Opinion: Top Universities’ Endowment ‘Hoard’ Hurts Students

Elite American universities are “addicted to multibillion-dollar endowments” that tie their fortunes too closely to the vagaries of the financial markets, BusinessWeek economics editor Peter Coy argues in the magazine’s current issue.

Colleges better serve their students if they “act more like companies” and spend revenue on current needs rather than building huge endowments and becoming reliant on the earnings for operating costs, as do Harvard, Princeton, and other top-tier institutions, Mr. Coy writes.