College Enrollment is Down: Why That's just the Tip of a Much More Frightening Iceberg.
Colleges and universities across the nation are reporting a major downward spiral in enrollment. However, this is merely the symptom of a much larger socio-economic problem. What I intend to discuss in this article is that the decline in enrollment, which is pretty much across the board, is a part of a much larger problem that will need to be addressed, sooner rather than later if we’re being completely honest with one another. Declining enrollment is caused by a generally decreasing population overall. It makes sense, however foreboding it may be, fewer people being born means fewer 18-year-olds to step foot on a college campus. But what are we really looking at here?
?? The guardian reports an across the board drop of 5% for first time freshman coming to college or university as of the Fall 2024 semester and as much as a 7% drop in enrollment in 46 states for all age groups (Guardian, 2024). This matter did not arise overnight, NPR mentions data collected from 2010 to 2021 showing a slow but sure decline in enrollment amassing to an amount of almost 3 million fewer students between this decade and the previous one (Marcus, 2025).
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75% of those polled on the matter report that the price was their main reason for not wanting to go to college…
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?? This is where the trouble really begins to pile up. One may reasonably ask, “why is enrollment declining?” The knee jerk might be to say college enrollment is declining; people don’t want to shoulder the cost of higher education. This answer would not be too far off the mark either, at least subjectively. 75% of those polled on the matter report that the price was their main reason for not wanting to go to college (Guardian, 2024). Ok, so that’s why the people that are already here don’t want to attend college. Now, let’s talk about a much bigger issue.
?? According to NPR, we began to hurl ourselves towards a “demographic cliff” in 2007, and accelerated with the commencement with the coming recession of that timeframe (Marcus, 2025). This came to a crescendo with the 2020 Covid Pandemic (Marcus, 2025), which many report their enrollment has just never been the same since.
?? What is this “demographic cliff”, and what exactly does it entail for the sake of higher education? Put simply, since the close of the first decade of the 21st century, with the onset of the great recession, people are just having fewer and fewer kids. And who can blame them? The cost of everything, especially expenses associated with raising children is skyrocketing. The Illinois Department of Human Services reports the cost of raising a child to be approximately $17,000 a year, or north of $300,000 from birth to 18 as of 2023 (IDHS, n.d.). With price tags like that, there is no wonder having kids, or at least as many kids as before, is so foreboding.
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However bad the impact might be on higher education; this is all just a symptom of something much worse.
?? The impact this will have on the field of higher education could be harsh. Fewer kids born means fewer 18-year-olds stepping foot on campus. Fewer students mean less money being generated by the college or the university. This spells trouble for those employed in higher ed, a workforce of over 4 million people (Marcus, 2025) as maintaining our current workforce could be quite daunting in light of enrollment decline.
?? However bad the impact might be on higher education; this is all just a symptom of something much worse. The economy we’ve built for ourselves was constructed with the expectation that it would constantly be manned by future generations. Without a sufficient birthrate to replace retiring generations, our economy will soon find itself in rather dire straits. Fewer people being born also means that essential services will start to fizzle out.
?? In the summer of 2023, as I was wrapping up the research I was conducting for my undergraduate capstone project, I came across a startling find. It’s not just the United States that’s experiencing a birth decline, it’s most of the developed world, with even population powerhouses such as China feeling the sting of a declining birth rate (CSIS, 2023). Even with the repeal of the one child law in 2016, China has yet to recover, with a reported birth rate of 1.28 children per mother as of 2020 (CSIS, 2023).
