With tuitions, fees, and room and board at dozens of colleges now reaching $50,000 a year, the ability to sustain private higher education for all but the very well-heeled is questionable. According to the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, over the past 25 years, average college tuition and fees have risen by 440 percent — more than four times the rate of inflation and almost twice the rate of medical care. Patrick M. Callan, the center’s president, has warned that low-income students will find college unaffordable.

Meanwhile, the middle class, which has paid for higher education in the past mainly by taking out loans, may now be precluded from doing so as the private student-loan market has all but dried up. In addition, endowment cushions that allowed colleges to engage in steep tuition discounting are gone. Declines in housing valuations are making it difficult for families to rely on home-equity loans for college financing. Even when the equity is there, parents are reluctant to further leverage themselves into a future where job security is uncertain.

Even though we’re still in the middle of this economic mess, it’s worth pondering what the long-term outcome will be once the recession finally ends. There’s been plenty written about a new frugality, with consumers changing their ways for good, and saving more and spending less. I haven’t totally signed on to that one. If the economy should somehow pick up, I think many consumers could easily revert to their old free spending habits. They always have in the past.

But when you think about much more limited access to credit — no more using your house as an ATM — combined with higher college costs, it’s a different story. We could very well end up with lower and middle income families finding college simply out of reach. That’s not something being watched closely right now, given our attention is focused on the banking and foreclosure crises.

The authors of the Chronicle piece –Joseph Marr Cronin, the former Massachusetts secretary of educational affairs, and Howard E. Horton, the president of New England College of Business and Finance – suggest it’s time to start. They’re trying to call this bubble before it bursts – which means at least one lesson from this financial crisis is sinking in, at least for some.

The neighborhood group is still trying to get the case back in housing court, but it’s a difficult battle. Let’s see: A neighborhood nonprofit up against the financial resources of two global banks. Whose pockets do you think are deeper?

It’s no surprise those banks wanted the case moved to federal court. It will be much more costly for the neighborhood group to argue its case there. Housing court judges, on the hand, can and do handle these cases quickly and efficiently. They bring the hammer down on banks that leave foreclosed properties behind in cities for the taxpayer to clean up. They often don’t buy the argument that servicers are responsible for the upkeep of the properties.

I remember talking early last year with Cleveland Housing Court Judge Raymond Pianka, who has drawn national attention for holding banks responsible for dumping foreclosed properties. Pianka lives in a Cleveland neighborhood, he told me. There are foreclosed houses on his street. This crisis is part of his everyday life.

The move to federal court is more than just an arcane legal development. The neighborhood group wants the case heard in housing court because it validates what has become increasingly clear in the foreclosure crisis: Banks are property owners, with all the responsibilities that come with it. As they foreclose on houses and their inventories of bank-owned properties swell, banks try to dodge this reality by blaming servicers and paying lawyers to get them out of housing court. The same thing happened in Cincinnati recently, where the local legal aid agency filed suit in housing court, but the case was moved to a federal court instead.

Maybe this tactic will work for a while, but eventually, I think banks are going to have to be held accountable for what they’ve done. Entire swaths of neighborhoods in once-great cities are in ruins – that’s not an exaggeration – as banks fail to secure, maintain or demolish foreclosed properties. Neighbors who pay their mortgages feel the pain as their property values plummet. City coffers and services take a hit. It will take decades to recover from this.

And yet, the banks walk away. The bank argument continues to be that It’s someone else’s responsibility. But banks aren’t just lenders anymore – like it or not, they are property managers. If they didn’t want to be in that position, they shouldn’t have sold high-rate mortgages that they knew people couldn’t pay. So as property managers, they have the same obligation any other landlord would, and they should be subject to housing code violations, just like any other landlord would. It’s too bad policymakers who put together the bailout didn’t put some conditions on it to require banks to do their part.

Instead, they got a free ride. And homeowners in neighborhoods all around the country are paying for it.

From Bloomberg:

After 28 years of growth, Atlantic City’s gambling proceeds are down for the second time in a row. In the first 11 months of 2008, revenue from casino games fell 6.7 percent to $4.2 billion, regulators reported Dec. 10. Last year’s 5.7 percent decline was the first ever, as the number of visitors slipped to 33.3 million from 34.5 million.

You might think this is no big deal. Most of the people who gamble probably shouldn’t, so if the economy forces them to quit the habit, so much the better. The only problem is that New Jersey and many other states need that gambling revenue, and its loss will add to already difficult budget problems.

Again, from Bloomberg:

The slowdown comes as Governor Jon Corzine has warned that the state faces a revenue shortfall of $1.2 billion for the year ending June 30 and $5 billion in fiscal 2010. Through November, the state collected $338 million in Atlantic City tax revenue, down from $364 million and $384 million, respectively, in the first 11 months of 2007 and 2006. Casino employment fell to 39,137 in November from more than 42,000 as recently as August and a peak of 51,560 in July 1997. James Hughes, dean of the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University, said the casino industry is vital for the economy of southern New Jersey and for the tax revenue it generates.“It’s possible Atlantic City is past its peak,” said Hughes, who predicted the situation may worsen next year. “It could never go back to its past glory. It’s a much tougher game now.”

That’s true everywhere these days, and now it’s hit the blackjack table as well.