HIGH FINANCE

Football on the grand scale receives its annual vindication in the report of the Treasurer of Harvard University for the twelve months ending June 30, 1927. Without the gate receipts of the leading fall pastime, the remaining organized sports of the University as well as the facilities for individual exercise, would incure a loss of some $320,000; ergo, the most valid raison d'etre for intercollegiate football in its present form. Regardless of all the other merits of the problem, the money making potentiality of football, necessary as it is in the absence of any other means of supporting athletic exercises, is sufficient to swing the scales in its favor. It is the ultimate argument for bigger stadia, better athletes, and more publicity.

The second fact of importance carried in the Treasurer's report is the exact statement of the tuition-to-cost ratio. With the operating expenses of the University over nine million dollars, less than one fourth of the amount is paid by the students in actual tuition charges. Included in the operating expenses, however, are enrolled items amounting to approximately another fourth of the total sum which are paid indirectly or directly by the students in the form of rent, food bills, and miscellaneous charges. The blunt fact remains that about one half of the University's operating cost for the year is taken care of by gifts and the income from the permanent endowment. This approximates the situation at Yale and other privately endowed educational institutions. A great deal could be accomplished with the four million odd dollars of gifts and fund, incomes in the way of increasing and raising the standards of facilities for education, were it possible to make the University self-supporting through its members. As it is Harvard can be thankful for being the most richly endowed university in the country, a situation which allows it to remain independent in the main of athletic domination and promiscuous begging.