And I'm getting paid by the company I work for because I work for that company. That's a condition for my getting paid :)
You guys are missing the point. There *are* free university programs in the world, say in Europe (read, no tuition), but not here. Yes, you are right that those positions and being a student are related. But if you are a student, you *must* pay the tuition fees - but TA/RA/scholarships/etc are not guaranteed (though common). RA and TA require you to perform work, so they are not given "for free". The school rather have you mark the midterms than toss lettuce at Subway. None of that is strictly speaking a financial aid - financial aid is bursaries and government loans explicitly designed to help with the tuition costs.
You also need to consider the money sources. RAs are not funded by the schools - they are paid by the professors out of their grants they won to carry their research. Scholarships are often provided by third-parties too, not universities.
Next argument, tuitions fees for the foreign students are much higher than for the domestic - yet the pay rate for the TA units, for example, is the same. The two things are not one and the same.
Think of it this way. A brilliant student gets admitted to Harvard on a full scholarship. Harvard usually runs you $50K a year in tuition alone, but it will be covered by the scholarship for that student. Can you say that Harvard is free?
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