, that something that is a translation of someone else's work is your own original work, then I think its morally wrong as in "you should be ashamed of yourself".

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Why do American universities cost so much?
Being from Russia, the idea of paying 5-6 digit sums for a university education sounds ludicrous. I understand that prices in the US are different but surely there have to be cheaper options. Besides, if your education operates like a free market, one would expect that at least some universities would choose to offer their educational services at a lower price. Do any? If so, why aren't they popular? Are there options for Americans to get your university education for free?

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.

Examining cost drivers in an industry is a complex economic task and making comparisons between countries is also quite complex, since there are many surrounding differences in other aspects of the economy.  There have been a number of studies examining the higher education sector with general equilibrium modelling (see e.g., Chatterjey and Ionescu 2012,
Jones and Yang 2016,
Abbott et al 2019
and Athreya and Eberly 2021).  There have also been several reports summarising cost drivers in higher eduction in the US (and elsewhere), with particular attention to the rising (real) costs of university since the 1980s.  Reports on this topic include Archibald and Feldman (2011), Archibald and Feldman (2016), Archibald and Feldman (2018) and Gordon and Hedlund (2021).
The US higher education sector is a mixed economy composed of public and private universities.  There are extensive public subsidies throughout the sector, including an extensive system of subsidised loans.  The sector operates in parallel with a number of large technological and industrial sectors in the US that have seen rapid growth in the last few decades.  I am not sufficiently familiar with international differences between the US and Russian higher education sectors to offer a point-by-point comparison, but here are a few of the main cost drivers for US higher education that are identified in the literature:

Cost disease: One of the drivers of increasing cost is cost disease (also known as the Baumol effect).  Due to labour competition between different sectors of the economy, the labour cost for higher education workers has tended to increase faster than increases in labour productivity in the sector.  For example, the rise of competing technology fields in STEM (e.g., "big tech") can drive competition for highly educated technical workers, which would drive cost disease within the higher education sector.  Since labour costs for higher education workers are high, ceteris paribus the resulting supply curve is pushed towards higher prices.

Less direct government funding (than other countries): In the US system there is direct funding of public universities by state governments, with a mixture of public and private universities.  However, governments fund a smaller proportion of the sector than in many other countries.  In some countries the cost of higher education is borne primarily or solely through taxation and so the service is "free" to the consumer.  Since direct government subsidies defray the "sticker price" of a service to consumers, ceteris paribus having less direct funding from government means a higher cost for the consumer.

Subsidised/govt-backed loans for education: Most students attend university using student loans.  These include loans from the Federal Government and private loans.  The US Government provide a range of direct loans up to a limit and then beyond this student can seek private loans.  As is the typically the case in economics, when the government subsidises or provides loans for a costly activity, ceteris paribus the demand for that activity increases and so does the price.  The "Bennett Hypothesis" (named after Secretary of Education William Bennett) is that increases in financial aid and government funded/subsidised loans caused the universities to raise their tuition and simultaneously increase capital spending on amenities to attract students, knowing that the loans would increase demand in the sector and defray costs onto the government.

Amenity competition and high capital spending: Because student loans are provided by the government this substantially increases demand for higher education and induces high levels of competition for students.  US universities are known to have responded to these changes by engaging in high capital spending to provide luxurious amenities (e.g., stadiums, sports facilities, pools, climbing walls, student lounges, cafes, etc.) to students to augment their education.  This has generally been considered to be a simple way to compete for students when faced with high inelasticity of education quality.  A number of critiques of the high cost of the higher education sector have noted the "gold plating" of US univerity campuses due to amenity competition.  This is largely a secondary effect of having a market with a high level of government loan-subsidisation to attract students.

Increase in administrative roles and associated labour costs: Higher eduction in the US has experienced a large increase in non-academic administrative staff since the 1980s.  Some commentators regard this as a development reflecting an increasing "standard of care" in universities while others see it as "administrative bloat" that does not increase the standard of care or even a broader aspect of an ideological capture of the universities that decreases the standard of care.  Regardless of how it is characterised, there has been a huge increase in labour costs in US universities due to proportionate increases in non-academic administrative workers who work in support roles in the university.

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Most universities, especially the pricier ones, also offer extensive grants for merit or financial aid. I went to a nominally quite expensive school, but after scholarships and financial aid the tuition + housing was about an order of magnitude lower than advertised. That's not loans, it was grants from the school.

Your point about increased capital spending in response to student loans is great. It does make me wonder - are there universities that have taken the opposite path, allowing students to pay cheap tuition in cash in order to study in dark, drafty 100-year-old buildings, type up their projects on Commodore 64s that the faculty dug up from landfills, and where sports is kicking a patched-up ball around a muddy ditch?

@RobertColumbia: Concerning the last point: Nothing keeps students from doing sports in one of the dozens of sports facilities/clubs unrelated to any university presumably found in most larger cities. (If the students in question have interest in sports to start with, that is.) In all, you're asking for whether the trick that worked for airlines (why compete by improved luxury service, if customers accept getting no (included) luxury service at all in exchange for paying a much lower price?) has been attempted in education, as well.

@O.R.Mapper yes, exactly. I know that some programs like physics and chemistry sometimes need expensive lab equipment, but I can't see any reason why there couldn't be barebones universities teaching humanities, social sciences, and mathematics in dank basements, drafty warehouses, and log benches in the middle of the woods. This wouldn't be for every student, but I know quite a few people who would love to do this if it would help them avoid student loans. So my question is really whether this is a thing, and if not, why not? Has it been tried and failed? Are there regulatory issues?

@O.R.Mapper more relevantly, I visited my alma mater this past year and was shocked at the level of luxury that I didn't have 20 years ago. There was a glass-enclosed fitness center right there in the middle of campus (pure luxury), and even arguably essential services like the library had received luxury upgrades like wood paneling and glass staircases. I was disgusted. What about students who want to save money and study in the smelly, dirty brick buildings I did? Is luxury required to maintain accreditation? Is there really no market in discount education?

