The sticker price is misleading though. There are scholarships for merit and grants for need. Work study (often in makework jobs with ample downtime for studying) for almost anyone who seeks them out.
Even after that, employers in competitive fields offer loan repayment as a starting bonus, or doled out over time for retention. Work in public service makes some eligible for loan forgiveness.
Even without that, the loan companies have provisions for indefinite deferment during unemployment and automatic forbearance during enrollment in any other academic program. Income based repayment is a standard option. Essentially, if you wanted to break the system, you could pay full price for a ridiculously priced private school degree then probably go work at starbucks and send them $20 a month for a while, then go take four years off to study pottery at a community college to pay $0 a month while the fed pays all your interest.
Oh, then even after that, even if you are actually personally paying interest on a loan, historically the rates have been competitive (though that flipped a few years back), and there are tax credits for education spending, and deductions that kick in even when you're just repaying school loans.
The most surprising feature of the American system to me is not the price, but how hard it works to camouflage all its progressive and meritocratic features.
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/04/college-is-chea...