Four years after President Obama proposed making community college tuition-free, free college proposals are all the rage among the Democratic presidential candidates. From Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s, D-Mass., plan to Sen. Bernie Sanders’, I-Vt., nearly every candidate boasts some version of a free college proposal.

The logic is as alluring as it is faulty. Free college would ultimately curtail students’ ability to make the right choices for themselves, by crowding out the emerging innovative options most likely to make a difference in their lives.