There are many factors.
First, we should address the difference between price and cost.  Price is what the student pays.  Cost is what the university spends.  In most of Europe, the cost is much higher than the price.  In the US, the price is generally closer to (but still below) the cost.  This is because, in Europe, the government foots a much larger percentage (and - in some countries - all) of the cost.
There is still a difference in cost - the US spends between 1.5 to 2 times as much per student as Germany.  Why the difference?
One difference is that salaries in particular for knowledge workers are higher in the US.  Google is now paying its US software engineers with a few years of experience close to $200K.  As I understand it, Google does not pay its software engineers in Germany nearly that much.  The university salary is not going to be as high as Google's, but professors who could become software engineers (and most of them could learn to be, even if they aren't computer science professors) are, on average, only going to accept so much of a difference in salary to be a professor.
(For that matter, graduate students at the University of California (all campuses) are currently on strike, demanding to be paid at least $45K a year, because rent in California is expensive and it costs that much to live there!  This is going to basically ruin that university system, because there is no way this doesn't completely break the budget, but they're also not going to be able to attract graduate students with what they're paying now since, with the recent inflation, that will require being homeless.)
A second difference is that the average US student is more expensive to educate.  In Germany, roughly only the top 50% of students go to university, and only 50% of those who go graduate.  In contrast, in the US, students with all levels of high school achievement go on to a tertiary education system that attempts to teach them university-level material, and the system aims to graduate all of its students (though it doesn't come close).  Part of the difference comes from a difference in standards - a US university graduate is not expected to know as much or be as capable as a German university graduate.  On the other hand, the average US high school graduate knows much less and is less capable than the average German high school graduate, and the difference is even bigger when you consider the university-going cohort.  This means US universities are teaching more, to students who need are slower learners, than German universities.  It's not surprising US universities spend more.
Finally, the US has a fair number of elite universities that spend a lot of money on research and on various luxuries for the students (and staff).  (When I visited a Canadian university, I was shocked by how crowded the library was compared to even relatively frugal non-elite US universities.  More square feet in the library cost money!  Or go to a French university and realize that roofs that don't leak are a luxury.)  They are a small percentage of universities, but they do spend so much that they do drive up the average by a noticeable amount.

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Do you have any sources for your statements: " a US university graduate is not expected to know as much or be as capable as a German university graduate" and "the average US high school graduate knows much less and is less capable than the average German high school graduate, and the difference is even bigger when you consider the university-going cohort. This means US universities are teaching more, to students who need are slower learners"?

As for the title of the question, why it costs so much: A fundamental difference between the US and other countries (or the US several decades ago) is that the rest of the world believes that education is a communal responsibility that should be paid for in large part by tax money. As a consequence, many countries have no tuition costs to students at all -- for example, during my college years in Germany, I never spent a single Deutschmark on paying for college: it was all tax-payer funded.
In contrast, contemporary American society has come to accept that taxes are bad and that many things are an individual responsibility. States no longer pay a substantial share of universities' operating costs, and so the majority of what it costs to provide students with an education needs to necessarily come from students themselves. That adds up to thousands of dollars per year per student. (A back-of-the-envelope calculation will show that that is not much more than it is in countries like Germany, for example; the difference is only who pays for it.)
Given this, it makes sense that you may be able to find opportunities to get a college education for more or less money, but you will not find much if you're looking for "essentially free" education. It simply costs $s to educate students, and someone has to pay for it whether that's at Harvard of Podunk Community College. The only approach you can take is to be good enough to get a scholarship: It that case, your education of course still costs money, but it's not you but some scholarship fund that will pay for it.

I was shocked to learn that (assuming you believe Forbes), we pay almost twice as much per student in the US.

@Ian That where? The US has quite a high standard of living, with consequently high salaries compared to most countries in the world. It would make sense that the cost of education -- which is to a very large part dominated by labor costs -- is also high.

The article notes that, "the OECD adjusts its spending figures for cost-of-living differences across nations." I'm sure that's challenging though.

@Ian That's only part of it. Salaries are not proportional to cost of living.

I don't think that article takes into account endowments, many of which are earmarked for things like fancy buildings with the donor's name on them.  This probably accounts for a significant difference in costs.

I believe this is the answer, but needs citations. My experience is I went to an ivy league school in 1984 and the tuition was 10K. With financial aid my out of pocket cost was 1K. I then went and graduated from my home state flagship public University where I paid about 700 for those 3 years. So price was there, just that state govenment subsidized the public Universities. Somewhere around the 2000s it started changing a lot...

Many good answers here, so I'll just address one aspect that they haven't:
For the top-tier Ivy Leagues, being expensive is the point. They are, practically speaking, giant hedge-funds with a university attached to them.
Harvard's endowment is $50 Billion. Princeton's is $40 Billion That's more than the GDP of many small/poor countries. They don't need to charge fees:

After a stellar year in 2021, Princeton University has an endowment of
$37.7 billion. Over the past 20 years, the average annual return for
the  endowment has been 11.2 percent. Let us give Princeton the
benefit of the  doubt and assume that at least some of that was luck
and maybe  unsustainable, and that a more reasonable prediction going
forward would be  that Princeton can average a return on its
investments of an even 10  percent a year. That puts Princeton’s
endowment return next year at roughly  $3.77 billion.
Now—what is Princeton’s annual operating budget? $1.86 billion. The
arithmetic here is not hard. $3.77 billion in investment income minus
$1.86  billion in operating expenses leaves you with $1.91 billion.
Princeton could let in every student for free.

The fact that Princeton charges $80K/y for undergrad, is not because they need the money, but because it signals prestige and exclusivity and there are more than enough takers. In fact, its peanuts, since wealthy people make multi-million dollar "donations" to ensure their children get in. This applies to all the Ivys.
(P.S. that rate of return is really high, but Ivy League Endowment rates of return have always been significantly higher than normal. There's no hard proof, but it's widely suspected that in addition to the donations, big-shots in the business community pay with knowledge that is used for insider trading by endowments.)

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/03/it-costs-73450-to-go-to-princetonheres-how-much-students-pay.html reports that when Princeton's tuition was $73k a year, 60% of students qualified for financial aid and those students paid an average of $13600 for tuition, room, and board. "Princeton covers full tuition and some of room and board costs for students from families earning up to $140,000, and covers all of tuition for students from families making between $140,000 and $160,000." So, the sticker price and what wealthier students pay is not necessarily representative.

