How did Germany manage to keep education free for all (including foreigners) while the United States burdened their young with heavy college debt?

Education in the United States is governed by a mafia of sinister Liberals who not only do everything possible warp the minds of youth unfortunate enough to be under their administration — but then also saddle them with debt as remuneration for this “privilege”. It is a calamity on the order of North Korea and the Soviet Union — disgusting twerps forcing their flawed ideas on defenseless ‘regular people’ to accumulate status and prestige for themselves — while subconsciously reveling in the misery and directionlessness of their victims.Germany is simply a wealthy, developed country that has a proper education system — there is no ballooning excess costs for ‘vanity’ expenditures, no ludicrous salaries for mediocre professors coming out of the students’ pockets, no billion-dollar endowments that are going to be spent on the next Liberalist whim, no insistent pleas for donations from wealthy alumni, etc.Its a clean, functional system that actually serves the student while still being feasible for the staff — exactly how any true ‘social service’ should operate. (Note how the US health/medical system is even more dysfunctional than education — because it is again being operated for the benefit of the providers — and very little regard for the patients).If you look at the USA from afar, you will realize that ‘education’ and its ‘high costs’ are just the tip of the iceberg for the result of 50+ years of Liberalism. You can come up with whatever more specific explanations you want — but the root cause will always be sinister, miserable people whose great desire is to impose their will on anything vulnerable enough to be subject to them — all while touting their patently false ‘benevolent intentions’ to absolve themselves from their internal monstrosity.(With regards to the claim that Europe/Canada/Australia are supposedly “even more Liberal” than America — they are ‘vastly more socialist’ in the rightful sense of maintaining a decent world for every citizen — but there is little presence of the self-serving impositionism that screws the very people its supposedly intending to help — the hallmark of the modern USA)

Germany promotes blue-collar labour (requiring apprenticeship training rather than college degrees) much more than America does, so the taxpayer-funded system isn’t swamped by hordes desperate for a piece of paper.Income and sales taxes in Germany are quite high which helps sustain the system.Germany does not have for-profit scam schools - such schools are a big driver of American student debt.You know how the top schools in the US, both public and private, have very high merit-based admission standards, and similarly high standards for staying enrolled? Same goes for Germany. The difference is that Germany isn’t simultaneously plagued with low-standard colleges (many of which are for-profit scams) that will admit anyone willing to pay, and will never kick out under-performers. This keeps the system sustainable - even if German colleges charged tuition fees, it would never result in the crippling debt crisis that America faces.International students are a minority at German universities, just like anywhere else. I personally think they should be required to pay at least something (nothing ludicrous, maybe 5000 euros a year), since that revenue could be put to good use, but I also recognize that they aren’t burdening the system, so that’s ok.

You are mistaken when you state education is “Free”. The burden of debt is shared by ALL the taxpaying citizens of that country.In the U.S. from Kindergarten through High School , taxpayers (mostly property owners) share the costs of education for public schools.For higher education the total U.S. student debt, as calculated by the Federal Reserve for the year 2015 alone, was 1.2 TRILLION dollars. Do you really want to see that bill tacked on to our current Federal budget, every year?And once the Government starts shelling out money do you believe Universities will become more or less efficient. Will costs go up, or down?Free education, free housing , free food, free everything , right? Not much in this world is FREE. And if it is, it’s worth exactly what you paid for it.

Germany does not have free education. The education is subsidised through ungodly high taxes. As other answers have mentioned, quantity is given preference above quality and professors don't have relationships with students like in the US. That does not mean the US prices are acceptable, but it is a matter of government inflating college demand to crazy levels through federal loans and constantly entertaining the misguided idea that everyone should have a degree. Again, government is the problem. On a general note: Germany and northern Europe in general is a great place, but people idealise the idea of 'free everything' too much. The government runs your life to a depressing level.

Some of the negatives ... While college is free, access is limited. Kids are tested as early as fourth grade and knocked off the college track. These kids then grow up and have to pay taxes for the college education of "the smart kids."German Universities are very good for the most part, but none are in the top 20 worldwide. So the very top students study in the UK or the US. German graduates tend to work in government or education or large corporations. For better or worse, Facebook would never happen in Germany. Income Taxes are 50% for the upper middle class (say 80-100k/ year) and VAT (similar to sales tax) can be as high as 19%.

I’m not German, but from what I know German’s value vocational training as much as college education. In America there is a stigma associated with TradeSchool even though compared to most degrees outside STEM fields this is a sure way to a higher paid job. So demand for places may not be as high.The main reason is that Germany has much higher taxation than the US. It has a social democratic model that while providing free higher level education (but only to a point - you still need to take loans out to live) it burdens you with higher taxes on the the money you earn and therefore your efforts in work.

Not “How?”… “Why?”The US post-secondary education system is in the hands of a corrupt oligarchy (politicians and the people behind the institutions) that is fleecing the American people.Look at this:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higher_education_accreditation_in_the_United_StatesThat’s basically a union of colleges deciding who/what gets to be a college.Germany on the other hand is under much more bottom up control (for example did you know Germany goes years without the police killing anyone), and simply arranged its colleges as it saw fit.

Along with other responses I would just like to add that Germany has an education system that only propels the top students to higher education. Lower ranked students are prepared for the workforce. Whereas in America, everyone is given the option, whether or no you should be attending college.

My understanding of things may be wrong - but it's not wrong to point out that the U.S. is the third largest country in the world in terms of population at roughly 320 million people to Germany's roughly 82 million. There are smaller numbers attending Germany's universities and - you would need a German national to explain Germany's generosity to international students. There are many who post on Quora. Where my understanding of how many other countries have designed their higher education systems may go wrong is with this - I believed that their universities were not open admissions. I believed there was restricted admission to university. I believed there were a series of something rather similar to entrance testing - what do the British mean by their O scores? - and that only those who remained standing and in good standing after taking the national exams were admitted to the nation's universities for very low fees? I do understand that Germany no longer charges even those very low entrance fees - it has not always been absolutely free in Germany - that's a recent development - but I'd like to understand how other western European countries and Germany determine who will enter university at the public's expense? Literally everybody regardless of their academic record may go to university and any university at all and all at the public's expense? I've heard of that in the oil-rich countries - I believe that was true of Kuwait but that is a very small country and it has been very oil-rich. I should pose the question on Quora - my distant relation in the UK told me that there one doesn't just decide and declare - "I'm going to St. Andrew's" on the government's tab and "I'm going to major (read for) chemistry." That once admitted one scrambles a bit to find an open space and it might well not be in the subject you hoped for. Is that not the case? Anyone may attend college in the U.S. - there is a complicated system of financial aid given and loans made. The tuition costs at U.S. colleges and universities have indeed outpaced inflation by 400% because there is no restriction on the amount that may be charged for tuition at private universities. And we have private universities and colleges here - many of them - as well as less expensive public universities.I don't think I'm wrong to say - that Germany - and many other countries? - have both national health care and national education as it were. The U.S. has neither.