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College Spending on Instruction

What portion of all spending by public colleges in the U.S. is dedicated to student instruction?

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The latest data from the U.S. Department of Education shows that public colleges dedicate an average of 26% of their spending to student instruction. Taxpayer funding of higher education currently amounts to 87% of all spending by public and private colleges on functions that directly contribute to the education of students and the general public. This includes instruction (like teaching salaries and classrooms), public services (like informational conferences), and academic support (like libraries and information technology). Facts about whether or not colleges are equipping students with practical skills are located at the third link below.

DocumentationCollege Spending Breakdown Taxpayer Funding College Practical Skills

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Impacts of Marijuana Legalization

The New York Times Editorial Board has just admitted in 2026 that they and other “supporters” of “marijuana legalization” have made “many” “predictions” that have turned out to be “wrong.”

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Contrary to their claims that legalization “would bring few downsides,” the Times now confesses that:

“legalization has led to much more use.” (Just Facts documented this in 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019.)
“wider use has caused a rise in addiction and other problems” like “marijuana-linked paranoia and chronic psychotic disorders.” (A paper in the journal Addiction documented this in 2014.)
“bystanders have also been hurt, including by people driving under the influence of pot.” (A paper in the American Journal of Epidemiology documented this in 2014.)
“at least one in 10 people who use marijuana develops an addiction, a similar share as with alcohol.” (A paper in the journal Addiction documented this in 2014.)
“more Americans now use marijuana daily than alcohol.” (A paper in the journal Addiction documented this in 2024.)
“greater THC potency has contributed to more addiction and illness.” (The American Chemical Society documented this in 2015.)
“decades of studies” on “medical marijuana” have “proved disappointing to its boosters, finding little medical benefit.” (The Journal of the American Medical Association documented this in 2015).

Now that states containing the majority of the U.S. population have legalized recreational marijuana over the past 13 years, the Times says we need to “examine the real-world impact of any major policy change and consider additional changes in response to new facts.”

However, most of the facts above are not new and have been available for a decade or more.

Although the Times is now calling for strict regulation and heavy taxation of cannabis, it is not reversing its stance on legalization because, “Every year, authorities arrested hundreds of thousands of Americans for marijuana possession. The people who suffered the legal and financial consequences were disproportionately Black, Latino and poor.”

In reality, a 2005 paper in the journal Contemporary Drug Problems found that the vast bulk of people serving time for drug use had plea bargained down from more serious crimes. Thus, only about 0.1%–0.2% of all federal and state prison inmates had served time for possessing “only marijuana.”

A study published in 2006 by the journal Criminology & Public Policy put that figure at “0.06% of all prisoners.”

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