OK, I have to ask one more time. Suppose President Biden cancels all student debt. What happens next?
It just starts piling up again for new students? State universities are forced to cut tuition and fees dramatically? The federal government starts massively subsidizing all university education?
Or do we just hold a student debt jubilee every decade or so? What's the story here?
Yep. Makes zero sense to cancel student without a comprehensive, long-term solution. No American should have to go into debt to get a university degree.
There are some programs--but they've not been well run. The student loan service companies have had problems. Student loan payments are limited to a % of your income, and if you make payments for X number of years, the rest of the balance will be forgiven. And I presume there are other requirements.
Alas more student aid is typically followed by jumps in tuition.
Fixed it for you: Alas jumps in tuition typically follow from cuts in direct funding by the states which, in turn, is followed by the need for more aid.
Alas more student aid is typically followed by jumps in tuition.
Yes, as your and others' comments indicate, this is a problem. You get the same issue with Medicare, actually. The way around it is to implement a form of price controls for tertiary education. Have the feds pick up tuition at any university (private non-profit* or public) that can hold the price to a certain level (call it $12,000). Fancy colleges wouldn't opt in. But a lot of colleges—including hundreds of state universities—could probably make that work. Raise the subsidy only slowly, ideally no more than the rate of inflation. Baumol's cost disease (I'd imagine) probably means we'd have to rely more on remote learning as time goes by. One benefit of this model is that it doesn't reward states that have been stingy with respect to public education (the plans that have been touted by Warren and Sanders suffer from this flaw).
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/07/12/what-elizabeth-warrens-free-college-plan-gets-wrong/
*For profit colleges for obvious reasons should not be allowed anywhere near such a system.
The choice is between bailing out the leaky boat, and letting some folks drown. You might want a new boat, but you're not getting one, at least anytime soon.
I think we're gonna need a bigger boat
"No American should have to go into debt to get a university degree."
That is an absurd statement of policy and absurd misallocation of resources, priviledging a certain already socially and economically advantaged class over the working class and a whole class of students for whom Uni is not only not a good solution but from an economic perspective, isn't advantageous.
In the end this policy is favouring a certain loud sub-elite and disfavouring the working class.
Isn't free high school an absurd misoallocation of resources and policy that privileges certain people over others?
It certainly was 1000% true when free public education up to college was first implemented. It was an elitist policy that worked out pretty well.
No, it is not, it is basic. And always was.
However University is not and one already has evident issues in misallocation and inappropriate focus - while adored of course by the Uni educated Left and the very visible and vocal Uni educated Left youth - for significant swaths of the population that are not uni academically inclined and can benefit better and be better aligned to technical training and apprenticeships for upskilling blue collar labour.
the dollars to be spent on rewarding essentially middle class and upwardly mobile uni attendees who chose poorly remunerated in first years degrees would be better spent on an investment in uprgrading neglected and outdated public (blue collar rewarding) technical education infrastructure rather than leaving this to the domain of scamming for profit pseudo-schools.
But of course Uni educated Lefties as very prominent here and generally online are blind to their self-regarding focus and blind to their cultural disdain and myopia in terms of technical education for working class applications.
This aid would presumably cover community college, 2 year programs, mechanic’s schools, truck driving schools, etc. The idea that this would not benefit blue collar workers is deeply mistaken.
Very few jobs that don’t require a 4 year degree but still pay a middle class wage don’t require some sort of training that in the US costs thousands of dollars.
Self serving sophistry that is either dishonest, ignorant or spin.
The data show the sob-story debt levels are actually rather concetrated elsewhere.
(Brookings: https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/10/09/who-owes-the-most-in-student-loans-new-data-from-the-fed/)
"Likewise, education debt is concentrated in households with high levels of educational attainment. In 2019, the new Fed data show, households with graduate degrees owed 56 percent of the outstanding education debt—an increase from 49 percent in 2016. For context, only 14 percent of adults age 25 or older hold graduate degrees. The 3 percent of adults with professional and doctorate degrees hold 20 percent of the education debt. These households have median earnings more than twice as high as the overall median ($106,000 vs. $47,000 in 2019)."
The pretence that somehow an enormous give away to generally economically priviledged with generally above average economic prospects is justified by some ricochet effect on the working class (asserted, unapparent in the data) is sophistry and attempted sleigth of hand.
