The College Cartel

“The College Cartel is a meticulously reported, deeply thoughtful, and vitally important book. Sahaj Sharda reveals one of the most destructive bottlenecks in our economic and political system: The powerful elite universities that stand between young people and their future. This book exposes a shockingly broken system while offering sharp and thoughtful proposals for fixing it. The problem is almost certainly going to get worse, making the message of this book more urgent by the day.”

—Christopher Leonard, New York Times Bestselling Author of “Kochland” and “The Lords of Easy Money.”

Most people don't truly know what elite colleges sell, and they certainly don't know how elite colleges sell. This book covers a story the media has ignored for too long. It details how elite colleges unfairly collude to monopolize the higher education industry and squeeze students, parents, and the public.

Between 1994 and 2021, the University of Pennsylvania's endowment increased from $1.5 billion to $20.5 billion, growing by 1301%. Over that period, Cornell's endowment grew by 1014%, Brown's endowment grew by 1035%, and Duke's endowment grew by 1717%. Universally, elite universities have grown opulent beyond belief.

Coinciding with that opulence is a growing scarcity of seats. As elite universities have hoarded more resources, they have jointly refused to teach materially more students. Between 1991 to 2021, the acceptance rate at the University of Pennsylvania plummeted from 47% of applicants to below 6%. Over that period, Cornell's acceptance rate went from over 30% to merely 9%. Acceptance rates similarly plummeted at Brown, Duke, Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Georgetown, and virtually every other elite university.

At elite universities in America, applications have erupted, enrollments have stagnated, and endowments have swollen. There is a word for an industry where a few collaborators make more collective profit by turning the product scarce.

That word is cartel .

As this book demonstrates, the college cartel of elite universities colludes both in plain sight and through hidden arrangements. The college cartel fixes prices, restricts the expansion of seats, and lobbies for unbelievable subsidies and tax breaks. Sitting in a market with strict barriers to entry, this cartel knows that the only invisible hand that reigns is its own invisible hand in middle-class pockets.

This book is a timely muckraking piece about how elite colleges have strangled students and squeezed their parents over the last few decades. This book also offers aggressive solutions for the dangerous concentration of monopoly power in higher education.