Those with college degrees make more. So if you forgive student loan debt, you're giving a ton of money to people who are largely doing very well.
One can make a large variety of very stupid life-altering choices at 25, these people should have known better. I would say, again unless you're trying to be a doctor or a lawyer your student loans should be capped at 100k. That would eliminate most of the most outrageous behavior. I know for myself I took a modest 20,000 or so in loans and that changed my life forever. That allowed me to go to college, and escape my horrible family who like not paying bills and getting evicted.
If you forgive the student loans, the counter argument becomes get rid of the student loans and then people who are responsible with them. Like myself, no longer have a ladder out of poverty. Honest to God, I have no sympathy for someone who with a college education decides it would be a good idea to take out another $200,000 in loans in order to get into a low paying field. Likewise if someone went and took their inheritance and bet it all on bitcoin, I wouldn't want a law passed reimbursing them.
Make more =/= "doing real well".
Some are doing well, some aren't, many are struggling. And the ones who are just getting by aren't having kids, which is really going to bite this nation in the long run.
>One can make a large variety of very stupid life-altering choices at 25
Where's that 25 coming from, eh? People apply to colleges when they're 17. That determines how big of a loan they'll end up with.
>these people should have known better
> I know for myself I took a modest 20,000
When? Did you bother to check tuition costs today?
Better than what? Than not go to a university that aligns with
> I would say, again unless you're trying to be a doctor or a lawyer your student loans should be capped at 100k.
"Should" is a nice word. My double-major undergrad took me five years, and I ended up with over $20K in loans while my tuition was free, because neither dorms (or off-campus housing) nor food were free, and that $25K didn't even cover those expenses.
And no, commute was not an option; and it was, indeed, a good choice of school (not to mention, free tuition).
$100K over 5 years barely covers living expenses[1], but let's be conservative and say the living expenses are paid with $50K over 4 years (by sharing an off-campus room with someone and subsisting on ramen).
Now, the fun part, tuition. Out-of-state tuition can be anywhere from $15K to $40K; it's about $38K in Texas A&M, for example, which is not what people would think is a prestigious school. $27K/year is just about average[2]
So out-of-state school puts us over the $100K for a 4-year degree right away. Tough luck if your state doesn't have great schools for your major!
Fine, let's settle for in-state tuition. Nationwide it's $10K/year on the average, but say, you were unfortunate enough to grow up in Pennsylvania or Illinois, where it's $15K/year[2][3].
Then again, having spent $60K on tuition and $50K on life over 4 years, we are $110K in the red. Bummer.
On the average, living expenses + tuition for a 4 year degree (in-state) is $80K; throw in books, supplies, transportation, and it's $100K[4].
That's average, meaning quite a few people attending public schools in-state end up paying more.
Any private college? Any college out of state? Any of the more expensive states?
Or simply not getting into one of the cheaper public schools in your state?
Or actually choosing a good program?
That's $200K over 4 years very easily.
> I have no sympathy for someone who with a college education decides it would be a good idea to take out another $200,000 in loans in order to get into a low paying field.
Yeah, it's totally reasonable to expect 17-year-olds to estimate correctly how well paid they will be in 4 years in the field of their choice.
We don't trust them with making any adult choices, except this one.
>If you forgive the student loans, the counter argument becomes get rid of the student loans and then people who are responsible with them
That's quite a leap of logic you have there, friend.
The first thing is to make student loans dismissible in bankruptcy. That makes the student loan just like any other loan. Bankruptcy exists for a reason.
Then, canceling the student debt just resets the game that was rigged in 1976 by making student loans different from the others. Education loans are lucrative, especially when given to responsible people like you. The banks won't pass on this opportunity (why would they?).
Finally, see my other comment[5] about how the most likely outcome is that the tuition costs will go drastically down. Availability of these loans is the reason the education is not affordable! You wouldn't need the loans if we didn't allow them.
Before the 1976 legislation, you could pay off your tuition working a part-time job on the weekends.
