With public university administrators continually arguing for tuition increases to counter state appropriations cuts, it seems far-fetched that their budget problems could be solved by eliminating student tuition and fees altogether.
But that’s the idea put forth by a group of students from the University of California at Riverside, who in January proposed a new funding model for the University of California system that seeks to solve two of the system’s biggest problems: unpredictable and large decreases in state appropriations, and the steady increase in tuition costs.
Under the students’ plan, called the UC Student Investment Proposal, students in the system would pay no upfront costs for their education but would agree to pay 5 percent of their income to the system for 20 years after graduating and entering the workforce.

Student Proposal In Brief:
UC students would pay no tuition up front to attend a UC campus.
UC students would agree to pay 5 percent of their income for 20 years of employment after graduation.
Payments would only be collected while students were working, not while students attended graduate school or were unemployed.
Percentage reductions would be granted to students who transfer into the system, enter public service fields, and/or stay in the state.

I suspect the schools would tend to steer students into fields of study that actually have a potential to pay off (i.e. science & engineering vs. liberal arts) much more so than they do today.

Given that schools are pretty much only there for people to go through the motions and get a nice job at this point anyways doing something like this will only exacerbate the issue. I really want to like this idea but the cynic in me says it would end in disaster.

Huh? Lots of young people go to college basically for the social experience. Others invest tens of thousands of dollars studying something they may find interesting but has learn essentially no marketable skills. There is definitely a a need for liberal arts education, but I think we might be better off if more people studied something, you know, useful.

In the UK its called a student loan, and the students hate it.

citation needed

A Liberal Arts Education also tends to take dogmatic, self-involved dickwads and turn them into considerate, thoughtful members of civil society. We should encourage that.

I'm not so cynical about the outcomes, and believe that education ought to be free to begin with.

Huh? Lots of young people go to college basically for the social experience. Others invest tens of thousands of dollars studying something they may find interesting but has learn essentially no marketable skills. There is definitely a a need for liberal arts education, but I think we might be better off if more people studied something, you know, useful.

Let me guess, all the self-involved dickwads are those that disagree with you, and the considerate, thoughtful members of civil society happen to agree with you. It must be nice living in a fantasy world so simple.

What for, that students have to take out a loan to help pay for their education that they will pay back once in work (in effect the scheme suspected here) or that they don't like the idea?

http://www.heraldscotland.com/sport/spl/aberdeen/students-to...

That they don't like the idea.
Evidence more recent than 22 years ago if possible.

I was clumsily trying to suggest that I was a dogmatic dickwad before I got an education. I guess that means the result is as you said, but the intent was different.

That they don’t want to pay for their education http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2005/aug/10/politics.hi...

Complaints about being is debt after the graduate. http://www.onlyfinance.com/Loans/Student-loans-out-of-contro...

Anger that student debt has not been cancelled.
http://www.heraldscotland.com/we-were-told-they-would-scrap-...

I have not even looked at the US campaigns against student loans, or come to that Canda.

One article is a scottish PhD complaining about a very specific issue.
One article is about the extra fees for the self-identified "good" universities.
And one is a very reasonable article about the level of debt a student will get into.

I'll give you the last one (though I think it's a valid concern). The others don't really prove that "students don't want to pay for their educations". Student Loans have been funding higher education in the UK for over 20 years and admissions have consistently risen in that time.

It's only this year that the trebling of tuition fees has come in, that we've seen a ~10% drop in admissions and that's on a pure cost/benefit judgement.

The labour govt. devalued a UK degree to the point where they're not worth the money they cos, for the most part. Which is one way to tackle the oversupply of shitty degrees, I suppose.

Students have been happily taking loans to pay for tuition and it's that that has turned the universities into cynical money grabbing machines that never fail anybody due to the need to keep taking those fees.

What happens if they go overseas?

How can the institution collect anything from overseas income that has no connection to the system?

Check out The Unincorporated Man for an interesting take on this.