So no, the idea is not "deeply mistaken" rather it is founded in actual data.
A poorly targetted action like this (1) is based in the Lefty mythology about Youth Vote, that wonderful Savoir promised since the illusion of the 1970s, never arriving; (2) self-serving navel gazing as policy by Lefty uni grads stressed by their debt loads and converting their self-interest into a grand tale; (3) modern uni grad dominated Left unconscious social disdain and disregard for the working class economically (except as abstraction) and culturally (bad people culturally, not wokey enough).
Projection: the post.
Your desperate grasping for political and policy reasons why this is bad and why it WILL HURT DEMS and HURT THE UNIVERSE are clearly just your own butthurt.
This is much more likely to do nothing than any real harm. And the harm to the extent it's real is already happening with people like you getting mad about something that hasn't happened (which is why waiting was stupid politics).
At the time, free public high school for everyone was clearly not basic, it was not utilized by everyone and obviously we haven't always had free public high school for everyone.
Your class based argument is the exact same argument against free/low cost, primary schools.
Given the luxury of hindsight, we all, yourself included, agree that the class based argument against free public primary school is a comically bad one.
The tradeoff you present is obviously not actually a tradeoff. We can do both, we can do one or the other, we can do neither. There is no rule or law that requires university education to be outrageously expensive because WHATABOUT TRADESCHOOLS!?
Education can and should be extremely cheap...whether that's grade school, high school, trade school or university.
Your anger at college educated lefties isn't a good rationale for expensive colleges. Just like past culture war anger at well-to-do high school grads wasn't a good reason to make high school outrageously expensive.
If half of Americans did not go to high school then it would make sense to have it paid for by loans, like college.
Since the vast majority of Americans attend high school and an even larger supermajority of those who pay significant taxes attend high school there are efficiency gains from paying for it from taxes.
That said, switching to loans and making students responsible might actually be a good idea since it would probably force the government to allow school choice and make effective and useful highschool educations an economic imperative.
Earning a degree isn't simply standing up to receive your privilege. A good university requires serious effort.
I wonder, though, if the amount of public support should increase from year to year, as the student provides more proof of their ability to benefit from higher education.
Lounsbury: Your assumptions are not clear. If everybody who qualified got free college that would remove most of the advantage that the wealthy have. Since everybody can get free high school there is a fairly good chance to qualify, although the rich can get special private high school.
Other countries have free college, but only for those who qualify.
The idea that providing free or very affordable higher education is "priviledging [sic] a certain already socially and economically advantaged class over the working class" is so fucking stupid, illogical and absurd I'm surprised you could even type those words out without having a stroke.
Classic old school conservative attempts to divide and conquer. First off you don't throw away capable people who happen to come from poor working class families, you provide pathways to education so they can reach their full potential. My dad and his brothers were the classic case - his family was crammed in a working class apartment while their father scraped by and dropped dead of a heart attack. My dad and one brother manged to get Air Force scholarships both had long sucessful careers, my dad in Meteorology, my uncle in the aviation business. The oldest was a professor.
Second waving away all college debt because there's a wealthy doctor with school debt or a lawyer in a tony law firm is undoubtedly cruel to the millions of ordinary Americans who were conned into taking on more debt than their careers could handle because you don't know what life holds when you are 18 and not everyone has saavy parents to warn you off.
I think we need to have debt relief but under a needs based threshold forgive debt for public servants, those in public service occupations like social workers and teachers, those who were conned by fake trade schools and maybe generally a flat $20,000 or so forgiveness to everyone making under a certain income to catch most other struggling folks.
Parallel to that we need to restore funding to the university system so that tuition costs can be kept in line, no need to go into so much debt to get a basic degree at a state school.
Maybe instead we should eliminate government guarantees for education debt.
Lenders should consider school, degree program, student qualifications, and ongoing grades when lending.
I think you would then see a dramatic drop in loan defaults.
There is nothing "absurd" about a high level of education attainment, which is a fundamental building block of a productive economy.
Quit pretending Congress will do anything. If they could, we wouldn't be talking about unilaterial executive actions.
The only thing that will make them do something is if Biden, so you're 180º incorrect.
