Things that have gone up in price so much, you just had to reluctantly stop buying/using

[shawthorne44]

17 hours ago, Frances said:

There aren’t any houses available here for $200k. You’d be lucky to find a mobile home. It also depends what you consider cheap for college. Not sure there are any private colleges here where you can get tuition and room and board for $25k per year. The only public one in commutable distance where my child could have lived at home didn’t have his major as they only provided service level STEM courses, except for in biology. So no physics, chemistry, math, etc beyond sophomore level. So any other public U would have included tuition plus room and board. And they are not in locations where living off campus results in much savings due to HCOL.

 

I guess we are lucky.  There are many excellent colleges within commuting distance of us.  Including a good STEM one.   People also include room and board in the cost.  I don't.   I assume living at home, or since you have the money buying something near the college.
 
I've known people whose parents bought a townhouse near the college, kid lived in it and got a roommate that covered taxes and food.  If the kid isn't living at home, there is no reason to go to school in a high COL area.  So, there would be money left to assist in upgrading the house for the kid's first job.   Of course, this assumes the parents have 300K set aside at the start. 

 

[Frances]

27 minutes ago, shawthorne44 said:

 

If the kid isn't living at home, there is no reason to go to school in a high COL area. 

 

There isn’t a single college in my state that is not in a HCOL area with very expensive housing. And going out of state generally either means paying for private college or paying out of state tuition. 

[lauraw4321]

13 hours ago, Frances said:

Exactly. We also funneled money through a 529 for the tax benefits, not really as a savings vehicle.

529 is an account type. You can purchase whatever investments you want within it (depending on whether your state makes such things available, which ours does). Our kids' 529s are invested in the market and have an average of 12% return - that's just for Vanguard S&P 500 investments. We put in money when they were little and we had more cash. Now we only invest in them when we have surprise money, and their grandparents have contributed as well. Retirement savings is a bigger focus for us.

[Frances]

Just now, lauraw4321 said:

529 is an account type. You can purchase whatever investments you want within it (depending on whether your state makes such things available, which ours does). Our kids' 529s are invested in the market and have an average of 12% return - that's just for Vanguard S&P 500 investments. We put in money when they were little and we had more cash. Now we only invest in them when we have surprise money, and their grandparents have contributed as well. Retirement savings is a bigger focus for us.

Yes, I know that. It just wasn’t our main reason for using the 529, as we lived at close to poverty level for so many years while acquiring our education, building our careers, and homeschooling and none of the grandparents were in a position to contribute. We also got some amazing returns on the small amount of money we had in there. But once we were paying for college, it made sense to funnel the money through a 529 first and take the subtraction from taxable income allowed by our state. For us, that benefit was much greater than the federal tax benefit of not paying taxes on the earnings.

Like you, retirement savings was a much larger focus for us, as we didn’t have multiple children and always knew we could devote one person’s earnings entirely for college.

[Bootsie]

45 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

529 is an account type. You can purchase whatever investments you want within it (depending on whether your state makes such things available, which ours does). Our kids' 529s are invested in the market and have an average of 12% return - that's just for Vanguard S&P 500 investments. We put in money when they were little and we had more cash. Now we only invest in them when we have surprise money, and their grandparents have contributed as well. Retirement savings is a bigger focus for us.

According to Vanguard's website, the return on the 500 Index  Fund has been about 6% annually since its inception in 2000.  Over the past 10 years it has done a bit better with an annual return closer to 8%.  For parents of children born in the late 90s and early 2000s --those in college right now--it has been hard to earn anywhere near a 12% annual return over the horizon to save for these chilren's college education.

[lauraw4321]

16 minutes ago, Bootsie said:

According to Vanguard's website, the return on the 500 Index  Fund has been about 6% annually since its inception in 2000.  Over the past 10 years it has done a bit better with an annual return closer to 8%.  For parents of children born in the late 90s and early 2000s --those in college right now--it has been hard to earn anywhere near a 12% annual return over the horizon to save for these chilren's college education.

I'm not sure if you are intending to call me a liar here, or what? My post was because someone stated that the help/purpose/benefit of 529 was the tax savings. I noted that investment is another reason. I logged into my kid's accounts, and it states that the current rates are 9.7, 9.8 and 10.2. I don't log in to them that often, so 12% was probably from my last review when the market was up. My kids were born in 2008, 2010 and 2013. I'm invested in a mix of Vanguard Index, Vanguard Growth and Vanguard Small Cap. 

