As college students, we are all aware that we are spending quite a bit of money to receive our degree. We get a nice little reminder once in a while to let us know about our student loans, outstanding student account charges, and all of that fun stuff. It can be very taxing and stressful for all of us, even with scholarships and aid. But what if that wasn’t a problem anymore?

In Germany, they’re making that a reality. They actually had free tuition up until 2006, until they began charging students, and even then it was ridiculously cheap compared to the United States. A typical semester at a university in Germany cost about $630, and students received many perks, such as discounts for a variety of living necessities like clothing, food, transportation, and others. They’ve stated that they’re trying to promote higher education by making it available to all income levels and families that do not come from academic backgrounds.

But that’s not all. Americans can get in on it too! They’re offering the same free tuition extension to international American students. The catch is that, for most degrees, you’ll need to be able to take the classes in German and complete the degree. The reason they say “most” is because this doesn’t really apply to degrees where English is a part of the curriculum, or if it is an international studies degree. So far, this sounds amazing, doesn’t it? Free tuition, and international students can get in on it? What could go wrong with this sort of system?

Unfortunately, there are downsides to almost everything, as much as we’d like to think that’s not the case.

The thing that people have to remember is now that students aren’t paying tuition to pay for the college facilities, how are universities going to afford to stay open? Money has to come from somewhere, and so it transfers into taxes.

The free tuition, while still very cool, will require taxes to rise substantially in order to cover the costs normally paid for by student tuition. Some people will still say it’s the price you pay for people to be educated.

However, others would disagree. Some sources, particularly Forbes, have stated that the rise in taxes will drive higher-educated, higher-earning Germans out of Germany because they will want to move to a country where they will be able to take home a larger percentage of their salary. So, the trade-off for free tuition is almost ironic. They did this to turn out more people with a higher education, but the increased taxes will drive those people out of the country. Of course, this is just speculation, and there is definitely a chance that people will be willing to put up with higher taxes in order to better the country and educate people. It’s just that history shows that isn’t usually the case.

The announcement of Germany’s schools finally all striking down their student tuition fees was rather recent, so there is still quite some time to let it play out. It could go many ways, and many hope that other countries will begin to follow suit, while many others are against it as they don’t desire high taxes. The question here is: Which sounds better to you? Would you rather not pay for college and just take home less on average? Or would you rather pay for college, take home more, but be paying off college loans? Either way, maybe in the meantime you could consider studying abroad in Germany to take the free tuition for a spin. You never know until you try it!

-Cameron MacDonald