A lot of liberals out there saying "fuck you I got mine" and hiding behind fake policy reasons to justify their resentment.
if you ask that same question, why would we ever give stimulus checks or any other benefit? Is it not fair to kids born in 2022 that they didn't get the 2021 stimulus check???
When you say Congress will do nothing about this, I hope you are including Su Santo Socialista de Monteverde Bernardo Arenas, La Cacique de Cambridge Isabel Guerra, & Senorita Cosita Alejandrina Ocasio-Kardashian.
I think the idea is supposed to be that by cancelling debt now, it sets a precedent and standard for legislating a permanent subsidy on education. Now, there already is this subsidy in the form of the federal loans - because of their availability, it's allowed colleges and universities to keep cranking up the tuition to whatever the market will bear.
So while cancellation of debt would be nice, what would really be even better is just making permanent some of the temporary measures around PSLF during COVID (expanded eligibility of payments, for example) that seem to be things that are at the discretion of the administration/department of education. Legislating the automatic forgiveness of federal loans under certain circumstances (up to X amount, going to a state school or certain set of schools, etc.) would be ideal, though.
Sounds fine to me and my 6 figure debt. Europeans get paid less but have no school debt and that seems fine to me.
But in fact a number of changes arw being done to improve the situation in the future you just didn't care enough to look for them.
Why? A university degree is an investment.
Should a farmer go into debt to buy a combine?
Should a plumber go into debt to buy a work van?
Should a new dentist go into debt to buy the equipment to open a new office?
I think we all agree yes.
So why shouldn't a person go into debt to get a medical degree, and MBA, and BS in Comp Sci, etc?
1. A lot of young people have a reason to vote Dem (maybe).
2. And a marker is laid down, that we *can* do something about this.
The truth is that the only reason we don't fix the problem is that too many deep-pocketed interests like things the way they are. No, canceling current debt isn't
a great solution. But it's better than nothing, and if it were done a few times, it
might force those deep-pocketed interests to actually stop blockading, and start
compromising.
Question though: does cancelling student debt mean that the government pays it all? Or that we just shit in the creditors’ hats? I assume the first but I don’t know
Either way, it really screws the incentive structure for going to college.
Assuming the sane option of a government payment: Recipe for more and more bloat from universities funded by big budgets that are in no way tied to quality of education. Even more money wasted on useless for-profit colleges. Students who aren’t capable of succeeding in college will tend to go because why not, then not use their degree
If student debt is a big problem, squeeze colleges to charge less and spend less on useless crap. Dump more money into university research (which undergrads pay for) and set strict regulations on what tuition payments can be used for
I understand the sentiment but doing something is not automatically better than doing nothing. Especially if the “something” is ill-conceived
“Question though: does cancelling student debt mean that the government pays it all? Or that we just shit in the creditors’ hats?”
The money is owed to the government, possibly through third parties but the government was the source of the funds that were loaned out. So one agency of the government would be paying another agency of the government. I don’t think a college debt jubilee is the best idea either, but no creditors would be shat on.
What are total costs that universities spend per student?
How does that compare to 10 years ago? 20+ years ago?
How does it compare to other advanced countries?
You sound certain that higher education costs too much, but does it?
I'm certain that tuition is too high at far too many state universities. My mom was able to pay for my education via a part time job she took on after being a stay at home mom for 25 years. Due to my parents generosity I had no school debt. Fat chance a part time job could cover the current tuition rate there.
The problem is that the Feds are willing to backstop loans that are too large and schools don’t have any skin in thr game. The real solution is smaller loans amounts and schools would have to reduce tuition or take some financial risk to charge what they charge. If a student can borrow $100k, a school will charge $100k, but how much if you can only borrow $50k?
"Dump more money into university research (which undergrads pay for) and set strict regulations on what tuition payments can be used for"
Tuition, whether undergrad or graduate, does not pay for research. Nealry all university research is funded through government grants, with the rest being funded by private organizations or directly by certain industries/businesses.
And a lot of non-uni oriented or not-taking-out-debt to go to fancy pants private unis will see yet another give-away by the cultural elitist Left to their expense.
Campus Radical chic politics in place of real policy
Come to America and learn the real story. Most debt is owed by folks going to state schools not fancy pants private schools, also there's debt owed by poor folks conned into going to trade schools like Pheonix U or ITT Institute etc.