I absolutely understand that market timing can be awful for folks. I don't doubt you. My point was and is that it's worth investing early if you can. The U.S. stock market is the best legal investment bet available to ordinary folks. Discouraging investing isn't good advice.

[Bootsie]

1 minute ago, lauraw4321 said:

I'm not sure if you are intending to call me a liar here, or what? My post was because someone stated that the help/purpose/benefit of 529 was the tax savings. I noted that investment is another reason. I logged into my kid's accounts, and it states that the current rates are 9.7, 9.8 and 10.2. I don't log in to them that often, so 12% was probably from my last review when the market was up. My kids were born in 2008, 2010 and 2013. I'm invested in a mix of Vanguard Index, Vanguard Growth and Vanguard Small Cap. 

I absolutely understand that market timing can be awful for folks. I don't doubt you. My point was and is that it's worth investing early if you can. The U.S. stock market is the best legal investment bet available to ordinary folks. Discouraging investing isn't good advice.

No, I am not intending to call you a liar; I am not sure how you would jump to that.  I am simply pointing out that parents can't count on earning that type of rate of return.  And as an finance professor I would never discourage investing.  

During most of the 1900s, investing in the S&P500 would have earned about 12% annually on average.  I have found that many people are using that historical number as a basis for planning for children's college and the fact is that for most parents with children in college today, they have been lucky to earn a rate 1/2 of that.  

For a child born in 2000, parents who placed money in an S&P500 index fund at the time of the child's birth had LOST money until 2013.  It was not until 2013, when the child was a teen, that they would begin seeing a positive return.  These parents did all of the "right things" according to standard investing advice and are finding that they are far short of where they thought they woul be to pay for college. 

[TechWife]

21 hours ago, Bootsie said:

One employee cannot serve hundreds of customers per hour alone; one employee cannot take an order, cook, collect payment, every 36 seconds.  The hourly raise must be multiplied by the number of workers.  Also, a $3 hourly pay raise costs the employer more than $3 because they must pay their share of SS tax and unemployment insurance tax on those wages. 

That alone does not justify the cost increases, but remember the restaurant is having to pay more for eggs and all of the other things it is using.  In the past year, the average price of food purchased in grocery stores has increased by 10.2% (it is likely that restaurants have seen a similar increase in food costs).  The average price of food away from home has increased 8.4%, so less than the average price of raw food materials. 

I didn’t say the employee worked alone. The post I replied to addressed pay raises only, so that’s all I addressed. I’m well aware there are other expenses. My point is that pay raises aren’t actually costing some businesses as much as they would like everyone to think. 

[TechWife]

Here’s an interesting article on falling costs and price increases. Long term contracts play a role as does the desire to increase the profit margin for investment purposes. This first article is packed with info about a lot of different goods & the different ways they are raising prices. 

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/01/25/inflation-is-cooling-but-high-prices-will-stick-around.html

This one is about raw material costs, transportation & similar.

https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/raise-prices-or-not-consumer-goods-makers-weigh-bets-buyer-strength-2023-02-20/

Edited March 23, 2023 by TechWife

[Faith-manor]

3 hours ago, Frances said:

There isn’t a single college in my state that is not in a HCOL area with very expensive housing. And going out of state generally either means paying for private college or paying out of state tuition. 

Same here. Housing is a racket all around in college towns. Landlords know students are over a barrel so they charge as much as dorms. Sellers know they can sell houses above market value than they would be worth in non college markets because often the population seeking housing is greater than the number of units. So there just isn't such a thing as lower cost of living. The supermarkets in our middle son's city charge double of our local supermarkets in the same state only three hours away. Why? College kids have to eat and do not have options. Colleges charge a horrific price for meal plans and low quality, quantity foods. Everything is a crazy amount more expensive for no other reason than exploitation. But that's true of just about anything in America. Capitalism without morality. 

I think the bubble will burst and the price tag come down. Gen Z is a small generation, and they aren't having kids because they aren't willing to consider it while they face massive consequences of climate change and eating nothing but ramen noodles well into their thirties. All of these huge dorm expansions and big price tags are going to be for nothing when there aren't freshmen to fill the class. Across my state, enrollment this year was down 4.1%, and this is after losses in previous years which means colleges are competing for an ever growing smaller pool of students. At some point that will likely mean having to become competitive with tuition, room and board, as well as larger merit award scholarships and more financial aid. We have schools that will tell students they got "the big scholarship", and it is $2000 on a $28,000 bill or $4000 on a $42,000 bill. Uhm. Nope. Eventually that isn't going to cut it.

