HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Do the Math: How Opportunity Costs Multiply Tuition. “The average full-time college student misses out on a little over $9,000 in earnings for each year they spend in school. That rises to $15,500 for the 25% of students who don’t work at all. And that qualifier—’for each year’—matters more than you might think, as nearly 60% of students take six years or more to graduate. This means that the diligent students who both work and graduate in four years still miss out on over $36,000, and the ones that take their time and don’t work at all can forego over $93,000 in income. And when you combine this with student loan debt, even those who manage to find a substantially better job will be playing “catch up” for a while.”