The huge loans owed by folks who went for professional degrees isn't as dire a problem though the lawyer glut does mean there's a bunch of under employed lawyers in debt peonage.
Hopefully, it means thousands of grateful young people will be able to get going in making this country better without this particular burden weighing on them.
Tens of millions.
Just cancelling debt will just make people mad. Those who paid off their debt will feel like suckers. People who didn’t go to schools with high tuition, and worked and sacrificed will feel like suckers. Parents who took out loans themselves to pay for their children’s tuition and now are paying it off will feel cheated. People who didn’t go to college because it was too expensive will be angry.
I do have a solution. The government could buy the loans and lower the interest rate to what the government pays in interest. Interest could be charged on the amount of the loan, but payment would be on principle first with no interest charged on interest after the full principal amount has been paid. Payments could be made as part of income tax with loan payments as a percentage of income. I believe most people would consider something like this to be fair.
Fantastic argument for repealing all tax cuts for the rich since 1980. What about the poor suckers who paid Eisenhower's tax rates before that? Unfair! Only possible answer is to claw all that money back from the richies who didn't pay anything later.
Honestly, I don’t see the connection.
With regard to tax cuts for the wealthy I’d say that Republicans have been really successful in bamboozling people in to believing that “trickle down” stuff and thinking that those cuts will lead to more jobs and that they will pay for themselves. If Democrats can convince ordinary folks that forgiving college debt will be good for them I’d be all for it. My thought is to give relief to those burdened by tuition debt without creating resentment.
Um, the argument is that no one from a later generation can enjoy a better policy because that would be unfair to anyone in an earlier generation, right? That's an argument that applies to pretty much anything the government does at all, and especially to tax cuts.
+1
It will piss off a lot of people. And low interest (or even no interest) loans are a better option.
And extend maturity date
OH NO IT WILL PISS A LOT OF PEOPLE OFF BETTER NOT DO IT DEMS.
This is such stupid politics. Let me translate it for you:
A bunch of richer Democrats are butthurt that they aren't getting something, LARPing as if they were Republicans.
It won’t be the “richer Democrats” who are “butthurt.” Centrist working class voters are the people who will be annoyed…..you know, the people who voted Biden over Bernie…..and the reason Trump is texting “truths” from Florida rather than tweets from the White House.
But go on, tell us how stupid we all are for not recognizing the average voter is really a Bernie Bro at heart.
And as I suggested below, you could also extend the maturity date and have the extra years at 0% interest. This way you could dramatically reduce the monthly burden and not add to total repayment. Also, there should be some criteria to qualify. Not overly burdensome, but it can’t apply to every loan. Final thought is: why this particular generation of students and how did this happen? It doesn’t address how we avoid in futur
The obvious solution is to just make them dischargeable in bankruptcy. This would require an act of Congress and would more or less end this question.
But since we can't do that and since not everything is perfect, this is the best relief we can offer.
As if not doing this everyone will suddenly say "oh that Biden is an inflation HAWK." Another month or two of high inflation isn't changing the politics of that.
"Fuck you, I got mine" RICH DEMOCRATS edition is making me sick.
Nothing holds back a nation more than the egotistical feeling of "If something affected me, then everyone should be affected too" when there is the possibility of sparing someone else of the same burden.
Or rather better, you should invest in non-Uni educational training rather than continuing on the US Left the ongoing alienation and disdain for the working class.
Spare me the sanctimony. In the US there isn't a lefty disdain for the working class and the lefties are the ones clamoring for better funding of Community Colleges throughout the US - Dr. Jill Biden is on the faculty of one near me. These colleges have a number of programs for getting into the trades as well as 2 year degrees in various practical majors like Accounting.
Political poison. This will drive more working class voters away from the Democratic party.
[citation needed]
Another meme with no factual basis. It's like "Democrats are doing something I don't like that's popular among a core consitutency so I'd better warn them that they will lose if they win."
This is why Democrats lose. They think politics is 3d chess. It's not even checkers. It's just win makes momentum.
Working class voters aren't coming back, dude.
There are tons of working class folks who support Democrats. Don't assume that working class means a white guy in a diner in Ohio.
The majority of the Working class supported Hillary Climpton & joebiden in the last two presidential general elections, they just happen to not look like the kind of people morrospy would want as neighbors of his Greenpoint brownstone.