As for other things, utilities went up again. So we changed phone plans for less data and no international calling, as well as replaced all the rest of the light jobs in the house with LED warm white light bulbs in order to cut electric again. Problem and went up, so instead of leaving the heat on at 52 to keep the pipes from bursting when we were in Alabama, we winterized, turned the water off, and took the houseplants to my mom.

Edited March 23, 2023 by Faith-manor
Typos I hate the kindle

[knitgrl]

On 3/17/2023 at 10:48 AM, shawthorne44 said:

Lots of expensive/wasteful stuff, we'd already cut out.  For example, I make laundry detergent, and we don't use paper towels.  We have chickens so we eat lots of eggs.  In fact I don't eat eggs in restaurants because they taste so nothing.  Because I love eggs I eat a lot less beef.  

The recent cutbacks are eating out and fast food.  Also the DevaCurl conditioner.  

The price of DevaCurl has doubled, so we won't be getting that anymore. Dd8 has very curly hair. We are getting close to finishing up the last of the conditioner. What do you use instead?

Edited March 23, 2023 by knitgrl

[prairiewindmomma]

14 minutes ago, knitgrl said:

The price of DevaCurl has doubled, so we won't be getting that anymore. Dd8 has very curly hair. We are getting close to finishing up the last of the conditioner. What do you use instead?

What is her curl type? The SheaMoisture stuff has been pretty good here, but it is too heavy for fine hair in like a 3a/3b ringlet. It’s perfect for coily hair or thick hair.

L’Oreal Elvive isn’t curly girl approved, but it’s what I use for my fine curls. I have heard good things about The Ordinary’s behentrimonium’s conditioner as well (which is under $10).

[knitgrl]

I just had to do a quick search on curl types. We didn't know what to do with it when she was really little. Nobody else in the family has this kind of hair. We tried brushing it and she looked like Bob Dylan. 🤣 Some nice lady at church clued us in and said that at 2, she was not too young for product, and suggested DevaCurl and we just stuck with it. I would say she has 3b ringlets. We had it cut for the first time this past summer, and now she has a few strands underneath that have straightened out.

Edited March 23, 2023 by knitgrl

[prairiewindmomma]

Carol’s Daughter is another brand I might look at. 
 

For me (3a), the technique (finger comb or wet pic only in the shower), using product to shape the curl, etc. is more important than the conditioner.

If you haven’t read up on curly girl techniques, I am going to point you in that direction. 

[Frances]

5 hours ago, Faith-manor said:

Same here. Housing is a racket all around in college towns. Landlords know students are over a barrel so they charge as much as dorms. Sellers know they can sell houses above market value than they would be worth in non college markets because often the population seeking housing is greater than the number of units. So there just isn't such a thing as lower cost of living. The supermarkets in our middle son's city charge double of our local supermarkets in the same state only three hours away. Why? College kids have to eat and do not have options. Colleges charge a horrific price for meal plans and low quality, quantity foods. Everything is a crazy amount more expensive for no other reason than exploitation. But that's true of just about anything in America. Capitalism without morality. 

I don’t know that it’s necessarily all that related to college towns here. There really are very, very few cities or towns in my state of any size that are considered affordable, as we are majorly lacking housing and several areas are desirable locations for second homes or short term rentals, due to the abundant scenic beauty and outdoor recreation opportunities. Plus we get lots of retirees from even higher cost CA. It’s not a new problem here, but it just continues to get worse.

[knitgrl]

20 minutes ago, prairiewindmomma said:

Carol’s Daughter is another brand I might look at. 
 

For me (3a), the technique (finger comb or wet pic only in the shower), using product to shape the curl, etc. is more important than the conditioner.

If you haven’t read up on curly girl techniques, I am going to point you in that direction. 

We do finger comb her hair. And have some DevaCurl Archangel gel, which seems to work well, but is also running out. So, if you have suggestions on techniques and/or products, I'm all ears.

[Karen A]

I've been thinking about this on and off, and thought that I really hadn't stopped buying anything--and then today I saw a sale on Pringles for $1.99 and realized I haven't bought them in a long time. My "buy" price for them has been to buy when they were advertised for $1.25 or less.  Wonder if they'll ever get back down to that or if we'll be eating Aldi tortilla chips forever... 🙂

[shawthorne44]

15 hours ago, knitgrl said:

The price of DevaCurl has doubled, so we won't be getting that anymore. Dd8 has very curly hair. We are getting close to finishing up the last of the conditioner. What do you use instead?