They were down 1.5% last fiscal year.  Malcolm Gladwell is making very strong conclusions from just a few years of outperformance, and your conclusion from his arguments is a tad strange.

@Chan-HoSuh the figure is the average for the last 20 years, not a few years of over performance.

@Eugene yes, I understand.  But until just recently, their performance was not sufficient (by Gladwell's standard) to entirely fund operating expenses: "Until this year, the endowment return was a healthy cushion—ALMOST big enough each year to fund the entire university's operations for the following year—but not quite"

Basically after a phenomenal year (2021), the endowment was large enough so that by Gladwell's own very subject investment criterion for sufficiency and a very suspect 10% projection, Princeton "could let in every student for free".  It only takes one bad year to flip that around as any investment professional (which Gladwell is not) can tell you.

@Chan-HoSuh Literally the next paragraph: "But, man—look at that triumphant spike in 2021! Even if Princeton were now to fall way back down to the average investment return it’s raked in over the past 20 years, we'd still be high above the blue line." Note that he uses 10% instead of the actual 11.5% avg for margin. And Princeton still gets grants, donations and royalties. The point is that they could charge zero tuition and still be AOK. My point is that the high fees at the Ivy's are for status more than real need.

Hmm, you don't seem to get my point.  Yes, if everything plays out the way Gladwell imagines, then things are good.  If they don't, then his perpetual motion machine doesn't.  Like I pointed out, they're negative so far this year.

"The point is that they could charge zero tuition and still be AOK." -- only in Gladwell's imaginary scenario, but sure.  Point taken, I guess.  "My point is that the high fees at the Ivy's are for status more than real need." -- I don't think you have any evidence for that.

"And Princeton still gets grants, donations and royalties." -- the endowment is actually a conglomeration of funds, many with different strings attached.

@Chan-HoSuh it doesn't matter how well the fund is doing in a particular year, the point was about the multi-year average. Also, are you trying to say that the donations, grants and royalties are part of the fund(s) somehow?

There are several factors, but in my opinion the biggest one is federally subsidized student loans which break the "expected"/"free market" behavior.
When my parents went to college in the US, it was seen as a privilege, for the highly intelligent, and not something everyone did (perhaps closer to how PhDs are viewed today).  Many people could simply graduate from high school and make a fine living. College was also much more affordable, many people were able to pay for a large portion of their tuition by saving wages from working over the summers in high school.
As demand for more skilled labor grew, however, a college degree became increasingly required for many jobs and more people began to attend college.  Eventually, college became seen as something "everyone" should attend.  In response to this sentiment, the Federal government created a liberal student loan program to help enable anyone attend college who wanted to.  Note that unlike most loans, student loans are not based strongly on credit-worthiness or the likelihood that you will be able to pay them back, nor can you default on them.
While a potentially laudable goal, some argue that this loan system had the opposite effect.  Instead of universities keeping prices relatively constant, they quickly realized that since almost anyone can get a loan they could charge exorbitant prices and people would simply take out the "guaranteed" loan to pay for it.  I don't know of a good data source off-hand, but I suspect there is a high correlation between the rapid increase in the cost of undergraduate education and the amount of federal funds put toward student loans (with federal funding leading rather than lagging the cost increase).
At least from the perspective of my parents, you are essentially now damed if you do (save carefully, don't qualify for student loans, then drain your savings to pay) and damed if you don't (don't save, qualify for student loans, then be stuck with crippling debt).
It's also worth mentioning that many of the top universities in the world reside in the US and there has been an increasing amount of foreign competition for admittance to US colleges. Not only does this exert upward pressure on the price, but many colleges charge a large additional fee to foreign students which acts as a further incentive to raise domestic prices.

Can the loans be as large as a university demands? Why doesn't the government put a cap on the loans? Also, are loans given to anyone who asks? Does the government at least look at your grades?

@IamCleaver There is a government cap on how much is given, and it has been increasing over the years. This acts as the university's base target (max govt. $ + $ you spend on top of that).  The money given is based on a sliding scale that includes your PARENTS' wealth (ie if you and your parents are poor you get max $, if your parents have a large savings account or have high enough income you get no $).  If you ask and are poor enough you get one. No they don't look at your grades, but if your grades once you are in college drop too much (>2.0) they can reduce how much they give you.

@IamCleaver Look up "FAFSA" (free application for federal student aid) to learn more.  It's honestly a bit crazy imho.  Imagine how high car prices would be if the government gave anyone who wanted to lease a car (that wasn't extremely wealthy) $25,000/year, no questions asked.  And they only reduce your yearly loan if you get into crashes regularly...

So, if I understand you correctly, ANY student, regardless of their prior academic achievements, who found ANY accredited university willing to take them in would be given a loan to pay the university (almost) as much as they ask to study ANY major, be it aerospace engineering or african american studies?

@IamCleaver Yep exactly.  A prospective CS major gets as much money as someone who wants to major in underwater basket weaving.   I'm not sure exactly how much is given (it tends to be a pretty high percentage) but you are right that it is based on how much the university is asking for tuition.  Now it becomes fairly obvious why they a) ask for exorbitant sums and b) admit as many students as possible.  Now a third trend c) is emerging: universities heavily pander to students and drop academic standards to keep as many attending (and thus paying) as possible. (bad grades also mean >>fed $)

As much as I believe that the government should provide free scholarships - not loans, this difference starts to seem trivial. The loans are far from ideal imo, but a far greater problem seems to be not in the idea of loans themselves, but in the fact that ANYBODY can receive a loan regardless of their academic abilities or the demand for their major. Also, the cap is the same regardless of whether you are applying to MIT or some backwater liberal arts college, right?

Let us continue this discussion in chat.

@IamCleaver The idea that the government could start deciding to only fund people to study X subjects, but not Y is pretty unpalatable to many.

@AzorAhai-him- Why? Its the government's money. Isn't it their job to distribute resources according to the nation's needs?