Shorter answer: brownstones are the only brown thing morrospy can stomach.
Good thoughts.
I guess we can never ever give a benefit again because the people who didn't get it will be mad.
Better pay the estates of people who died before 1935 their social security or else it's a bad policy too!
Your solution is basically just the government paying for the loans out of the deficit, which is basically just forgiving the loans. We should definitely do that for loans that meet certain requirements (up to X amount, certain schools, maybe certain post-graduation job categories, etc.)
But I have news for you overall: even those of us who went to schools that aren't high-cost graduated with 40K+ in debt, so the commonly cited 50K forgiveness really applies whether you went to a "cheap" state school or a "fancy" private one.
"Just cancelling debt will just make people mad. Those who paid off their debt will feel like suckers. People who didn’t go to schools with high tuition, and worked and sacrificed will feel like suckers."
This kind of dumb crabs-in-a-bucket resentment isn't entitled to any consideration.
The obvious answer is that this is exactly like George Bush (or pick your GOP politician) passing a tax cut which "expires" in 10 years. They know it will be extended, because of the political jiujitsu created by passing the tax cut in the first place.
"State universities are forced to cut tuition and fees dramatically? "
This is bold a statement, considering States' under-funding of their universities and colleges is why students took so many Fed loans to compensate for the rising costs. Dig around and you realize up to 75% of the changes in school costs were driven by states reducing their funding.
I'm so tired of everyone ignoring this and flailing about the loan part. It's getting to the point of being willful ignorance. So now they want people in one state to pay for another state's lack of school funding by having the Feds pay for it and increase everyone's debt.
The progressive left's squawking about debt relief is shows how idealism is often a cover for stupidity.
I do not believe any state, at any point, has reduced college funding to its state college system. (Per student funding might have gone down, but I don't believe total dollars have ever gone down.) If you have information showing otherwise, I'd like to see it.
After the 2008 recession, state universities got hit hard.
https://www.cbpp.org/research/state-budget-and-tax/state-higher-education-funding-cuts-have-pushed-costs-to-students
OK, this says that the overall was cut--at least, adjusting for inflation. I may have been wrong.
But note that is spends almost all it's words talking about per-student funding? Per-student funding is not the number I'm talking about.
Sure they have: https://bityl.co/C0Z7
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/fancy-dorms-arent-the-main-reason-tuition-is-skyrocketing/
> So now they want people in one state to pay for another state's lack of school funding by having the Feds pay for it and increase everyone's debt.
That's how the fucking federal government works--and YOU are complaining about willfull ignorance?
My state gets like 80 cents on the dollar in taxes back. Red states take more. Welcome to a commonwealth.
"That's how the fucking federal government works--and YOU are complaining about willfull ignorance?"
Wooosh. A swing and a miss. This isn't disaster relief, or national social policy, or aspects of the defense budget, yadda, yadda.
These are State manged and funded institutions. So the Feds pay for my local library when we have a shortage? Our police depts? I didn't realize the Feds had a responsibility to manage State budgets, by back stopping them whenever they make crappy financial decisions.
If you want the Federal govt to nationalize (manage and fund) college education, that's another debate.
And yes, if my State managed their budget well and our citizens kept their taxes up to help students fund their college, I'd be a wee bit pissed that I now have to cover for the financial irresponsibility of another State who cut their taxes and failed students.
Amen on the state funding and universities basically making students use increasing amounts of federal loans to cover that gap.
Colleges raise tuition to attract students who are willing to borrow more (knowing Democratic electoral prospects will require another cancelation at some point).
Nope. Fictional account of what is happening. Based more on political tropes
Over the last few decades, we have shifted the burden of higher education from state/local governments to students.
A debt cancellation plan means we would instead shift from state/local governments to the federal government.
This is not the worst plan.
The above comment about not bailing out the boat because you can't come up with a plan to redesign the structure of the boat is a good one.
>The above comment about not bailing out the boat because you can't come up with a plan to redesign the structure of the boat is a good one.
It is and it's an easy one to make as are most of the refutations of all of these butthurt people suddenly getting their Ayn Rand on when it affects them.