 

Well, I completely changed it up, and it has been working well.  Better than DevaCurl, in fact.  I stumbled on Katherine Sewing's Historical Haircare youtube videos.  I don't do everything she does.  I haven't made my own scalp treatment, or used the clay and I don't have a boar bristle brush.   But I have bought the oils and use those.   It is still early days for me.  

Her hair photos from her past are pretty spot on to mine, except mine is red but same curl level.  Super bushy when I don't use products, and contained curl but split ends when I did.  The one unfortunate haircut, and long hair otherwise.  

Some of the comments complain about cultural appropriation, because while she started down this path looking into historical methods (historical sewing is her thing) what she talks about is still being done in some groups, I think Indian is one of them because she mentions shopping at an Indian market.   The thing is, what made me pay attention was that her hair looked just like mine in the photos.  If an Indian woman said the same thing I wouldn't pay attention because my hair is curly.  

Since it seemed to work fine on my hair, I gave the Black Aloe Vera oil a try on DD's hair.   It had been looking very dry in the back, and it looked tangled even when it wasn't.  It was amazing!   Her hair just soaked it up and looks healthy.  We use these for detangling (and they are amazing), so I used that for smoothing the oil on all the hair.  

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ZRNF3W1/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

 

[lynn]

Some food items we use to enjoy and purchased weekly we only get once a month or when it goes BOGO.  Dh and I always check Walgreens, target circle, and local grocery store ads for neat values.  There are things we refuse to give up  that we prefer the better quality of nutrients but then again it's only us and dd at home.  If the boys were still home things would change.  Just for reference I pay the same amount in groceries for 3 of us as I did having 3 teenage boys at home...

[prairiewindmomma]

I looked at the above link…it’s the same rough idea across all cultures….curly hair has high moisture needs, protective styles help limit breakage of hair, etc. 

My boys use boar head brushes, but their hair is shorter. They do polish and reduce frizz better than plastic brushes, fwiw. I can’t use them on my hair, though, unless I am doing a hairstyle. Any brush dry on my hair makes me a poof ball.

 

[prairiewindmomma]

Bakery items are another thing I realized we have largely stopped buying in the last few years. The kids wanted doughnuts yesterday, so I baked some pumpkin cake doughnuts. 

[LucyStoner]

My hair thickening product (I have very fine hair and use this when I need my hair to look nice for an event or picture) is now like $43/bottle, up from like $28.  

My husband threw it away because he thought it was empty and I pulled it out the the waste basket because I knew that there was one more use in it by cutting the tube open and scraping the inside with a little spatula.  He’d finally, some 20 years into marriage, convinced me that it’s ok to toss toothpaste tubes without cutting them open for the last couple of uses so he was like, oh no, not this tube cutting thing again.  

[Dmmetler]

I've gone to using mostly studio licensed materials or loaning books out vs purchasing new for each student. And, if possible, I'm avoiding printing for things that include a home license anyway, unless a family simply doesn't have a tablet device or can't print at home.  I'm also cutting out things like "free" tote bags when a new student starts and "Free" t-shirts for camps, because those add to my costs. Ultimately, I'm trying to cut costs on my side vs increasing prices, but it's getting harder and harder to do so. 

[JustEm]

Oh one thing I have changed is I don't buy books anymore unless it is for home schooling and I can't find it at the library.  And I love owning my books.  I've always been real picky with what books I purchase but now I don't even consider buying them if the library has it.  Even books I will read over and over again.  

My birthday is in July and I imagine my entire wishlist will be gift cards for book stores.  I could put books on my list but I think I'd love the experience of pulling things off the shelf and purchasing them myself

[shawthorne44]

One thing that I'm not worrying about the prices of (at the moment) is groceries.   Not that it isn't painful paying at the grocery store.  But, if we have good stuff at home we are less tempted to eat out.   For example, I don't even look at the price of Blue Bell Ice Cream.   I just buy it.  That makes going to the local really really awesome ice cream place less appealing. Even though the local place has even better ice cream (which is saying something).   

 

[math teacher]

2 hours ago, shawthorne44 said:

One thing that I'm not worrying about the prices of (at the moment) is groceries.   Not that it isn't painful paying at the grocery store.  But, if we have good stuff at home we are less tempted to eat out.   For example, I don't even look at the price of Blue Bell Ice Cream.   I just buy it.  That makes going to the local really really awesome ice cream place less appealing. Even though the local place has even better ice cream (which is saying something).   