@IamCleaver That could easily turn into programs collapsing because the government decides we don't need English or Middle East studies anymore. Or turn into "only the rich can study CS/medicine/etc."

@AzorAhai-him- I still don't see it as a problem. If the government believes that there are enough majors for that profession already without government financing then so be it.

It’s probably too complex to discuss further in comments and I don’t participate in chat.

I'm rather surprised I didn't see any other answers addressing the premise that

education operates like a free market

because education is not a free market.
In a free market, by definition, there are low barriers to entry. This is not the case in the education market. There are a large number of very high hurdles a new educational institutional must pass in the United States to even gain access to the market, including:

Obtaining quality faculty
Putting together a curriculum
Physical buildings, not just for teaching, but also for dorms and extracurriculars. These are not strictly necessary, lack of physical presence has a large impact on perception of quality.
Permission from the state's department of education (This alone will take 2+ years)
Obtaining accreditation (Regionally or nationally, by a private nongovernmental organization like ABET)
Certification from USCIS (to take foreign students)
Specific program accreditation for things like law or medicine

Snuck into these hurdles is a rather nasty catch-22 where accreditation is usually denied to institutions that don't already have students. However, students are obviously wary of institutions lacking accreditation.

If that is the case then why are there many reports of universities (that are already accredited) going bankrupt? If the bar to entry is that high, and you are already on the other side of the fence, then surely cutting expenses would be a better option...

@IamCleaver You might be better off asking these sorts of questions somewhere else; might be on-topic at Money.SE, but please don't use this site as a discussion forum and keep asking numerous additional questions under each answer to yours.

@IamCleaver I don't have good sources for this, but it might because of the shift to more technical majors. These require infrastructure: labs, computers, technicians and possibly more expensive staff than just that required for a liberal arts college. Just because the price is high doesn't mean the margins are good. (I suspect that last point isn't true nationwide, but it might be possible for small colleges)

@IamCleaver You can only cut expenses so far, though.  There's a certain critical level of money that you need to bring in each year to cover your minimum operating costs.  If you're (for example) sitting on a lot of building-related debt and your enrollment drops below a certain point, you can't pay your bills anymore. It's hard to recruit students when your school might not last long enough for them to graduate. The downward spiral can be swift and hard to escape from.

@code11 Regarding your answer, yeah, I think the reason is mostly because of regulation that requires it to be expensive. The regulation isn't entirely in the education industry, however. Some extra rules are tagged on in order to get government funding. Some rules exist to prevent malpactice. Lots of stuff. If there were no regulation, there would be no minimum cost, in theory.

Unlike Russia, there is a more clear perception of a more prestigious university = higher station in life. This does not always work out as expected (see the current outrage about student loans). The education model is fundamentally different because of reasons having little to do with academia and a lot with economy.
In Russia, taking a bank loan (mortgages and unforeseen urgencies aside) is typically a pretty bad idea. In the US, the credit score is important, and borrowing money one way or another is viewed as one of the pillars of capitalism: $100 now is better than $100 a few years later. The idea of taking a loan from the government to invest in yourself to pay it back many years later makes more sense in that financial system. Actively managing their finances is just not something most Russians do (surely not to an extent Americans seem to do that). And yes, there are scholarships, but they are pretty rare (on the flip side, purely academic careers able to sustain a small family are also exceedingly rare in Russia).
Both have their pros and cons. One of the notable deficiencies of the current Russian system is the perverse incentive to get a coveted diploma no matter the actual education provided, sometimes viewed as 5-6 years of largely wasted time. Soviet-era tekhnikums are now proudly calling themselves "institutes" or even "universities" because that is what moves the most tax money through them. Again, reasons for that are economical - the alignment between the education system and the industry is poor, unlike some European countries. The same is true about the US, but in a different way, and you have people complaining about massive debt they are never able to pay off.
And yes, there are cheaper options, but you graduate from Harvard and are easily on your road for six figures annual; you graduate from Podunk and are barely making the ends meet. So "free market" dictates how much one could fleece each social class and market to them accordingly. There is little incentive to facilitate social mobility for universities - this is something a government should be handling, and it is rather hands-off in the case of the US.

Yeah I think the culture or "prestige" of how the system works in America cannot be overstated. We drive up the costs ourselves because of course we want to go to a famous old school. The "invisible hand" of the free market can't work if everyone insists are a very particular source of the product.

@JamieB "free market" Higher education is heavily subsidized in the US.

@user76284 It's less subsidized than a number of other countries, and unsubsidized private colleges remain popular (and "the most prestigious"). I think if you could start a new school, hire literally the entire faculty of Harvard to run it, no one would want to attend, because "it's some school no one has heard of".

@JamieB US government spending on tertiary education, as a fraction of GDP, is higher than the G20 average and close to the OECD average. I agree that reputation is important.

There are many reasons. The basic one is that higher education isn't fully funded by the government through taxes. Some universities get substantial funding from individual states (funded by income taxes), but not enough to cover all costs. In those universities, tuition isn't completely covered, but it is lower for residents of that state (taxpayers) than for others.
Many (actually most) universities are private and receive only limited governmental funding so much of the tuition is borne by the students. Many universities (private and state) give out some scholarship aid to a minority of students. This can reduce the cost considerably, even to zero. Some states give (or gave, in the past) scholarships to residents even for study at private universities.
Free higher education comes for only a few. Some athletes and some financially disadvantaged students primarily.
Most universities have many revenue streams, but a lot of that is to support research, not teaching, specifically. But even with the high cost of tuition, the student pays only a fraction of the total cost in all but a few "for profit" colleges and universities that tend to have special missions and, possibly, lower standards.
Funding in the US for education generally is very poor and it comes from some crazy sources. Property taxes, in particular, ensure that if you are poor and live in a poor area then your primary and secondary education will be poorly funded since most of it is local funding. We don't seem to be able to break that habit. That isn't quite the same as for higher education, but, some states fund higher education poorly.