This is just a straight political pander to a very narrow constituency and has some strong detractors. The actual problem has never really been defined. Certainly some people are struggling to service their debt, but what about those who are managing and enjoying higher earnings as a result of their degree? Wipe that debt. This was Elizabeth Warren’s solution in search of a problem. Biden does any of this at his own peril, he will get shredded for it
OH NO A POLITICAL PANDER! Better go vote for the coup people.
How dare Democrats do political pandering or anything that my "policy" views contradict! It would be bad!
People clearly punish pandering politics and demand only the most technocratic governance, right?
This is why we lose.
Cut your snark and just ask the question you meant to ask: "How does this one-off action solve the problem of high tuition costs?"
It doesn't, but nothing else has so why is this suddenly the only terms upon which anything can be done?
Have you considered that the one thing that might actually spur Congress into action is just this? (No, you haven't because you're mad someone else is getting something like a big fat GOP baby)
You make a lot of assumptions. Maybe don't do that.
My car loan payments are really holding me back financially. Hopefully the government will cancel those loans as well.
Yeah, and how do your car loans contribute to an educated workforce or really anything back to humanity? Great analogy. If you learned to reason that way at your university you really do deserve your money back.
I need to my car to get to work so I can do my job and give back to humanity.
If this country can afford Trillions in tax cuts for wealthy individuals, it can afford to cancel this student debt.
They don't have too much in the way of tax cuts. The top 1% of earners pay 39% of all federal income taxes. More than the bottom 90% combined.
Here's my point of view.
I went to a small private college from 1988-1992. After what tuition my parents could pay and a bit of financial aid and a few scholarships, I paid the rest through loans handled directly by the state and I ended up owing about $191/mo for seven years and $150/mo for another three years. Even with inflation that was pretty manageable back then.
Around that time tho they got the "privatize" bug and moved loans to private companies because they'd be more "efficient." Problem: You're asking banks to offer huge loans to young people with little to no credit history and no job for the next four years. (Plus of course the constant "YOU HAVE TO GO TO COLLEGE" drumming those kids are subjected to.) So to encourage banks to give those loans the government has to promise to back them. Now banks and colleges have cart blanche to give out loans in any amount they want knowing they'll be covered by the government even if they go into default. Prices go up, pockets get lined, an entire predatory private college industry scam arises, and tuition debt explodes.
I look at the weight some of my younger friends are buried under compared to what I had to deal with and it's depressing and infuriating. When I hear about cancelling debt I see a release for a system that never should have developed into putting these kids in the situation they're in now. I also hope and assume that cancelling debt would be accompanied by some kind of realignment of the whole student loan system to make sure this doesn't happen again, whether that means reforming the loan system, making state colleges free or cheap again, or whatever. Would that happen? I dunno, but that's my two cents.
Remember, not all of these are young people. I know lots of folks, including me, who went back to grad school later. I am in my mid 70s and still have some loans I would love to see cancelled. IBR is great for keeping payments low, but it doesn't stop the interest from adding up. I owe as much now as I did when I graduated.
Yes, cancel debt every seven years. That's what the Bible says, and all Republicans would have to vote for this.
Someone needs to write an article about how pissed off the "liberal" pundit class is about student loan cancellation—something we're only talking about because Congress is broke and we have the few unilateral executive policy tools out there to do anything. Much better would be to reduce public service foregiveness to something like 3-5 years so that people can do that and be done. 10 years is a long time and makes it just given to people who were already going to do that career. 3-5 would encourage a lot of people to try service like things.
But that requires Congress and we all know that's not happening. Come on.
All of these "policy" reasons are just the same thing Republicans have used to construct an ideology justifying their plutocracy. They are largely post hoc justifications for your rage that someone else is getting something. You would all see this is if it was Social Security privatization.
If it save even 1-5 seats this fall it's worth it to me. I know all of you are suddenly in pure wonk mode on this, but I think you're all just bitter.
The plan going forward is free college education, but only for those born in odd-numbered years. People born in even-numbered years will pay for it.
Who cares as long as my debt is cancelled?
This is America! There is no 'we' in America -- but there is a 'me'!
Thank you.
Always good to have you back.
Dems: we are struggling with non college educated voters, what should we do? I got it!! A trillion dollar tax payer finance debt cancellation for college educated voters. Brilliant!!
