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With the crashing economy making life difficult for many Americans, college students in particular are finding fewer ways to make ends meet. Tuition has risen dramatically over the past decade: in California, the average college tuition rose 37% between 2000-2007, and in 2008, it rose a whopping 9%. Obviously wages haven’t kept up with this dramatic increase. But neither have financial aid grants. Now, college students across the country may see small relief in President Obama’s new budget, which aims at dramatically increasing the number of students eligible for Pell grants. Government Pell grants were originally designed to cover 80% of the cost of going to college. But given the sharp rise in tuition, they now cover barely a third of the costs. Obama’s budget increases the amount of each grant, and also makes funding mandatory. At a time when college graduates are desperately looking for jobs that just aren’t materializing, doing so with a smaller debt burden may ease the economic pain of these trying times.

GUEST: Eric Lotke, research director at the Campaign for America’s Future. For more information,