Law School Cost Inflation

I recently came across some really interesting thoughts on law school tuition at The Law School Tuition Bible (via ATL). Selected material from the post is reprinted liberally below:

"So, how does one project law school tuition? I just extended the linear regression of each law school’s tuition based on its Official Guide entries going back to 2004. The basis is that past tuition increases are a predictor of future ones. The alternatives are making exponential projections based on previous tuition, using the average annualized growth rate for the last several years (5.32 percent), and arbitrarily knocking two percentage points off the average annualized growth rate (3.32 percent). None of these is particularly satisfactory, but when I tested methodologies recently by using the 2004-2010 tuition figures to predict law schools’ 2011 tuition, which we already have, I found that linear regression was the least precise in absolute terms but it was also the most likely to low-ball a law school’s actual 2011 tuition. I think this relative inaccuracy is important because no one seriously expects tuition to grow as quickly as it did even a few years ago.

The only addition for this year is that I’m adding a column on the right side giving the “relative variance,” which is a measure of how (in)accurate the linear regression test was when comparing projected tuition to their 2011 outcomes. I think the lower the better, but anything below -3.0 percent or so is probably too low. The idea is to give readers a measure of how reliable the estimate is, given that some law school engaged in serious expansions in recent years that I hope they couldn’t get away with now, especially Faulkner University, which doubled its tuition in the span of a few years.

These are ranked according to their 2021-22 projected tuition, enjoy:"