In 1975, six weeks of work at minimum wage paid your tuition at a public school.
Today, it's 33 weeks. Five times as much. If you're lucky.
We can and must go back to where we were 50 years ago. And the banks have to pay for milking us for those 50 years.
People like us won't be hurt when the banks pay up.
[1]https://www.collegecovered.com/paying-for-college/real-colle...
[2]https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college
[3]https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/average-col...
[4]https://www.valuepenguin.com/student-loans/average-cost-of-c...
For 3rd year and above >$12,500-No more than $5,500 of this amount may be in subsidized loans
For sake of this example, let's say they let you take out this much for all 4 years. That leaves you at 50k. This assumes your parents can't take out a Plus loan.
Your very unlikely to be able to get 200k in undergrad loans without a co-signer. If you don't have a co signer your effectively capped at 50k.
This is a story about grad student debt. This is a story about, at a minimum 22 year olds ( normally a bit older) deciding to make a choice. You can make a ton of life altering choices at 22.
If we just got rid of loans for grad school, we're taking away an entire life path. For many taking grad school loans leads to a much higher paying career. You don't hear stories about someone who takes out 100k in grad school loans, but then lands a job paying 145k.
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-graduate-schools/payin...
>The median earnings for full-time, year-round workers holding bachelor's degrees was $66,536 in 2019, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. With a master's degree, median earnings for full-time employees jumped to $81,636. With a doctoral degree, median earnings were $113,578, and the amount for individuals holding a professional degree was $127,487.
None of these people in this article were forced into blowing $200,000 on a degree which isn't going to help them make much more money. The best thing about America is people generally do have a lot of leeway in how they live their lives. And the dark side of the European system is many people just can't get into any type of college, I've met these kids attending community college in America since the European schools wouldn't take them.
By far my biggest disappointment with the current administration is not pushing more for free community college, that would nudge people in the right direction. I went to community college and I worked and that's how I paid my living expenses.
I was working full time, already making 100k a year ,when I finished my BA at a CSU.
Let me ride this tangent for a bit, in California you have two state school systems. You have the UC system, which treats college like a vacation with a hint of learning. These schools are actively hostile to anyone with a job.
Then you have my alma mata, the CSU system. There you'll actually have flexible schedules where you can work a full-time job and still attend school. Of course UCs are viewed as more prestigious. Adults have a right to make choices. Everyone who attended this USC program wanted to plaster USC on their resume. They all had the option of attending cheaper schools.
It's not nearly as simple as looking at a few extreme cases and deciding to forgive a trillion dollars in student loan debt. I'd agree more regulation is needed here, but in general people need to take more personal responsibility.
Sure, but plenty of parents do take out PLUS loans - which are capped at whatever the tuition is. Aside from that, many lenders are handing out loans without cosigners[1]. And as the 2008 crisis has shown us, that's not an error: they are gambling.
>This is a story about grad student debt
OK, but the discussion is about student debt, not grad student debt. I think it's reasonable to assume that most people would be talking about undergraduate debt cancelation.
As for those absurdly expensive Masters degrees - the one in the article is borderline a scam.
>If we just got rid of loans for grad school, we're taking away an entire life path.
Again, it's quite a leap from debt cancelation to loans not being available to anyone ever, particularly for grad school. As you said, graduate school students are older, and graduate degrees often do pay off. Why would the banks pass on a money-making opportunity?
The degrees that are a solid investment would not disappear (and neither would loans for them), but the scammy ones (like in the article) would.
>By far my biggest disappointment with the current administration is not pushing more for free community college
Amen to that.
>Then you have my alma mater, the CSU system
OK, off-topic, but I'm going to live right next to CSU East Bay campus, and would appreciate any info about that system. One of my 2022 goals is getting involved in community outreach (math education / talks / etc); trying to remedy the damage done by our education systems when it comes to mathematics, particularly hoping to reach working adults.
Would love to hear your thoughts about that.
[1] https://loans.usnews.com/student-loans-without-co-signer
