Recent Deep State Higher Education Cuts May Harm Students and the Economy for Years to Come - Phil Oliff, et.al., Center for Budget, Policy and Priorities

As states prepare their budgets for the coming year, they face the challenge of reinvesting in public higher education systems after years of damaging cuts — the product of both the economic downturn and states’ reluctance to raise additional revenues. In the past five years, state cuts to higher education funding have been severe and almost universal. After adjusting for inflation:

• States are spending $2,353 or 28 percent less per student on higher education, nationwide, in the current 2013 fiscal year than they did in 2008, when the recession hit. 
• Every state except for North Dakota and Wyoming is spending less per student on higher education than they did prior to the recession.[1] 
• In many states the cuts over the last five years have been remarkably deep. Eleven states have cut funding by more than one-third per student, and two states — Arizona and New Hampshire — have cut their higher education spending per student in half. 

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3927