Ten years ago the total cost of attendance at some of these schools was high 40K to low 50K. This is nearly double and ridiculous. Of course our housing market went the same way and look how well that worked out.
If you look closer, tuition is going up for many reasons:
1. Faculty (specially clinic faculty) get a pay raise every year, usually the same rate as the tuition goes up (at least 3%, depending on the school). Don't forget about the dean and the other administrative people, they too get a raise. Remember, there is shortage of faculty in almost every school, so the students directly pay the cost of new faculty if they are hired.
2. Operational costs: A lot of dental schools closed in the 90s due to failure of creating enough revenue to stay open. The only way to overcome these problems were to raise tuition and increase class sizes. This meant student-doctor ratio would have to go up, more students had to share chairs in clinic, and passing cost of supplies down to students. Private schools are leaders in this system, they will do business just like any other private business.
3. State Funds: State funds for dental education are drying out. There is no longer enough money going around for schools like it use to be. So most state schools are now in $40-50k/yr total cost, and it will continue to go up until state funds come around again (which will not happen anytime soon due to the economy).
4. Patients: Most states had to cut back on their medicaid dental benefits due to budget problems, specially for adults. For example, California will be eliminating their Medi-cal, which serves 7 million people, this July. This will have a significant impact on the schools in that state, since majority of patients are those with state-funded dental insurance. Fewer patients could be seen at their clinics, which means USC will be left with no choice but to increase their record tuition again.
5. In the grand scheme of things, everything in life has gone up and doubled; gas, food, etc. Inflation is inevitable.
