You must be rich if you go to college.
Not everybody who goes to college is rich :whisper:
There is financial aid through loans and there are plenty of scholarships floating around (some based on your academic achievements others simply because you're a certain ethnicity).
If you're in the lower income bracket the government will pay for a good portion of your education if not all of it (not a loan). There are also programs that will help pay off good portions of your student loan http://www.americorps.gov/. Some jobs (not through a government program) will even sponsor your education as you're working for them.
Even if you aren't in America there are alternatives in most developed countries for paying for college.