HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Where The Sugar Babies Are. “In recent years the rising cost of student debt has given birth to an odd phenomenon: a population of ostensibly generous older men who appear poised to solve the higher-education crisis, one student at a time. Once a relatively underground subculture, this benevolent group of men is coming to the rescue across the country, essentially volunteering to subsidize the students’ tuition costs. But that description could be, shall I say, sugarcoating it. . . . Statistics aside, the fact that this path has become increasingly popular among so many young women is a damning indictment of the country’s higher-education system.” You could write a book on it.