Tuition Fee and Its Impact on Domestic Students - Dissertation Example

Based on human capital theory, investments in education permit people to raise their stock of human capital. This process is useful both for people and for societies. Since human capital is a significant aspect of production, increasing its stock will lead to improvement in productivity. Education is a source of innovation, which is imperative to economic growth. In addition, in the era of globalization, more organizations will need employees to have higher degrees of education. Numerous research papers support these phenomena; the studies demonstrate that the knowledge, ability, and technical skills of the workforce are key factors in a nation’s economic performance.

Researchers indicate that investment in the field of education benefits both qualified individuals and the overall society (Taubman & Wales, 1975). In their pre-adult life, individuals have to make a decision on whether to acquire higher education or to enter the labor force. As mentioned above, not only will these choices have a significant influence on the individuals’ lives, but they will also be critical to the country’s economy. As a result, it is important to understand the impact of increased tuition fees has on students in the United Kingdom (UK).

The prospect of tuition fee increases for universities has attracted a huge amount of attention over the years as governments in all industrialized nations have responded to the combined pressures of increased demands for higher education and increasing costs of competing areas of social spending. The debate on the future of higher education financing had been the central focus of frequent policy discussions at national and European levels: should tuition fees be increased to support the effort of Europe's higher education sector to strengthen its quality and preserve its attractive position compared to the US and emerging countries?

In a number of European nations, public financing has been considered the usual way to financing higher education.