EACH time the topic of free education comes up, I will pose the same question of how exactly do those who propose to do it, plan to pay for it.

And if the circle is to repeat itself, some will say “vote for us first and we will do it” or “we will end corruption to do it”. Quite honestly, both are utopian pipe dreams that might happen when elephants start flying over our East Coast Expressway by using a magic feather akin to Dumbo.

Yes, free education is perhaps a great promise, but  to implement it on a realistic scale, simple and basic questions need to first be asked.

How much will it cost?

You cannot use the National Higher Education Fund (PTPTN) figures as estimates for how much a student needs for his or her education because, and let’s face it, that loan amount dished out every semester is not enough for students to cope.

For a realistic figure, you would have to include just how much it would cost not only to pay fees, but also a stipend for the students themselves to cope with the cost of living, unless you want another round of “Mahasiswa Lapar” happening.

Who is going to pay for it?

Of course, it should be the federal government. But with what funds, and how this amount of funding will be reached is still a huge question mark that nobody seems to want to answer.

Not even the state-owned Universiti Selangor offers free education, even if PKR state politicians continue to talk about it. Not even for a Selangor-born student going to a university owned by Selangor, which has a cash reserve of RM3.62 billion with a collected revenue of roughly RM2.1 billion in 2016.

And thus, let me ask a better question – would everyone reading this be willing to pay more taxes in order to fund free education?

Perhaps a hike of 1% in the Goods and Services Tax (GST) which might lead to an increase of RM10 billion to fund education should do the trick, if we’re focused purely on making tertiary education free.

In fact, why not raise the minimum wage to a point where more people have to pay income tax as well. According to 2016 assessment rates, a Malaysian would have to earn RM2,851 monthly to pay a monthly tax deduction of RM1.10.

Also, the introduction of a capital gains tax for share ownership and transactions outside of unit trust and retirement funds should also be helpful in generating income from those who can afford to part with some cash.

Perhaps look also to introduce an estate tax for those who die and leave behind an inheritance worthy of collection.

At the same time, consider this – no country offers free education up to the tertiary level without income to back it up, particularly from taxation.

Denmark, a beacon of free quality education, taxed anyone earning beyond US$60,000 a whopping 60% in 2014. If you’re single with no kids, it will be 38.9% on the nation’s average salary of €3,902 a month.

In the same year, Germany takes out 39.9% from wages, inclusive of their contributions to social security.

Yes, education should be free up to the tertiary level. And even now, more nations in advanced economies are talking about a basic wage for every citizen. It is yet again something to aspire to.

But it will only happen if someone is willing to pay for it, and that someone has to be all of us – not just the rich, but everyone from rich to middle class, and even the low income masses who can say and see that they are spending for a cause worthy of supporting.

And mind you, not everyone believes in offering free tertiary level education as evident by the fact that we have a workforce which is half made out of SPM-level students.

Because at the same time, we have a glut of university graduates who are unemployed, making it even more difficult to justify making education free since the return on investment in the form of taxes will not appear through anything other than a consumption tax, such as the GST.

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr said that taxes are the price we pay for living in a civilised society. Thus, if Malaysians truly want to affect change in education and everything else, someone needs to pay for it. And every Malaysian should be that ‘someone who pays for it’ – no exceptions. – July 28, 2017.

* Hafidz loves to ruffle feathers and believes in the EA Games tag line of challenging everything. Most times, he represents the Devil’s Advocate on multiple issues.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.