 

I hear you on that. Blue Bell is amazing!!

[Faith-manor]

On 3/23/2023 at 8:22 PM, Frances said:

I don’t know that it’s necessarily all that related to college towns here. There really are very, very few cities or towns in my state of any size that are considered affordable, as we are majorly lacking housing and several areas are desirable locations for second homes or short term rentals, due to the abundant scenic beauty and outdoor recreation opportunities. Plus we get lots of retirees from even higher cost CA. It’s not a new problem here, but it just continues to get worse.

I recognize that. But comment was not made about housing in general. It was in response to the idea that one can buy a home and have students live there cheaper than dorms. It included specific information about dorm and off campus housing policies colleges often maintain to keep students in the dorms as long as possible, and how landlords around colleges take advantage of the situation. I was not suggesting anything about the greater housing issue.

[DawnM]

On 3/23/2023 at 5:23 PM, knitgrl said:

The price of DevaCurl has doubled, so we won't be getting that anymore. Dd8 has very curly hair. We are getting close to finishing up the last of the conditioner. What do you use instead?

I have found that I really like the Marc Anthony curly girl products, and you can buy those at CVS and Target.   

[scholastica]

On 3/23/2023 at 5:48 AM, Pawz4me said:

Some states have length-of-time requirements before one can qualify as a resident for tuition purposes. Here it's at least twelve consecutive months prior to the start of the term.

If you are where I think you are it’s 12 months prior to application date for freshmen.

[Lady Florida.]

On 3/17/2023 at 11:14 AM, Spryte said:

Oh! Yes. Salmon. We used to have salmon weekly, but have cut that back to more like once every two or three weeks.

 

I was shocked at the increased price of salmon, which was already pricey. We still eat it because it's healthy, but less often. Same with other seafood. 

 

On 3/17/2023 at 11:50 AM, mommyoffive said:

Um nothing really. 

I think sometimes we are just flexible.  When eggs went up, we just didn't buy them.  They are back down in the $2 range for a dozen so we are going back to buying them.

We don't eat out, hardly ever.

We only drink water, milk and tea.  We have juice on hand for sickness.

My kids and dh are huge milk drinkers and cereal eaters.  We embrace the store brands.  Honestly, they taste the same as name brand things.  I think there has been one time where we thought it was gross.  

I do stock up on sales at Costco.  

 

We haven't really stopped buying anything either. We might have slowed down on some things but we haven't stopped anything, including eating out. We're just more selective about where and how often we eat out.

 

We drink coffee in the morning and mostly water the rest of the day. We're not soda, tea, juice, or milk drinkers. Sometimes we have wine with dinner and I haven't noticed significant price increases there. Dh 25 living here gets Mio or generic flavor drops to put in his water.

 

I'm good with store brands for the most part though I'm not crazy about Walmart's brand of most foods.

 

 

On 3/18/2023 at 12:01 AM, chiguirre said:

Aldi has Triscuit dupes that are really good for $1.50 a box

 

Aldi has a lot of dupes that are quite good.

 

On 3/19/2023 at 6:18 PM, DawnM said:

Something else that has gone up tremendously......TRAVEL.

I used to get great deals on hotels/condo rentals/travel experiences, etc....

No more.   

I have a girls' trip to the beach every May and typically it isn't difficult to get a deal, but this year was a bear.   It took me triple the time and lots of talking to the girls and saying the prices were high and we may need to kick in more $$.

And then my Disney trips.....I used to get fantastic bargains....no more.   Even the bargain sites where I used to get great deals are not close to good deals anymore.

 

I just got back from a ladies only trip to Greece. We bought our airline tickets last Sept. and I'm so glad we did. We were watching the ticket prices rise steadily and by the time we left the price had more than doubled. 

 

Disney: I grew up an hour away. I remember when WDW first opened. We used to go often when family came to visit but were never a big Disney family. Dh's family was the same. Ds wasn't into anything Disney growing up so we've only been with him a handful of times. I have friends who are very into all things Disney and have been complaining about the changes, especially the lessening of Florida resident perks.

 

I always wondered how out of state/country families could afford WDW. In addition to the tickets there's travel, accommodation, and food. Reading the posts here I see that it's worse now than it ever was. Disney doesn't seem to be hurting though. 