For completeness, I'll note that all universities cost a lot - everywhere. The difference, really, is who bears the cost. In the US, students bear a lot of it. If faculty are poorly paid and exploited somewhere then they do. A sensible (IMO) system recognizes that an educated citizenry is a benefit now and for the future and finds a way to spread that cost accordingly and appropriately.

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Among many other reasons:
In the US, employers pay for employee health care.  In many other countries, this is not the case.  In the US, the health care system is exceptionally inefficient and prices are rising fast.  Universities are hit particularly hard by health care costs because they employ many older staff.  Those costs are passed on to students.
Health care costs are particularly significant to students because, while universities can cut staff pay and defer capital expenses, it is quite hard to cut health care costs.

Actually, the cost is split with the employee in many places, but that doesn't change the bottom line. The employee, in paying part of the health insurance also subsidizes the education. The costs of insurance are still there, no matter who pays.

The employee contribution is limited. https://www.irs.gov/affordable-care-act/employers/questions-and-answers-on-employer-shared-responsibility-provisions-under-the-affordable-care-act#Affordability

Some people answering the question before me have the incorrect impression that U.S. students have no choice but to pay high tuition for private universities.
Let us start with some U.S. government statistics.

In fall 2020, nearly all undergraduate students (95 percent) attending degree-granting institutions enrolled in either public 4-year (48 percent), public 2-year (30 percent), or private nonprofit 4-year (17 percent) institutions... The remaining 5 percent of undergraduate students were distributed across private for-profit 2- and 4-year institutions and private nonprofit 2-year institutions in fall 2020.

"Public" in the U.S. means educational institutions run by a government - not what it means in the U.K. and some other English-speaking countries.
Some random examples of public 4-year institutions are

Hunter College of the City University of New York

University of California, Berkeley

The Ohio State University

Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

The Pennsylvania State University

Some examples of public two-year institutions (almost synonymous with community colleges) are:

12 2-year colleges in Connecticut State system

116 California Community Colleges

Borough of Manhattan Community College of the City University of New York

(For non-U.S. readers - many undergraduates attend a community college with the intention to transfer later to a 4-year school and get a 4-year degree. Not all succeed, but at a typical U.S. community college, young people intending to transfer often form the majority of the students.)
Some diverse examples of private universities are:

Columbia University in the City of New York

New York University

Georgetown University

Liberty University

Indeed, the sticker prices of the tuition at most private schools seem like a lot. But, according to the government statistics above, nearly 4 out of 5  U.S. undergraduates choose to attend a public 4-year or a 2-year program, rather than a private one. Public institutions tend to be free or very low cost for the students, with the taxpayers covering most of the cost. For example, in the City University of New York or State University of New York systems, tution is free for students who reside in New York State and earn less than $125,000 a year (details). Tuition is not free, but is still very cheap for students who each more than $125,000 a year, or come in another state or country.
We should note that in addition to paying (or not) for tuition, a student needs to eat something, and sleep somewhere, which in the U.S. can cost about $1-2,000 / month for 4 years. Many public and private institutions offer their students subsidized housing and meal plans - typically, not free, but cheaper than market price. Also many undergraduates are able to live on the cheap at home with their families while getting their bachelor's degree.
Nor, in general, are these free and low-cost public institutions difficult to get into, which is how free universities in other countries usually operate. For exmple, CUNY and SUNY have practically open admisisons. The statistics on the percentage of students who apply and are not accepted are not useful for these schools because (almost) any student who graduated high school in New York with a grade of B or better has to be admitted, and can usually get free tuition.
Most U.S. students are well aware that it is not necessary to pay for a private school in order to earn a bachelors degree. Only a little over 1 in 5 do choose to attend a private school, rather than a public one.
EDIT: I will adress some points raised in the question and in the comments.
Let us compare the above facts (widely availability of free and low-cost public institutions) with the picture painted by the Russian government's Internet Research Agency:
https://almavest.ru/ru/node/1379
English translation:

The United States, in the field of education, lacks many concepts familiar to us in the post-Soviet space...

There are no federal "state universities" in the United States, because historically it turned out that education is not mentioned in the US Constitution - in 1787, the Founding Fathers of the United States, apparently, were not interested...

All universities in the USA are paid, there is no free post-secondary education in the USA at all.

https://legalizuem.ru/blog/vysshee-obrazovanie-v-ssha
English translation:

It is also worth considering that American education is considered one of the most expensive in the world; unfortunately, there is no free education in America...

The minimum cost of studying at an American university is from $ 5,000 per year. On average, this is about 30,000 dollars a year.

Besides, if your education operates like a free market, one would expect that at least some universities would choose to offer their educational services at a lower price. Do any? If so, why aren't they popular?

There are some for-profit universities. As you can see from the statistics I cited, the vast majority of U.S. undergraduates attend public of private non-profit institutions. Here are a couple of examples of for-profit universities:

De Vry

University of Phoenix

For-profit universities can't compete with public universities by offering lower tuition, because public universities are heavily subsidized by taxpayers. Generalizing very broadly, most Americans don't view for-profit universities as a good option for earning a bachelor's degree. Some people view for-profit universities as sometimes a good option for taking some non-degree courses, e.g. learning a foreign language or a particular skill. Some for-profit universities are outright scams.

Are there options for Americans to get your university education for free?

Yes, many. For example, as I explained above, most New York State residents can get into SUNY or CUNY (the admissions are almost open), and the tuition is free for most residents, and very low for others. Almost 4 out of 5 U.S. students choose this option.
At universities that do charge high tuition, many students receive some kind of grants or scholarships. I'd venture to say that it's more common nowI'! than paying the full sticker price tuition. For example, the beatnik author Jean-Louis Lebris "Jac" de Kérouac attended Columbia University on a football scholarship (go Lions!!)
A recent New York Times article says that some private universities are lowering their tuition sticker price to better reflect what students actually pay.
One common way to earn free tuition at expensive private universities is to volunteer to serve in the U.S. military. Then (with some restrictions), U.S. taxpayers will pay college tuition for you, your spouse, and dependends.
Some (not all) states have programs where the state pays some or all university tuition for people receiving public assistance (welfare, dole). Sometimes they pay for a very expensive private university.

why is there a student debt crisis?

