Have you done any thinking about hard mode? Getting trapped in a 'deep' pattern (?ight: e, f, l, m, n, r, s, t, w) too soon seems like a problem. But this is way outside my bailiwick.
That's a big fast 'citation needed' for the initial claim.
I'm not sure where this idea comes from, but it's wholly false, at least at the myriad of colleges I've worked with, and generally true in urban settings [0]. Housing is often a loss for the university (hence the explosion of PPP to try and recoup those losses). Instead, especially at places like UCSB, it's landlords in the area that are a large financial burden for students. At my last university, rental occupancy within a 5 mile radius was at 98%, which exerts a huge upwards pressure on rent. Students were BEGGING for more housing, because campus housing was on-par or lower than the area, and comes with many other benefits related to travel and campus resources. Furthermore, college housing often provides a 9 or 10 month lease option, which can save a lot of money over an annual lease.
Additionally, there is regular evidence [1][2] that living on campus helps with retention rates, which is critical to avoiding the 'spending money, never getting the credential' problem plaguing higher ed. In this light, even if campus housing were somewhat more expensive, the benefit in completion could easily outweigh those costs.
Munger looks terrible, but there's a HIGH demand and LOW supply for housing at UCSB, and at urban colleges in general. It's not a cash cow for many, if any, campuses. Certainly not public ones.
0: "'When you look at the metros that have exceptionally high cost of living expenses like New York, Boston and San Francisco, there has been research done that those areas can be significantly cheaper for a student to live on campus,' says Amy Glynn, vice president of financial aid and community initiatives at CampusLogic, a firm that advises higher education institutions."
There's a substantial difference between downvotes on comments and downvotes on stories. Upvoting or downvoting a story is a vote for whether you agree or disagree that the linked story contributes to "hacker news". Upvoting or downvoting a comment should be a vote for whether or not the comment constributes substance to the conversation.
I'd be in favor of reversing what can be down-voted: allow submissions to be downvoted, but only allow comments to be upvoted. Then the comment 'vote' more easily becomes "is this good?" (or at least removes the "is this something you disagree with?") and we can maintain a 'flag' on comments for the trolls/spam.
Money certainly has utility, but it's not the be-all and end-all of my existence. It enables freedom in choices but doesn't become the reason I make choices.
And it certainly has let me chose not to work with someone who is impressed by 'dumbing down'.