“The worst-case scenario is that colleges are involved on both sides of a Second US Civil War between Christian Fundamentalists and neoliberals. Working families will take the largest hit.”
It’s a stark and provocative warning, but one grounded in decades of neoliberal policy, predatory capitalism, and ideological warfare. From our perspective at the Higher Education Inquirer, the College Meltdown is not a future risk—it’s a slow-moving catastrophe already unfolding.
Two Fronts in a Cultural and Economic War
On one side of this looming conflict are Christian fundamentalists who seek to remake public education in their own image: purging curricula of critical perspectives, defunding public universities, and promoting ideological orthodoxy over inquiry.
On the other side are neoliberal technocrats, who have transformed higher education into a marketplace of credentials, debt, and precarious labor. Under their regime, colleges prioritize growth, branding, and profit over education, equity, and labor rights.
Both groups, while ideologically different, are willing to use colleges as instruments of power. In doing so, they turn institutions of higher learning into ideological battlegrounds, undermining their civic purpose.
The Educated Underclass: Evidence of Collapse
One of the most visible outcomes of this dysfunction is the rise of the educated underclass. These are people who did what they were told: they went to college, took on debt, and earned degrees. Yet instead of opportunity, they found instability.
“A large proportion of those who have attended colleges have become part of a growing educated underclass,” Shaulis noted in his interview with Stocker.
This includes:
Adjunct instructors working multiple jobs without benefits
Degree holders underemployed in gig work
Students lured into expensive, low-return programs at subprime colleges
These individuals are too educated for social support but too broke for economic stability. They are the byproduct of a system that treats education as a private investment rather than a public good.
Colleges in Crisis: A Systemic Failure
At the Higher Education Inquirer, our concept of the College Meltdown describes a long-term decline marked by falling enrollment, rising costs, debt peonage, and declining academic labor conditions:
Enrollment has been falling since 2011, with sharp declines in community colleges and regional publics.
Student debt has exploded, with minimal returns for many graduates.
Academic labor is being deskilled, with "robocolleges" relying on underpaid, non-tenure-track staff or automated instruction.
State funding is shrinking, as aging populations drive up Medicaid costs and crowd out investment in public higher education.
Enter the Trump Administration (2025)
The return of Donald Trump to the presidency in 2025 has further accelerated the higher ed crisis. His administration is now actively contributing to the system’s unraveling:
Deregulation and Predatory Practices
Trump’s Department of Education is dismantling federal oversight of for-profit colleges, weakening gainful employment protections and allowing discredited institutions back into the federal aid system. This benefits subprime colleges that trap students in cycles of debt.
Political Weaponization of Higher Ed
Trump-aligned state governments and federal agencies are targeting DEI initiatives, restricting academic freedom, and enforcing ideological conformity. Public colleges are increasingly being used to wage cultural wars.
Funding Cuts and Favoritism
Funding is being diverted from public institutions toward private religious colleges and corporate-friendly training programs. Meanwhile, community colleges and regional universities are being left to die on the vine.
Undermining Debt Relief
Efforts to reform or forgive student loans have been stalled or reversed. Borrowers are left stranded in opaque systems, while private loans surge in popularity—often with worse terms and even less accountability.
A Best-Case vs. Worst-Case Future
When asked what the next few years could look like, I offered a fork in the road:
Best case: Colleges become transparent, accountable, and aligned with the public good, confronting crises like climate change, inequality, and authoritarianism.
Worst case: Colleges become entrenched ideological battlegrounds, deepening inequality and social fragmentation. The educated underclass grows, and higher education becomes an engine of despair rather than mobility.
Conclusion
The College Meltdown is not a singular event—it is a long-term systemic crisis. Under the combined forces of privatization, political polarization, and demographic stress, U.S. higher education is being hollowed out.
As colleges pick sides in a broader culture war, the public mission of higher education is being sacrificed. The working class and the educated underclass are the casualties of a system that promised prosperity but delivered precarity.
In this volatile moment, the future of American higher education may well mirror the broader American crisis: one defined by deepening divides, fraying institutions, and a desperate need for accountability, justice, and reinvention.
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