The truth is more complex than what your government's propaganda paints. For example, I know one young woman who borrowed over $100,000 as student loans, and spent it mostly on things like travel and clothes. She states that her plan was to marry a rich man who would pay off her student loans. As far as I know, her marriage plans have not materialized yet, but rather I and other U.S. taxpayers will end up paying for her student loans.
According to CUNY's Hunter College,

The median federal loan graduate indebtedness for Hunter students was just $12,500. (Hunter is proud that 75% of its students graduate debt-free.)

Is there a reason why more people don't go there?

I'm sure that the over 1 out of 5 students who attend private universities believe that there are valid reasons for their choices. For many students, the tuition cost is not a big consideration because someone else pays. Some students believe that the campus environment is more pleasant in a private university, than in a public one (example), or that they would get better education in some way, or that they would be more likely to find a good job or be admitted to a competitive graduate school after graduation.
But the claim that Americans wanting a bachelors degree have no choice other than to borrow hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay for private university tuiton is demonstrably false.

Do these universities offer all majors?

That's definitely a consideration for some students. For example, some religious students attend a religious university (many Roman Catholic universities; Liberty - evangelicals, etc) because they want to study theology, and they don't want to do it at a public university.
For certain majors, such as cinema studies or forensic studies, some undergraduate programs are very well regarded, while most others are not.

Ok, so how much os tuition for someone at these public universities?

As I explained, the tuition is free for most NY students at CUNY or SUNY. According to https://www.cuny.edu/financial-aid/tuition-and-college-costs/tuition-fees/ , undergraduate NYS residents, not eligible for free tuition pay $3,465 / semester  for CUNY 4-year institutions or $2,400 for 2-year institutions,  while undergraduate non-residents, including foreign students, pay $620 / credit at 4-year institutions , which, asuming 15 credits / semester would come out to $9,300 / semester, or $320 / credit at 2-year institutions, which, would be $4,800 / semester. Other schools differ.

This makes the prices sound very reasonable. If the situation is as you describe it to be, why is there a student debt crisis?

Is there a reason why more people don't go there? Do these universities offer all majors?

I've edited the answer to address your comments and additional questions.

Also, most Catholic (especially Jesuit) colleges offer a full program. Theology is a very small part. Once can study math, science, the humanities, literature and all the rest. People go there not for theology but because of some measure of association with the church. And not all students are even Catholic, nor are all faculty members. There isn't much proselytizing in my experience.

Public four year institutions are seldom free. The current in-state undergraduate tuition and required fees at UCBerkeley is over $18,000 per year. Add in books, housing, living expenses and the four year total exceeds $100,000.

@Buffy A very long time ago, I used to adjunct at a Jesuit university. It was great, no complaints, but I observed that: most (not all) of the people around were very catholic, not prozeitizing, but talking about their catholicism a lot. But non-catholics students and instructors were welcome and not excluded in any way. Many students told me on many occasions that they went there because they went to Catholic HS before, and wanted to continue their studies in a Catholic university, taking some undergraduate religion classes.

@Buffy I don't have the stats for what  fraction of public institutions are free. I was surprised by what you wrote about UCBerkeley, so I found a UC pages https://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/tuition-financial-aid/  and https://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/tuition-financial-aid/tuition-cost-of-attendance/ and confirmed that the tuition is free for families earning less than $80,000 / year, and is . The same page says that 55% of CA undergraduates pay no tuition.

This is very helpful. I'd take a stab at "The truth is more complex than what your government's propaganda paints it", however - I'm far more exposed to the US left-wing commentary than my own state media. If anything, the notion of student debt is hardly confined to the anti-US propaganda. Total tuition cost is about $20k on average, but loans cover living expenses and such as well, so the total bill is at tens of thousands of dollars: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/tub/graduate-student-loan-debt (other relevant country-wide stats can be found at NCES website as well).

Thanks for pointing out the typo. I edited the answer, fixed some typos, and added a couple of quotes from the Russian government's "Internet Research Agency" about the alleged absense of free university education in the U.S. The page you cite is titled "Trends in Student Loan Debt for Graduate School Completers". We've been discussing the cost of undergraduate education here. The cost of graduate education is yet another interesting discussion topic.

Put simply.. the US government provides government guaranteed loans..
Since a potential student can get a $60,000 loan for education purposes only the colleges can feel free to charge them pretty much as much as they can afford to borrow.
If the potential student could not borrow $60,000 for a college loan the university would have no choice to lower the admission price (as few people could afford to pay $60,000)
Think about it. Without the current loan system.. could the universities charge this much money for college? How would students come up with the money to afford these high prices?

You seem to be equating higher education with profit making enterprises. They are anything but. I agree that the current system is flawed and the loan system especially. But "charge as much as you can" isn't the underlying cause. Think harder. The loan system is the result, not the cause of the problem which is that the costs are fundamentally high and government (politicians) refuse to cover those costs adequately. And taxpayers would punish them if they tried. Sad.

@Buffy answer this question. without the current loan system.. could the universities charge this much money for college? How would students come up with the money to afford these high prices?

A better question, is how could they run at all with no revenue. Enslave the faculty and staff? Sell off all the buildings and land? For your question, with no loans there wouldn't be any students under the current system. Well, maybe Elon's kids but not so many others.

@Buffy exactly so they would either "go bankrupt" or lower the price of admission.. Which do you think they would do?

You are ignoring costs. Lowering the "price" without lowering the cost is not a winning strategy. If they let everyone in for free they cease to exist in less then a year. The costs don't just go away. Think harder.

@Buffy they would probably cut costs as well.. as any normal business operates under changing market conditions.. ? sell land cut staff.. do away with amenities.. without the loans and therefore the students ability to pay the high admission they couldn't afford all the extra stuff..

I think its worth mentioning that America has a culture that encourages or at least normalizes going into debt. There was probably nothing wrong with going into debt in the 1920s to start a profitable business but today that translates to "its acceptable to go into serious debt to take a college degree which has slim to no chance of paying back" and unfortunately a lot of people get caught up in that. In other cultures simply offering lots of loans would probably not result in such a drastic rise in college tuition. You need a culture of taking loans to your own detriment as well.

