EGALITARIANISM IN THEORY, BUT NOT AT HARVARD.

Cue the violins.  "Little-noticed provision in new COVID-19 relief bill would slash aid for colleges and universities with large endowments in half."  Special pleading by hedge funds masquerading as universities is nothing new.  Sometimes the politic thing to do is to give the outgoing administration a victory.

Trump, for instance, criticized the idea of giving Harvard, which had an endowment of $39.4 billion in 2019, any help. “They have one of the largest endowments anywhere in the country, maybe in the world, I guess, and they’re going to pay back that money,” Trump said.

"Wealthy institutions that do not primarily serve low-income students do not need or deserve additional taxpayer funds," [education secretary Betsy] DeVos followed up. She also urged Congress to change its rules for distributing the stimulus funds. "This is common sense. Schools with large endowments should not apply for funds so more can be given to students who need support the most," she said.

In May, four Senate Republicans, led by Hawley, co-sponsored a bill that would prohibit universities with endowments larger than $10 billion from receiving CARES Act funds unless they spend 10 times the amount of federal funds appropriated to them on coronavirus-related financial assistance for students.

In response to the criticism, some institutions like Harvard, Princeton and Stanford Universities decided to forgo accepting their share of [coronavirus relief] funds.

“It seems like mostly a political statement to avoid the Twitter debates of last spring,” said Jackson Nell, senior analyst at education research company, EAB, who mentioned the provision in a blog post. “Harvard is probably happy to be out of the picture.”

Spokesmen for the rich universities note that sometimes the endowments include dedicated funds, which they will point to when it is convenient, such as when much of the money goes to support medical research or some diversity initiative, but which they will grouse about if somebody donates money in support of traditional scholarship or an entrepreneurship curriculum.