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With universities facing rising costs and tightening budgets, LSE’s administration has implemented a controversial market-based system for course selection. All courses have been capped and students must now bid for the limited places.

In a statement to the Raccoon, LSE’s undergraduate director Luke A. said “As the London School of Economics it is only natural for us to practice what we preach. This is the fairest way to ensure students are allocated to the courses they actually want to take, only if they can afford them of course.”

Popular courses such as AC102 and FM101 have seen huge price spikes, with places sold for as high as £350. “I need these firsts so badly,” commented one student, “it doesn’t matter that I’ve had to go into my overdraft before term has even started.” Another has complained that the system is “unfair” as these courses are mandatory for her degree; LSE’s administration has dismissed the complaint as a “skill issue”.

Predictably, certain students have started reselling course places at exorbitantly high prices. One scalper reported a profit of over £100 after reselling an EC1A5 slot, boasting that “once I advertised its 60% first rate, the price went through the roof.” He has since been apprehended by the authorities for market manipulation.

However, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority have announced they are investigating the system for breaching competition rules. LSE maintains that they are fully complying with the investigation, and should the system be abolished they will use their backup plan of randomly pulling courses out of a hat.

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