This does not match the experience of a number of countries, and therefore cannot be enough to be the answer on its own. Without accounting for the other factors, such as mentioned in comments, this is just incorrect.

@Buffy The loans are absolutely a contributing factor to the prices. You should take a basic economics course before making such unfounded claims.

@Nij Which countries do you have in mind? And what other factors are you referring to?

University domestic students are 100% government-funded in much of Europe, but costs are nowhere near $60000 per student. Government-backing is therefore not the sole cause, other factors must be involved.

@Nij US government spending on tertiary education, as a fraction of GDP, is higher than the G20 average and close to the OECD average.

Your answer tries to claim it's the government backing which is responsible for the high tuition costs, while other countries either have government backing and lower cost, or government backing and higher cost, or no government backing and either higher or lower or similar costs. So, "government backs the loans" is just not relevant to the level of cost, which is why this answer is incorrect and needs to account for other factors that are relevant.

@Nij In Australia increased government loans and increased costs to students were at least correlated.

"If the potential student could not borrow $60,000 for a college loan the university would have no choice to lower the admission price"  This is not usually correct.  In practice universities usually enroll fewer students and cut costs, or simply close.  Sometimes a lower price is announced, however this is a lower price before the discount and may be unrelated to the discounted price.  Lowering the price is not a good strategy if production cost is greater than the price.

@AnonymousPhysicist I think the assumption here is that production costs (after making adjustments, e.g., cutting unnecessary costs) are well below the price.

@user76284 Yes, that is the wrong assumption here, at least based on the university's opinion of "necessary."

@AnonymousPhysicist "based on the university's opinion" Which is not necessarily that of others, including the author of this answer.


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How to call a paper that has been submitted to a journal?
For my statement of academic purpose I want to highlight that I have a work on arXiv which has been submitted to a journal. How would I call such a work? Is the term "submitted publication" appropriate?

Does this answer your question? Should I list a submitted but not yet accepted conference paper in my resume for grad school applications?

Let me suggest a different approach. In the CV, create a section for "Work in Progress". List this paper (yes paper) there and mark it with "submitted" or "under review" or similar. List other things you have going. You can do this whether or not there is a public-facing version of the paper such as at arXiv.
Then, you only need to mention it briefly in the SoP, which should actually be focused on the future, not things you've done in the past. Mention the paper there only as it supports your future goals for study and thereafter.
A work in progress section is an advantage, IMO, in any application.

Bibliography styles usually give provisions for that: see e.g. this APA FAQ. MLA has an entire collection of them, here is one for Chicago.
Pick your poison.
EDIT: Lumping unpublished works together with published ones in academic submissions may not be okay overall. This will then depend on submission guidelines. I am familiar with ones where it is okay to include something which has passed the revisions and was accepted, but not yet published. Otherwise, it is fine to reference it as any other preprint.

Would it be okay to call such a work a "paper" when it is on arXiv?

Added an edit concerning publication lists specifically. Otherwise, it is a paper, no reason not to call it as such. As long as you are not misleading the committees about metrics. If you have multiple papers under consideration by journals, you may add another subheading just for those. Generally I'd say list it in the text with some description, but take care with inclusion in lists where people might gloss over it and mistakenly assume it was already published.

Thanks. Sorry for following up - So, if I make clear that it is submitted and not accepted yet (ie in the peer review process), can I call it "paper"? Or is the term "paper" per se implying published in a journal?

No, "paper" does not imply it was already peer-reviewed and published. If you are still working on a draft, you are working on a paper, even though it is not even under consideration yet. Unless it is completely bogus (which is rare), it usually makes its way into publication eventually, although the situation seems to be a bit different for CS right now. Either way, it constitutes a part of your research output, but it is understood more work is needed before it is "finalized".

Thanks. One of my professors said if it is on arXiv now and submitted then I can also call it technically a publication". Would you agree to this?

No. It is a preprint. I have been looking at Scopus statistics as well as arXiv for CS papers recently (papers on CNNs), and a substantial fraction of work is never formally peer-reviewed nor published, although this is uncommon in purely academic settings. Still, I would not call it a publication at this stage.

You refer to this work as 'submitted manuscript, currently under review'.
Optionally you can add 'at journal X' although opinions differ whether that's tasteful or not. Might depend on your subfield.
If you want you can add where the preprint is available. That's generally useful but its utility depends how much space you have and whether that information is already accessible elsewhere in your application.


text:
do professors care how much a prospective student read about their research while applying for a research position?
How much do a student's interest and enthusiasm matter when selecting or getting interested in a student?
In research position cover letters do professors care if a student has read details about their research, took time to search around related papers and background ?

Possible duplicate: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/54646/how-to-research-about-professors-wisely?rq=1

Another: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/189235/how-should-i-email-quite-a-few-professors-for-phd-positions-while-also-not-mass?rq=1

Browsing your earlier question you seem to be from India and study physics. Are you asking specifically about that place and field?

In life, it is many times very useful to perform your 'due diligence' on a topic. One use is to show to a prospective boss (professor, manager, collaborator, date, ...) that you have actually looked into the opportunity and think you have something to contribute. Do I notice that some people I interview have done their due diligence? Why, yes, it is usually pretty obvious.

Some people respond well to flattery and obsequiousness. Personally, I hope a good applicant will have a general sense of what kinds of things I've worked on, and will be able to identify which aspect(s) of my work they would like to get involved with. (Theory or experiment? Method 1 or 2? Application A or B?) Why do you want to work with me and not the guy in the next office? But I don't expect you to have read all my papers in detail, or to propose "an extension" to my work. (Really, don't do this. I know more about my own research than you. You're just going to make yourself look stupid.)

Bryan, it's not duplicate, those questions are from students' perspectives, here I want to know what goes on in a professor's mind.

Buffy ...... yes physics or math mostly but okay in other subjects too. I want to know what goes on a professor's mind.

