Real (inflation-adjusted) wages have declined or stayed static since the 1970s.  Even if college tuition only increased at the rate of inflation, it would still be harder to afford today than it was in the past.<p>Also, Ford workers at that time were making above-average salaries.  They weren't the lower-middle-class to middle-class auto workers of today, they were solidly upper-middle-class.  And 32 days is like 12% of his salary, so it wasn't exactly cheap for him (though far better than the 30-40% we see now).<p>Finally, it's disingenuous to compare 1918 colleges to 2008 colleges.  Two major events really shook up the post-high-school landscape in those 90 years: the GI Bill and Vietnam.  The GI Bill sent like 5 million people to college in the 40s-50s who otherwise couldn't have afforded it.  Then Vietnam made college compulsory for middle-class or upper-middle-class men looking to avoid military service.  Throw in desegregation, affirmative action, and co-education, and it's pretty clear that college went from being the domain of the brilliant and affluent to being open to the majority of Americans who finish high school.  This total structural shift and basic re-definition of college makes pre-70s tuitions irrelevant to today's system.<p>If you want, you can also toss in the degree to which the job market has changed to requiring skilled workers with some form of post-secondary education.  While some of this is likely a result of the education levels of the labor-supply, at least part of it is due to our changing industrial and commercial landscape.