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Comment by hcknwscommenter | Hacker News Reader

As a former Ph.D. student and now graduate, I would have to say the title is is not sensationalist at all. This aspect of the tax plan will raise additional funds (to at least partially offset the magnitude of the revenue reductions). Where do you think those funds are going to come from? They come from the graduate students who will now be taxed on these tuition waiver amounts.

It is extremely facile to just waive arms and assert that, somehow, the schools will simply get around the issue by changing their accounting. If that were the case, why would this even be in the tax bill?

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Why is this in the tax bill? Congress has complex rules around passing permanent tax cuts that raise the deficit. The GOP is attempting to present a tax plan that has very large tax cuts and an equal amount of new revenue (e.g., less deductions, less exemptions). The complex rules around deficit-neutral bills don't make provisions for future changes in behavior negating a passed bill. So Congress would like to take away this exemption to help pass their current bill; universities will change their behavior to keep the profitable graduate system in place.

> I would have to say the title is not sensationalist at all

It's appalling that you don't find the title extreme. No way will a tax plan completely destroy higher education as we know it.

> Where do you think those funds are going to come from?

Its simple. The schools are going to start including the cost of taxes when covering the grad students tuition costs. For example, if tuition is 50k + a tax of 10k. The schools will cover the 60k for tuition for a full ride. No school with a conscious is going to slap a grad student with a sizable tax bill.

Appalling? Now who is being sensationalist? What you are saying is that the school is going to bear the cost rather than the student. Probably. But then, the Ph.D. program just becomes much more expensive for the school to administer. As such, all but the most well-endowed are going to simply stop admitting Ph.D. students. Your simplified, and actually unworkable, accounting trick achieves the same effect of destroying our world-class and unparalleled STEM graduate system.

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