Avid ... neither "flattery", nor "obsequiousness" are appropriate. Somehow I believe you can't do any high-quality research work with anyone who behaves like such. Yes, students can't read or understand every paper of a particular professor but why do you feel that students can't propose extensions to research? I don't know about other fields but I can surely happen in physics or mathematics. Even professors can be clueless about a topic. Physics and math textbooks even contradict very established subjects. Students can find papers that can have drastic effects on professors' research.

@JAMES213 They are students asking what they should do, which obviously depends exactly on the professors' minds.

I don't particularly like @avid's comment about flattery and obsequiousness either. But the point about knowing what I do generally, rather than having an encyclopaedic knowledge of everything I've ever published, and not telling me how to extend my own work, is well made. I think the key is to look like someone how is generally interested in the field, not someone who is following a formula to make themselves look like someone who is interested in the field, even though they could really care less.

Does this answer your question? How should I email quite a few professors for PhD positions while also not 'mass emailing'?

This depends on place, field, and an individual's judgement. In my case (US, math) it had no effect at all. I was recommended to the professor and he to me by other professors who knew me well. He had time and ability to take me on so it was an easy choice for both of us.
In some lab sciences, perhaps in physics, and in places like Germany where a student needs a masters for admission to a doctoral program and also joins a professor's lab or working group, it might be quite valuable to know what sorts of things that lab does. A student might well be working on problems already established in the lab and so familiarity would be a plus and maybe part of the selection process. You are doing more in such labs than just working on your own research, also contributing to the work of that lab.
In math, on the other hand, even in Germany, where students mostly work on their own problems, even when suggested by the supervisor, it might make no difference at all, as long as the supervisor has some interest in the research topic. It is unlikely to be a negative, in any case, and it can help you choose an appropriate advisor to get an idea about their interests.
I don't know about India, but if it is like Germany and you join a specific lab then the more you know the better off you are. It is also good to have an idea of what you want to work on and whether that meshes well with the advisor.

My interest is in math-related physics or applied math and not just looking for answers from India but anywhere. So in math, professors don't care much if a prospective student knows about their research as they can shift their interest in another direction easily?

It depends. If someone has applied to work in a particular group and their background does not fit with that, they will get rejected. This does not mean that they are unsuitable for a maths PhD, just unsuitable for that maths PhD.

(Disclaimer: not a professor, so this is secondhand)
If you're asking about Europe, "demonstrating interest and enthusiasm" for the specific PhD project that you're applying might be very helpful. One of my previous Universities is very well known in some subfields, and offers very good working conditions. These are very often third-party funded (i.e. the project can't be changed too much). Professors get a lot of applications from abroad; if it's a field where publications during the MSc are uncommon, and your academic networks don't overlap, hiring you is a bit of a gamble.
In that case, showing that you're able to read and understand papers from their field, and that you care enough about the position and topic to familiarise yourself with it, can be a strong green flag. Your potential supervisor is aware that you'd be moving to a new country (and culture!) for what is universally agreed to be a challenging experience: having done the academic due diligence can be interpreted as a sign that you have some idea of what you're getting yourself into. PhD studies also require a high degree of self-motivation and initiative. If you're not motivated enough to read the group homepage and skim 1-3 relevant papers before applying, that might be taken as a red flag.

Just to add to this, just copying text from the website or cut and pasting article titles into your cover letter is even worse than doing nothing. I looks like you are trying to trick me into believing you are interested in my field, while probably just spamming every professor in the country.

No, but I prefer it when the student are at least aware of the area(s) my group works in, and has published in recently.
If you email me praising a paper from 7 years ago that I am a collaborating co-author on, and which is clearly not aligned with anything else I have done before or since.... and then you go on and on about how that's what you want to do your PhD on... I will likely ignore you.


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Computer Science: How are undergrads from liberal arts colleges viewed by PhD admissions?
I am a graduate from a top 30 liberal arts college (according to usnews.com at least) and I've applied to several PhD in Computer Science programs. How do the departments of the, say, top 15-20 programs view applicants from liberal arts colleges? Are they still classified as "top schools"? Or is there any disadvantage in coming from liberal arts schools and not an R1/R2 university?

In general, there should be no issue for any "good" undergraduate institution, as long as the undergraduate degree is appropriate for study in CS. Places get reputations, and recommending professors get a reputation for accurate predictions.
Since this seems to be a US centric question, you don't even need to have majored in CS necessarily, and something like math is probably enough, though some skills (programming, data structures,...) would be helpful. Changing fields within bounds after a bachelors is pretty common.
If you are a CS student in a program accredited by ABET/CSAB engineering board (pretty typical) then you should have no issues at all about the institution, and acceptance will depend on all the other usual factors.
Some top undergrad programs don't bother with accreditation and use other means to demonstrate their quality.
Note that good R1 or even R2 doctoral programs wouldn't be able to run on just the output of other such places, as almost all students graduate from other sorts of institutions. The doctoral program itself recognizes this fact and is designed accordingly. There are good undergraduate programs and good professors in lots of places. You also are likely to get more faculty "attention" at a small place than at an R1. Fewer research opportunities, perhaps, but a typical doctoral program (some exceptions) doesn't start with research.

Okay, thank you!

I'm a CS Professor at a US liberal arts college.
Our graduates regularly get accepted in top grad programs in the US.
Most of those who get accepted have at least some research experience in the form of an undergraduate honors thesis. Some have done REUs, and a few have published papers as undergrads.

Thanks! I have good research experience with two publications. But I am worried because those experiences came in coding theory. In grad school, I signalled my interest to work in a very closely related field (algorithms, complexity, etc.). I am worried that what I did as an undergrad is not entirely in my field. Is that gonna hurt, say, at the top 20 programs? I am just hoping that the faculty in these other areas are able to relate to my research in coding theory, I tried to make it as simplistic as I could in my SoP but there might still be some jargon.

I think they should be fine understanding it.

Opinion only - no data.
I think good grades in a cs major and strong recommendations from faculty who know your work would make your application competitive with similar applications from research oriented schools.

Is it going to hurt that I have majored in math? (but have taken plenty of classes related to CS, incl. data structures, cryptography, algorithms, computer organization etc).

No. That's a good cs background. The math will be a plus for any theoretical cs work. Go ahead and apply. Good luck.