I graduated from college nearly 20 years ago with a full scholarship that paid for my tuition. My parents went into bankruptcy to pay for everything else just to get me through college so I may have a better life… and aside from around five or so years I’ve mostly worked a long string of near minimum wage jobs. I couldn’t imagine what my life would be like with student loans. I’m facing bankruptcy just from the fact my pay hasn’t risen any while everything I pay for has in some cases doubled in price. I have no healthcare, and I’m almost 40.
I’m not the only one in a similar boat. We have now two generations who are crippled by debt they signed up for when most were 17 with absolute zero chance of paying it back in their lifetimes because they were lied to saying there’d be jobs waiting for them when they graduated, and we’re arguing on here what happens if the president somehow forgives the debt? We should be asking what happens if we don’t. We should be asking what else can be done to save the economy when the last of baby boomers retire. They’ll be the last generation to retire if we don’t repair all the cracks threatening to take the whole house down.
I graduated high school into a recession, finished college right before a near depression, laid off in another recession, and I’m probably facing another layoff in the one we’re about to go into that might make all the other ones of my adulthood into a joke. What are all these people expected to pay their student loans with? Even your fabled charts show that wages have crashed.
Mark my words. There are going to be near entire generational bankruptcies soon similar to the great depression.
i've got to ask: what was your field of study and what kind of jobs have you had that pay near minimum wage nearly 20 years after you (presumably) graduated? i'm aware there are a bunch of fields that pay crap especially to new graduates. i was in one. took me a long time to make decent (not great) money. but generally speaking, with some experience and a little tenacity you can find jobs that pay enough to get by.
That post has "troll" written all over it. He got a "full scholarship" to college but his parents went into bankruptcy to "get him through college?" And yes, as you point out, two decades of near minimum wage work post degree: did he major in convenience store cashiering?
All I know is that when a relatively intelligent Republican comes out as an outright fascist who supports marijuana legalization and student loan forgiveness, you can kiss democracy goodbye.
The Democrats have nothing to lose by doing either - ain't no one who votes for the Democrats because they're against fascism going to switch to voting Republican because of marijuana legalization or student loan debt forgiveness.
But please, do be a'scared about the mythical "swing voter" who is going to opt into fascism because they didn't get debt on a piece of paper wiped out.
This country is fucked.
This putative pol isn't John Fetterman?
If it were up to me, I'd love to see student loans rewritten to charge interest rates that mirror the actual rate of inflation. The rates people pay now are far too high, given how difficult it is to get out of paying it. We could cancel the remaining debt for anyone who has already paid enough to cover the principal.
Public service forgiveness programs should also be expanded and made simpler. Perhaps we could offer partial forgiveness for less than 10 years in the program.
If Biden wanted to write off about $10,000 per borrower, that would go a long way to help the poorest debtors, who are typically college dropouts.
Just don't expect people to reward Democrats for loan forgiveness. Obamacare certainly didn't create legions of grateful voters, and this is going to piss off as many people as it helps.
It seems almost unthinkable that Congress would pass comprehensive college cost reform legislation right now. Without that, loan forgiveness today will just result in no one paying their debts off in future. Everyone will expect another jubilee. The biggest beneficiaries from that will be for-profit online schools, which will be able to expand much faster than brick-and-mortar institutions.
I think current debt is largely a sunk cost and should be relieved only on a needs based basis.
However, going forward I'd propose the feds pick up the entire bill for college on the condition that they get a straight 10% of income for life. 10% is far below the average college salary premium so no one loses.
That 10% is used to fund the 'free college' program on a pay as you go basis (like Social Security! And Medicare!) in perpetuity. So a few years of high start up costs followed by a smooth self-funding machine that takes the whole issue off the table.
However, going forward I'd propose the feds pick up the entire bill for college on the condition that they get a straight 10% of income for life.
Yes! Hell, we should do the same with K-12 education! It's perfectly in keeping with economic justice to require the non-rich to forego ten percent of lifetime earnings over and above the taxes they already pay to finance public education. It's true the wealthy won't have to opt into a system (they can pay out of pocket for fancy private schools). But we shouldn't blame Elon Musk's children for being born into a household with a $200 billion net worth. Also, making America's tax-transfer system less progressive should do wonders for the Democratic Party's political fortunes.
How about we stop issuing it at an interest rate higher than mortgages, if we're going to do it?
It's criminal that it's nondischageable and at credit-card levels.