The problem with Hillary Clinton’s plan to make college affordable is that it doesn’t do anything of the sort. Her $350 billion “New College Compact” would instead change the way college is financed – but not what it costs. There’s a big difference. Until costs are reined in, plans such as Clinton’s and President Obama’s only put the taxpayer on the hook for an ever-rising tab.

“Hillary Clinton rolled out her college affordability plan Monday, pledging to voters in New Hampshire that ‘costs won’t be a barrier’ to secondary education in a Clinton administration,” CNN reported. “Clinton will do this, she says, by providing incentives to states that agree to provide ‘no-loan tuition at four-year public colleges and universities.’ States that agree, under the Clinton plan, will win grants from the federal government. Clinton also pledged to continue President Barack Obama’s free tuition plan at community colleges, as well as ensuring that students will ‘never have to pay more than 10 percent of their income when repaying the loan.'”

What’s wrong with her plan?

First, directing more federal and state money at colleges will have one result – it will raise the price tag.

That’s what TheNew York Times concluded when it investigated why college costs so much. It’s not that government funding has been cut – it hasn’t. It’s that there’s too much government funding.

“In other words, far from being caused by funding cuts, the astonishing rise in college tuition correlates closely with a huge increase in public subsidies for higher education,” the Times notes.

This sounds counter-intuitive, but Reason magazine’s Barton Hinkle can explain it.

“The public-policy prescription for this trend has been to throw more money at the problem, in the form of student aid,” he writes. “This is lunacy. It does nothing but encourage colleges and universities to charge even more, secure in the knowledge that student aid will rise to keep up.”

Nothing in Mrs. Clinton’s plan will actually bring college costs down, because nothing in the plan holds colleges accountable.

“Trying to address spiraling college costs by increasing student aid is like trying to put out a fire by dousing it with gasoline,” Hinkle says. “The way to cut the cost of college is to cut college spending by making colleges trim their administrative fat, require more work from their personnel and close those offices and departments including a majority of money-sucking athletic programs that do not pull their own weight.”

Mrs. Clinton’s plan says states will be rewarded for increasing their support for public colleges. But states get their funding from the same source the federal government does – the taxpayers. Her plan wouldn’t just involve a tax increase to pay for it; it would force states to raise their taxes, to pay for their part of it.

Want to see what real reform in college costs looks like?

Take a look at Texas’ $10,000 degree. Responding to a challenge from then-Gov. Rick Perry, 12 Texas colleges now offer a bachelor’s degree for $10,000. Other states are following suit.