Moody’s gives colleges a negative grade — from the NYT by Andrew Martin

Excerpt:

The credit reporting agency Moody’s said on Wednesday that it had revised its financial outlook for colleges and universities, giving a negative grade to the entire field.

For the last two years, Moody’s Investors Service gave the nation’s most elite public and private colleges a stable forecast while assigning a negative outlook to the rest of higher education. (Moody’s assigned a negative outlook for the sector in 2009, but it upgraded the most elite ones to stable in 2011-2012.)

 

Nowhere to turn — from insighehighered.com by Kevin Kiley

Excerpt:

If colleges and universities thought they could ride out the current revenue challenges by becoming more like some other institution, Moody’s Investors Service has a bit of bad news for them: The grass isn’t greener on anybody else’s quad. Not even Harvard University’s.

In a report released Wednesday, the ratings agency outlines how every traditional revenue stream for colleges and universities is facing some sort of pressure, a finding Moody’s uses as grounds for giving the whole sector a negative outlook. The agency has been pessimistic about much of the sector since its annual outlook in 2009 after the economic downturn began, but Wednesday’s report contains a downward shift in how analysts view even market leaders, the elite institutions with high demand and brand recognition.

 

Originally saw thes graphic below on the Education Stormfront blog (thanks Andrew) — also see Will Hanlon Pop the Higher Ed Bubble?

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Higher Ed Inflation.jpg

 

From DSC:
As you know if you are a regular reader of this blog, I believe the higher ed bubble has already popped — but I have it that it will pop at different times for different institutions.

 

Addendum on 1/22/13:

 

Addendum on 1/24/13: