Rooms for Rent

With more sorrow than surprise, the undergraduate found in his mailbox Sunday an announcement of a 30 percent jump in room rents. The increase was far from unexpected. Although expenses at Harvard had risen much less than elsewhere, it became clear that the administration could not hold the line when other colleges, such as Columbia, were already announcing their second round of rent boosts.

Behind the move was a simple set of facts. Last year the Department of Houses and College Dormitories showed a surplus of $90,310.04, or almost $10,000 less than the $100,000 which the Houses "traditionally" pay to the faculty of Arts and Sciences. Add to this the increased cost of electric power and steam which follow from the rising price of coal, and last year's surplus is swallowed up, according to Massachusetts Hall estimates.

But the bad news for dormitory residents does not end here. Despite recent dips in commodity and retail prices, University financial experts believe that there will be a substantial rise in the general price level by next year, a rise that will bloat maintenance costs and in other ways increase the expense of running the Houses and dormitories. With the College returning to a two-term schedule and summertime rents gone, the men who plan the College's financial future can see no alternative to raising room rents.

Objections can certainly be made against planning based on the expectation of large-scale price increases. But experts can be found on both sides of this question, and one can hardly attack University officials for siding with one school of economists instead of another. The chief flaw in the College's reasoning lies not in this direction but in another.

No reason can be found to expect the Houses and dormitories to produce a $100,000 "traditional" surplus for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Increased room rents for non-House purposes penalize those living in the dormitories, yet leave commuters and married students untouched. Why such a distinction should exist is not clear. A still more vital objection to the $100,000 tithe is that a rent rise hurts the veteran more than a boost in tuition. For an increase in rent must come from the veteran's meager subsistence allowance, or, if that is used up, from his personal savings, while a tuition boost can be absorbed by surplus eligibility time. Even the recently voted increase in subsistence allotments, which will almost exactly cover the rent jump, should not blind College officials to the fact that balance-sheet niceties are less important than student wallets.

But if the boost is really necessary to cover rising costs, and it is not a hidden, unnecessarily expensive, and poorly distributed rise in tuition, Housemasters and housing officials should take advantage of the situation to eliminate current confused and unfair room rent discrepancies. The cases of occupants of small, evamped rooms being charged higher rents than those living in more spacious and desirable suites are too numerous under the present sealing system for current prices to seem other than haphazard. Any increase in rent affords a perfect opportunity to iron out these iniquities.

Even more important, every effort should be made to keep as many rooms as possible in the lower price ranges, even if those willing to pay for superior rooms must pay more than their pro-rata share. The College has an obligation to the marginal student, for whom any rise in expenses is a serious blow, and may rightfully ask those students who are in less stringent financial conditions to bear a greater share of the load.