“Hi there, my name is Ron Steen. I am selling 2% of my future earnings for a chance to go to college.” That’s how an e-bay auction began in August 2006, in which one high school graduate offered to send the highest investor a check every year for 40 years in return for tuition money. E-bay eventually discontinued the auction, but Steen’s desperation does highlight a problem: college tuition prices growing like weeds.

In a recent article, American reporters Kevin Carey and Frederick M. Hess write, “between 1989 and 2005, college costs had increased at double the rate of inflation.” The College Board, administer of the SAT, says “there’s no escaping the fact that college costs are rising.” For the 2007-2008 year, it reported that, on average, families paid up to “$1,404 more than last year for this year’s tuition and fees.” Suddenly, Steen’s idea of a tuition market may not be so asinine.

The question, then, remains: What if students could convince investors to pay their college tuition in exchange for a fixed percentage of their future income? Such a tuition market could benefit all those involved. More students could afford college without incurring suffocating debt; banks would see fewer defaults; and we’d see increased standards of higher education. But it’s the latter that may be the greatest benefit.

As investors regularly look for “good deals,” colleges across the nation would be forced to lower prices and increase quality. Why invest in a $180,000 Harvard student, Carey and Hess ask, when one could invest $48,000 for a Pennsyltuckey U. student that produces similar, if not better, results (while collecting the same rate of return)?

The concept is tempting because it utilizes one of economics basic, most trusted principles: competition. And in an era where many top universities have sold their souls for cultural relevance, competition might be able to exercise the demons. Ivy League institutions such as Harvard (which has abandoned a common core curriculum) would be forced to once again offer an education instead of just a name. As Carey and Hess put it:

“Investors would steer away from overvalued institutions, making them more expensive, raising red flags, prompting hard questions from investors, and lending real urgency to institutional efforts to cut costs and boost student success.”