 

We do love Universal and periodically get passes (also FL resident). 

[KungFuPanda]

On 3/23/2023 at 7:10 PM, knitgrl said:

I just had to do a quick search on curl types. We didn't know what to do with it when she was really little. Nobody else in the family has this kind of hair. We tried brushing it and she looked like Bob Dylan. 🤣 Some nice lady at church clued us in and said that at 2, she was not too young for product, and suggested DevaCurl and we just stuck with it. I would say she has 3b ringlets. We had it cut for the first time this past summer, and now she has a few strands underneath that have straightened out.

My mom copes with my fine curly hair by putting me in braids every day until I could do my own hair. She has thick, auburn hair and had no idea what to do with my head. My daughter has my mother’s hair. 
 

Good conditioner is nice, but applying curl cream and hair gel while wet and not trying to do any styling when dry is key for me. Ouidad heat and humidity control gel is a miracle product and might be enough by itself for a kid.  It dries soft, not crunchy  

 

I thought of this thread today.  I spent $58 at the grocery store  I bought bread, deli meat, cheese, a 2 liter soda, a bag of chips, and one pound of meatloaf mix. It’ll be about 5 meals for two people but sheesh  😵

 

[Frances]

14 hours ago, Faith-manor said:

I recognize that. But comment was not made about housing in general. It was in response to the idea that one can buy a home and have students live there cheaper than dorms. It included specific information about dorm and off campus housing policies colleges often maintain to keep students in the dorms as long as possible, and how landlords around colleges take advantage of the situation. I was not suggesting anything about the greater housing issue.

I understood what you were saying, I was just making the point that I don’t believe that what you are describing is the situation in my state. If anything, in the most expensive cities to live, students want to stay in the dorms because they are cheaper than off campus housing, but there isn’t always enough room in the dorms. We heard this on more than one college tour. And the other cities with major universities, students can pretty readily live off campus except maybe restrictions for some freshman. I also don’t think there are any real differences here in grocery store prices in college towns vs elsewhere here because pretty much any good sized city has a college and small town prices are usually higher. I’m not saying all of what you said is not true in your state, just that it doesn’t apply in my state.
 

The bottom line, though, is that the idea of parents buying a place for their child to live who will then get roommates to cover the cost is not realistic here for all but an extremely small demographic, especially with the current interest rates. What the poster thought a post-college house could be bought for ($200k) would not even get you anything here you could buy for a college student and their roommates. So it would take some significant cash to purchase a place for a college student to live. 
 

[Garga]

I don’t buy tops (shirts/tshirts/sweaters) in the stores anymore. I can get all my tops at thrift stores. Pants and shoes are different. Pants are tricky to buy and I only want used shoes if they’re practically new, and that’s hard to find.

Coats are from the thrift store, too. I’ve gotten very nice coats at the thrift store. 

If we eat out, it’s always water with our meal.

—-

IRT the college discussions: the closest state school is an hour away and not quite commutable, especially because my son’s ADHD makes it so that he needs hours more than most people to get his work done. A 2-hour commute each day wouldn’t work. And he needs the social outlet, so we’re stuck having to pay R&B which costs more than the tuition. 

 

 

[mommyoffive]

Corporate greed is jacking prices higher. It could push customers over the edge (msn.com)

[kbutton]

On 3/23/2023 at 12:23 PM, Bootsie said:

No, I am not intending to call you a liar; I am not sure how you would jump to that.  I am simply pointing out that parents can't count on earning that type of rate of return.  And as an finance professor I would never discourage investing.  

During most of the 1900s, investing in the S&P500 would have earned about 12% annually on average.  I have found that many people are using that historical number as a basis for planning for children's college and the fact is that for most parents with children in college today, they have been lucky to earn a rate 1/2 of that.  

For a child born in 2000, parents who placed money in an S&P500 index fund at the time of the child's birth had LOST money until 2013.  It was not until 2013, when the child was a teen, that they would begin seeing a positive return.  These parents did all of the "right things" according to standard investing advice and are finding that they are far short of where they thought they woul be to pay for college. 

This is definitely more what I've understood about these plans, and our financial advisor didn't think they would be a great investment for us when it was time to consider one (pretty long list of LDs with our 2e kids). One isn't planning to attend college (construction).

I also distinctly remember at my first job out of college that people with college age kids were struggling with a big drop in the market when they were needing the money in the funds. It was a big problem for some of them.