	SCHOOL	TUITION: 2011-2012	TUITION: 2016-2017	TUITION: 2021-2022	RELATIVE VARIANCE
1.	Cornell Law School	53,226	66,800	79,800	1.7%
2.	Yale Law School	52,525	64,600	76,300	1.1%
3.	Columbia University	52,902	63,800	75,000	-0.9%
4.	Northwestern University	51,920	63,400	74,800	0.4%
5.	University of Pennsylvania	50,718	62,200	73,500	0.4%
6.	New England School of Law	40,984	57,300	72,300	5.1%
7.	Seton Hall University	46,840	59,900	72,200	2.8%
8.	Cardozo	48,370	60,600	72,200	2.3%
9.	Vermont Law School	43,993	58,400	72,000	3.2%
10.	Duke University	49,617	60,500	71,400	0.2%
11.	University of Southern California	50,591	61,000	71,300	0.0%
12.	Brooklyn Law School	48,441	60,000	71,200	1.0%
13.	Fordham University	47,986	59,600	70,700	2.1%
14.	St. John’s University	46,450	58,700	70,700	1.3%
15.	Baylor University	43,573	57,000	70,200	0.7%
16.	Stanford Law School	49,179	59,400	70,100	-1.6%
17.	Syracuse University	45,647	59,000	70,100	8.8%
18.	New York University	50,336	59,900	69,700	-0.6%
19.	Harvard Law School	48,786	59,100	69,400	0.2%
20.	Vanderbilt University	46,148	58,200	68,900	5.2%
21.	Touro College	41,890	55,600	67,900	5.7%
22.	Faulkner University	32,187	51,300	67,800	17.1%
23.	University of Chicago	47,786	58,000	67,800	1.5%
24.	Georgetown	46,865	57,400	67,500	1.7%
25.	Quinnipiac University	45,050	55,700	66,500	-0.4%
26.	Hofstra University	45,600	56,000	66,400	0.4%
27.	Washington and Lee University	41,947	54,200	65,900	2.6%
28.	American University	45,096	55,500	65,700	0.9%
29.	George Washington University	45,750	55,300	64,800	0.2%
30.	Washington University	46,042	55,200	64,500	-0.2%
31.	New York Law School	47,800	56,000	63,900	1.0%
32.	Loyola Marymount	43,060	53,800	63,700	3.0%
33.	Tulane University	43,684	53,800	63,400	1.6%
34.	California Western	42,700	52,500	62,500	-0.5%
35.	DePaul University	41,690	52,100	62,500	-0.2%
36.	Illinois Institute of Technology	42,030	52,200	62,500	0.2%
37.	Emory University	45,098	53,600	62,100	-0.2%
38.	Pepperdine University	42,840	52,400	61,900	0.9%
39.	Case Western Reserve University	42,564	52,200	61,700	0.0%
40.	Roger Williams University	39,550	50,900	61,700	2.3%
41.	Suffolk University	42,660	52,300	61,600	1.9%
42.	Seattle University	39,282	50,500	61,600	1.0%
43.	Chapman University	41,873	51,800	61,400	1.0%
44.	Notre Dame	43,335	52,100	61,200	-1.2%
45.	University of New Hampshire	39,990	50,400	61,000	-0.5%
46.	Phoenix School of Law	37,764	49,600	60,900	2.9%
47.	Thomas Jefferson	41,000	50,600	60,600	-2.2%
48.	University of La Verne	40,732	50,500	60,500	-1.2%
49.	Golden Gate University	40,515	50,500	60,400	0.5%
50.	Southwestern University	42,200	50,700	60,100	-3.8%
51.	Charlotte	36,916	48,500	59,800	2.2%
52.	University of the Pacific	41,393	50,600	59,400	1.4%
53.	University of San Diego	42,574	51,300	59,300	2.8%
54.	Southern Methodist University	42,057	50,400	59,200	-1.9%
55.	Northeastern University	42,296	50,900	59,000	2.1%
56.	Catholic University of America	41,995	50,200	58,800	-1.4%
57.	University of Denver	38,502	49,000	58,500	4.2%
58.	Union University	41,845	50,500	58,500	2.9%
59.	Boston University	42,654	50,400	58,100	0.2%
60.	Wake Forest University	38,756	48,600	57,900	2.3%
61.	Valparaiso University	38,086	48,100	57,600	2.4%
62.	Boston College	41,818	49,900	57,400	2.4%
63.	University of San Francisco	40,544	48,800	57,100	0.2%
64.	Santa Clara University	41,790	49,000	56,700	-1.9%
65.	Whittier Law School	39,140	48,000	56,500	1.3%
66.	John Marshall (Chicago)	38,180	47,400	56,200	1.8%
67.	Florida Coastal	36,968	46,300	56,000	-1.4%
68.	Marquette University	37,570	46,300	55,600	-2.1%
69.	Western State University	37,284	46,200	55,500	-1.6%
70.	Loyola University Chicago	39,496	47,600	55,500	1.0%
71.	Villanova University	37,780	46,800	55,400	1.9%
72.	University of Miami	39,848	47,700	55,100	2.0%
73.	University of St. Thomas	34,898	45,900	54,800	10.0%
74.	Western New England College	38,240	46,600	54,700	1.6%
75.	Pace University	40,978	48,200	54,700	2.7%
76.	Charleston Law School	36,774	45,500	53,600	3.0%
77.	Michigan State University	35,840	44,900	53,500	2.5%
78.	Mercer University	36,860	45,500	53,400	3.0%
79.	Loyola University New Orleans	38,266	45,500	53,400	-3.4%
80.	John Marshall (Atlanta)	34,810	44,000	53,100	1.1%
81.	Elon University	34,550	43,800	53,000	-0.6%
82.	Lewis & Clark College	36,412	44,000	52,100	-2.2%
83.	Oklahoma City University	35,470	43,500	51,600	0.0%
84.	William Mitchell	35,710	43,400	51,400	-0.8%
85.	Campbell University	33,910	42,700	51,400	0.6%
86.	University of Detroit	36,050	43,400	51,300	-3.0%
87.	Samford University	34,848	43,000	51,200	-0.3%
88.	Drexel University	36,051	43,600	51,200	-0.6%
89.	Ave Maria	36,448	44,300	51,100	5.2%
90.	Drake University	34,006	42,400	50,600	1.2%
91.	Hamline	34,555	42,800	50,600	1.7%
92.	Saint Louis University	36,175	43,400	49,900	2.8%
93.	Widener University	36,450	43,000	49,800	-0.8%
94.	Widener University (Harrisburg)	36,450	43,000	49,800	-0.8%
95.	Duquesne University	33,752	41,800	49,700	0.3%
96.	University of Richmond	35,430	42,500	49,500	0.3%
97.	Stetson University	35,466	42,200	49,400	-2.5%
98.	St. Thomas University	34,618	41,800	49,100	-0.9%
99.	Cooley	34,340	40,900	49,100	-8.2%
100.	Barry University	33,630	41,200	48,200	3.0%
101.	Creighton University	32,494	40,500	48,200	1.5%
102.	Capital University	32,683	40,900	48,200	4.9%
103.	Nova Southeastern University	33,250	40,800	47,500	3.9%
104.	Gonzaga University	34,105	40,700	47,200	0.3%
105.	Regent University	32,780	39,900	47,000	0.0%
106.	Mississippi College	29,150	38,200	46,700	2.7%
107.	Ohio Northern University	32,750	39,300	46,400	-2.7%
108.	Howard University	29,131	37,200	46,000	-4.5%
109.	University of Dayton	31,598	40,100	45,900	14.2%
110.	University of Tulsa	32,056	38,400	45,100	-1.6%
111.	Willamette University	32,540	38,000	43,800	-1.5%
112.	Appalachian School of Law	29,825	36,600	43,500	-0.7%
113.	Liberty University	30,604	37,000	43,500	-0.7%
114.	St. Mary’s University	29,406	36,500	43,000	3.4%
115.	Texas Wesleyan University	28,790	35,500	42,300	-0.3%
116.	Brigham Young University	21,200	30,300	38,100	10.4%
117.	South Texas	26,850	32,700	38,000	4.1%
118.	Pontifical Catholic University of PR	14,446
119.	Interamerican University of PR	14,403
120.	Brigham Young University	10,600
	MEDIAN	39,550	49,000	58,100	0.9%
	MEAN	39,697	49,060	58,175	1.2%
	AVG DEVIATION	5,050	6,168	75,24	2.1%