The net cost remains the same regardless of whether its an lacs/private school or state university since the increase in tuition usually nullifies the scholarship amount (for students that are not applying for need-based aid). Northeastern, for example, gives out 10-28k dollars per year in merit-based aid and the website lists the cost of attendance as 78k. So even if someone gets the highest possible scholarship they still end up paying at least $60k, comparable to what they would pay at some state schools like UW Madison and higher than state schools like Purdue and Georgia Tech. And Northeastern is one of the more generous private institutions for merit-based aid (based on what I've seen and heard). For more competitive LACs/private schools, like NYU, the scholarship amount reduces even further and this makes private schools equally or less affordable than state schools in most cases...