?? ?Earlier, we were discussing how fewer people being born meant fewer people enrolling in a college or a university, but now, let’s talk about what that means in a larger scale. We as humans are on average living longer lives; a fact which I believe to be relatively common knowledge. People are living longer and with that, are living lives where they are increasingly dependent on daily life care from others such as adult children or retirement/nursing facilities. Let’s consider some basic math, assuming that for everyone that goes to a nursing home, or if cared for by adult children, have multiple children to shoulder the burden of care, there is a ration of adults in the workforce relative to a ratio of retired people that rely on them in some capacity for daily living and care. Fewer people means that ration is skewing closer to a ratio of 1:1 (CSIS, 2023). This is disastrous because this means that 1 person of working age will effectively be saddled with the financial burden of caring for all the expenses of 1 person in retirement. Needless to say, this is a financial burden that could cripple societies in the future if not corrected.
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The field of higher education I fear will have a long road to recovery.
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?? Let’s recap what we have so far. College enrollment is down across the board, birth rates are down globally, and the socio-economic impact is already beginning to reveal itself, promising to get much worse without any sort of corrective action. I wish I could be the one to provide a readymade solution to the matters at hand, but quite like everything else here, they are woefully complex. These problems weren’t made overnight and they sure won’t be fixed that quickly either.
?? The field of higher education I fear will have a long road to recovery. Even if the birth rate was corrected today, it takes, well, 18 years for students to be ready to go to university. That’s a window of time where too much can happen to negatively impact higher education further. Even then, you could still find yourself with a legion of newly minted 18 year olds who all collectively eschew college or university because of the egregious price tag that comes with it. So, without addressing the cost of higher education, fixing the population bust we are currently experiencing will have been for nothing. As I said before, this is a quite the convoluted and interconnected mess that we have collectively gotten ourselves into.
?? Beyond the campus gates, the scene isn’t much prettier, in fact in many ways it’s much, much worse. Without a replacement workforce, many industries will have downsized in droves to keep down operating costs for a smaller workforce, and keeping in tow with a shrinking consumer base. As mentioned earlier, a shrinking workforce will be forced to care for an ever expanding retirement population (CSIS, 2023), a disaster in and of itself. With this, disposable income will shrink, scuttling many luxury and recreational industries as a direct result of it.
?? I’ll admit, I’ve painted a bleak picture thus far. It doesn’t have to be all doom and gloom though. In shrinking populations, things will become more buyer favorable. An example of this will be lowered admissions standards for even more reputable post-secondary institutions according to the Guardian, stating this will lend itself well to the few college enrollees in the future (Guardian, 2024). The employee with see strengthened bargaining power over the employer as well, following this logic. Only time will tell if these positives will be enough to ease the sting of the coming population bust though.
?? Overall, the message I wish to send is a word of warning tinged perhaps with a hint of cautious optimism. I believe the sting of the population bust is not only coming but is already here in many ways. Furthermore, I believe the worst is yet to come in terms of a shrinking population and its on the socio-economic infrastructure of our societies. However, I also believe that we can weather this storm like our species has weathered so many before. We are a resilient lot, and we can come out the other side stronger and wiser. This goes not just for those of us like me in higher education, but for the world over. We’ll be able to arise and say, “I’m still here.”.
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References
China Power Team. "How Severe Are China’s Demographic Challenges?" China Power. March 6, 2023. Updated January 31, 2024. Accessed February 15, 2025. https://chinapower.csis.org/china-demographics-challenges/
Guardian News and Media. (2024, December 8). College enrollment is falling at a “concerning” rate, new data reveals. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/08/college-enrollment-declining
The Illinois Department of Human Services. (n.d.). How Much Does it Cost to Raise a Child in 2023. Illinois Cares for Kids. https://www.illinoiscaresforkids.org/blog/how-much-does-it-cost-to-raise-a-child-in-2023#:~:text=The%20estimated%20cost%20of%20raising%20one%20child%20in,%2412%2C350%20and%20%2413%2C900%20every%20year%20for%20each%20child.
Marcus, J. (2025, January 8). A looming “Demographic cliff”: Fewer college students and ultimately fewer graduates. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2025/01/08/nx-s1-5246200/demographic-cliff-fewer-college-students-mean-fewer-graduates