I’m Romanian, I’ve just finished high school, I’m currently taking the Bacalaureat, and I’ve already been admitted to an American university (USC). I knew from the start that I wanted to study abroad, and I’ve always been fascinated by California, especially Los Angeles, so the U.S. was my first choice. That said, I also looked into universities in the UK, the Netherlands, Canada, and Ireland, and their tuition fees are significantly lower.
Societal preferences combined with a fairly unrestricted market.
In the US, people don’t go to college in order to increase their knowledge. They go to be able to pursue theoretical higher paid jobs.
Going to school/college in the US isn’t to increase societal knowledge, its for selfish personal gains and as such only really shared by the person going.
This combined with very few restrictions on what colleges can charge means that the excuse of “well it’s for your own personal development” can be used as a way to sidestep the inexcusable pricing.
in many countries, the post-education sector is either subsidized or cheaper cost due to society having a higher value on the actual education aspects of it and the want of the general members to be more knowledgeable, that value isn’t as strong in the US, and depending on what state you are in may actually be against the members interests as a whole.