This summer, LendingTree was fortunate enough to have intern Abigail Harris from Charlotte, NC in the office for a few weeks before she headed to the West Coast to attend the University of Southern California.  Before she took the big next step, Abigail analyzed the cost of college today versus the cost of college two decades ago. Read below for Abigail’s interesting analysis:

Last month I flew to Los Angeles for my college orientation and while waiting to board my flight bound for LAX I conversed with a businessman. Mid conversation he interjects, “Man, that’s scary to think about. I must have graduated from college around the time you were born, I graduated in 1992”.  I grinned and replied “Yes, I’m 18, I was born in 1992”.

Having just spent several months “angsting” over which university to attend I had become well versed in the complexities and nuances of the college decision process …

As mortgage rates dipped even lower this past week, we got to thinking about the last time we saw rates like this  -  the 1950s. Let’s put the Tivo on pause and pretend we’re not reading this on the Internet. Lace up your saddle shoes and climb out of the bomb shelter for this brief retrospective on life back then.

With the end of World War II, an economic boom generated new jobs and expendable income. As troops returned from war, attention turned to the home; and as people moved to the newly-constructed suburbs, the Baby Boom generation was born. Elvis burst on the music scene and the polio vaccine was developed. At the same time, nuclear war fears sparked the creation of backyard bomb shelter. Here are some other ’50s factoids:

In 1950 a new house cost $8,450.00 and by 1959 was $12,400.00, according to ThePeopleHistory.com website. Mortgage rates between 4% …

The federal government wants us all to get smarter about how we spend and save our money. So, a new Office of Financial Literacy – part of the newly-signed financial reform bill – will develop programs meant to educate the American public on savings and loans.

The office is expected to create standards for financial advice programs and to help people find ways to avoid financial scams. Financial literacy is being promoted separately by other groups, too. The LendingTree Foundation, for example, is a recently-created non-profit organization that provides counseling to families in financial turmoil.

In Washington, D.C., Michael Barr, Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions, told us in a phone press conference yesterday that the government’s financial literacy outreach is meant to help “individuals take the necessary steps to make themselves better educated about what it means to save and borrow, and to conduct the basic transactions in life.”

The attention on …