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Are you against "forgiving" student loans?

Apr 12, 2024, 5:44 AM

If you are, then you're just jealous! That's according to this psycho with the LA Times.

Forgiving student loans is least we can do

BY LZ GRANDERSON

LOS ANGELES TIMES

President Joe Biden is at it again with student loan forgiveness.

Last summer, the Supreme Court ruled that he couldn’t use the HEROES Act – passed after 9/11, just as the Iraq War was escalating – to forgive federal student loan debt for roughly 20 million borrowers. Since then, his administration has been exploring other mechanisms to provide piecemeal relief. In February, he introduced the SAVE Plan, which helped nearly 153,000. This week, he outlined plans that could lift a financial burden off the shoulders of more than 30 million people in a country where more than 70% of people live check to check.

Some conservatives have accused Biden of trying to buy votes – as if Donald Trump offering tax breaks to a room full of billionaires was a policy-motivated decision. Others point out the president is only doing this to fulfill a campaign promise, which, for some reason, I thought was part of the job.

However, the most prevalent response to Biden’s attempt to forgive student loan debt is summed up in this quote from Malcolm X: “Envy blinds men and makes it impossible for them to think clearly.”

Nearly 60% of graduates of public universities in Texas had nearly $25,000 in loan debt in 2021. Almost 1.4 million Texans would have gotten relief from Biden’s first attempt. Two Texans with student loan debt sued the administration because they weren’t eligible. The case was tossed. But the suit highlights just how much this conversation is about individual fairness as opposed to societal benefit.

In America, the childless pay for schools they don’t need, and city dwellers pay for county roads they’ll never drive on. That kind of economic cooperation is needed in a land as vast as ours. Economist and author Robert H. Frank often writes about how the shift from society to self in our policies has really undermined our ability to be happy for others. And stats over the last 50 years support it. From 1949 to 1979, the incomes of the bottom 20% grew faster than those of the top 1%. That started to flip with the trickle-down economic policies of Ronald Reagan.

Student loan debt isn’t an impediment to the ultra-rich, who pay out of pocket for college, or even for many in the upper middle class, who have connections to turn their $400,000 degree into a $200,000-a-year starter job.

But for the bottom 20% of earners in our society, people who once had a chance to climb up the economic ladder, college has become a treacherous option.

That may appear like a personal problem for people who grow up in those lowest-earning households. But like public schools and country roads, we all need college to be accessible for people from all economic backgrounds. Out-of-control college costs and crushing student debt are everyone’s problem.

The annual cost to attend eight of our best schools averages more than $90,000. Today Americans are carrying nearly $2 trillion in debt ($150 billion just among Californians) for something that was once so affordable, a one-parent income could cover tuition for multiple children and still pay the mortgage.

Those days are long gone. What’s been put in its place is unsustainable. Biden’s attempts to forgive student loan debt don’t heal the wound or stop the damage to students of today and tomorrow, but they slow the bleeding for workers whose paychecks vanish into servicing insurmountable student loans.

Biden’s latest effort won’t directly help me. It may not help you. But should we let envy cloud our minds? Any help with college costs and loans is better for society as a whole than none. Why is it so hard for people to be happy for others?

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IMO, predatory loans would be loans where the terms are unreasonable and/or manipulated where the borrower is not or could not be clear on the terms.

I don't think "society" making kids feel like they have to go to college and have to get loans to do it is predatory...it might be stupid, but not predatory...nor is it something that taxpayers should be responsible for taking care of.

As for the interest rates, would they not have been defined in the terms of the loans? I assume they float based on LIBOR, SOFOR, or something along those lines. If that's true, then the "lenders" aren't changing the rates.

I also don't agree that students have "no choice" but to accept these loans. I know plenty of kids working their way through community college. Work in the day and classes at night or on-line. Normally takes them a little longer.

My company offers 100% tuition reimbursement to any employee. We have a number of hourly production workers working on 2nd and 3rd shift that take classes during the day...either in-person or on-line. As long as they make a C or higher in the class, we reimburse the cost of the class. A lot of places offer similar programs.

And finally...this is strictly my own observations and not based on a study or anything...but I have the impression that most people that struggle with student debt wither aren't working in their field of education or got degrees that don't have anywhere near the earning power to justify the debt level. That is simply poor decision making/parenting. For example, when coaching bball at my daughter's middle school I had a female teacher helping out that got an education degree from an Ivy League school and she's teaching middle school in Anderson making what I'm guessing is ~$50k and she has massive loan debt. She could have easily obtained the same job with a community college or state college degree. Or my wife's friend that is a social worker making ~$50k that got her bach and masters from Duke...in social work. She's been working for 10 yrs and still have something like $80k in student loans. And in my estimation has never adjusted her life style to be consistent with her financial situation...but she feel strongly her loan should be forgiven.

As for a fix...how about having forgive loans only to the extent that the schools that they were used on participate in the liability.

Are you against "forgiving" student loans?

Forgiving student loans is least we can do

Re: Are you against forgiving student loans?

Re: Are you against forgiving student loans?

Re: Are you against forgiving student loans?

Buying votes, plain and simple.***

I think LA Times subscriptions should be forgiven.***

Stealing and killing babies, the lefts two platforms.***

Re: Are you against "forgiving" student loans?

Yep... Just ask "who" actually got all that taxpayer backed student loan money??

Higher Ed admin bloat is 1000% the culprit in this situation

Honestly, I don't know how this hasn't sparked criminal investigations

Forgiving student loans is a short-sighted "fix"

How have student loans, in general, been predatory?***

It's a complicated cycle that...

I think you're misusing the term then...

I think when colleges and loan companies are assisting in...

Are the colleges and loan companies the ones pushing the idea...

Re: How have student loans, in general, been predatory?***

guess it just depends on the definition...

Re: Are you against "forgiving" student loans?

Absolutely

Yep, Dem strategists think they have found a clever way to buy votes.

Won't it be funny if it works, and all these folks elect Brandon, then the

There's nothing "funny" about 4 more years of this fustercluck administration.***

Welfare, they knew what they signed up for***

Re: Are you against "forgiving" student loans?

This article is TOTAL BS

we should forgive all loans for certain people

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