At a time of devastating reductions to state appropriations for higher education, it is tempting to attribute performance problems that have been accumulating for years and even decades to the resultant financial stress. But the problems of performance predate the Great Recession. Well before its onset, American higher education was underperforming in areas critical to the national welfare: increasing the proportion of Americans, particularly young Americans, who enroll in and complete programs and narrowing educational gaps that are associated with race, ethnicity, and income. The author believes that this underperformance is unlikely to be addressed unless the nation, the states, and institutions of higher education reopen fundamental policy questions that have not been systematically raised for several generations: How much higher education does America need, and how should the responsibility for paying for it be allocated? Raising these basic questions, however difficult, is the only path to a restructured policy framework--one that is national in scope; incorporates federal, state, and institutional responsibilities; and is aligned with priorities and incentives that are consistent with societal needs calibrated to the economy and demography of the twenty-first, not the twentieth, century.