To the long and growing list of things that are no business of the Department of Education, let’s now add textbooks.

In today’s Martin Center article, economics professor Clark Ross writes about the department’s moves to dictate how colleges must bill students for their books. Ross first explains the three ways that have evolved (freedom of choice, inclusive access, and equitable access), then gets into the department’s plan:

Of relevance today is the Department of Education’s recent efforts to ban all automatic-billing methods unless an institution requires students to give prior permission, thus essentially mandating the “opt-in” variants of “inclusive access” and “equitable access.” Prior to 2016, it was not legal for colleges to bill students with federal financial-aid funds without their permission. In recent years, however, federal funds have been permitted for inclusive-access and equitable-access plans. Given student complaints about paying for unused textbooks and the limited duration of online access to materials (typically for the length of the semester only), there is now renewed governmental effort to require an explicit “opt-in” process.

The feds say this will improve “transparency” and lower costs. I say this is one more things that aren’t any business of the federal government.

Read the whole thing.