Poll: Biden executive order for student loan forgiveness

[Wolfpack Mustachian]

every policy decision about money is going to advantage some over others. Child tax credits for people who will never have children, solar credits for people who hate solar, or could never afford to go solar, etc. etc.

And some raised their kids before the credits, or installed solar before those credits.

Some people are always losing out on new directions, that doesn't mean they aren't the right way to go. 

for student loan forgiveness, seems a much better move than these oil subsidies.....

I can understand the sentiment, but oil subsidies is a pretty low bar to pass for reasons why to do something by comparison. I'm being a broken record, but to date in this thread, no one has addressed a true comparison of why the government should forgive student loan debts to people who statistically are better off than other segments of the population, as opposed to forgiving other forms of debt - credit card, payday loans, etc. etc.

There are millions of borrowers who have 10k or less of student loan debt who do not in fact have degrees.

Certainly there are. However, overall, statistically, people who went to college are better off than people who did not. If people want to try to propose something where we pay off student loan debt for people who didn't graduate, that's fine, but propose it. It would be an even harder sell, but then the argument could potentially be made that they're actually worse off. In general, though, the way student loan forgiveness is being packaged, there's no rationale that I've seen for forgiving it for that group as opposed to other debt which is also crippling, was taken on by people from predatory practices, etc. It really boggles my mind, because it seems in opposition to what Democrats purport to stand for - it's not helping out the people who need it the most. The issue is not whataboutism either. I'm talking about two situations that are extremely similar (not comparing the cost of student loan forgiveness to the cost of the Green New Deal or anything dissimilar like that), where the Democrats are all gung ho about this issue but with nary a peep about other issues.

OOOOO - so this about "the democrats", ok.

nary a peep about other issues? not sure where you are getting that. I think AOC is on constant peeping! about everything!

Currently, about relief for texas....

Um, no, it's not just about Democrats. I am a moderate, not a Democrat. I voted for Biden this time. I'm not trying to score political points, but I will not withhold criticism of a party that deserves it.

And yes, nary a peep. Texas relief is about a natural disaster. You are clearly missing what I am talking about, either intentionally or otherwise because you saw a criticism of Democrats and immediately jumped to your foregone conclusions. I was specifically and clearly talking about the other types of debt that could be forgiven. Have you seen any legitimate pushes for forgiving any of the other types of debt I have mentioned?

there is this:
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/02/coronavirus-stimulus-democrats-try-to-pass-1point9-trillion-relief-bill.html

Democrats’ proposal includes $1,400 direct payments to most Americans, a $400 per week federal jobless benefit through September, and $350 billion for state, local and tribal relief. It also puts $170 billion into K-12 schools and higher education institutions, along with $20 billion into a national vaccination program, among a slew of other provisions.

any student loan in there?
https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2021/02/01/what-the-new-stimulus-package-says-about-student-loans/?sh=7b90a9812e87

The new, $1.9 trillion stimulus package that President Joe Biden proposed doesn’t include any student loan cancellation. The stimulus plan instead focuses on other policy priorities like $1,400 stimulus checks and $400 a week unemployment insurance. Senate Republicans have proposed a separate $618 billion stimulus package — about a third the size of Biden’s stimulus plan — that also excludes student loan cancellation and offers $1,000 stimulus checks as a response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

I interpert that as the student loan issue is not a high priority for biden right now, although there are a few dems who are trying to push something through on the side of this relief package.

On one hand, with payments suspended and 0% interest on federal loans - I agree with not a priority. However, many people have private student student that are unaffected by those mitigation measures, and if you had consolidated your loans they may not have been affected by the 0%/no payment as well.  Likely the fed will do nothing to impact private loans anyway. Not sure where the consolidated come out.

So I'd say biden and most of his group are not that focused on the student loan thing. He probably just promised sanders that he would do it to get sanders to not derail things like he did in 2016.

The stimulus is certainly doing something, but it's still not a debt forgiveness. It's purpose is to keep the economy afloat and to help people in general who due to Covid are financially struggling.

I do agree that student loans are on the backburner with Democrats, but it was a fairly large campaign promise and arguably one that garnered votes for them (which is my criticism in general, it seems they were pushing this specific thing as a political football to garner votes, not because it'll help the most people).

I will, again, say that I give Biden credit for not bowing to the pressure for $50k when he said he wouldn't.

In regards to your comment about Trump's tax cuts - I didn't like them or think they were necessary. I did not support them, but in the same respect, a reduction in the tax someone pays is never going to generate as much frustration on my part as a government program that just gives out money. I can't speak for others, but that's why, for example, I would not support student loan forgiveness and actually post to talk about this compared to just simply not supporting Trump's tax cuts.

[maisymouser]

What I am gathering from this thread and especially the latest posts is that there is *PLENTY* of opposition to a one-time payout for student loan holders on both sides of the aisle. Look y'all, we have arrived at a bipartisan opinion! It's a Christmas Miracle!!! And it's not even March.

[Alternatepriorities]

One thing about this thread I don't feel is getting enough attention is the question of doing any of this by executive order...

Those in favor, do you really want to set the precedent that the executive branch can spend a trillion dollars without the consent of congress? Do you really want the next president you don't agree with to have that option?

[Bloop Bloop Reloaded]

As an example of other fiscal changes, when the tax rates changed:
   Tax Rate   Single   Married Filing Jointly
2017      39.6%   $418,401+   $470,701+
2020      37%   $518,401+   $622,051+

https://smartasset.com/taxes/trump-tax-brackets

a single person making 500k also got a 10k bonus.....but not one time, on a yearly basis going forward. now..... these are people I would say are doing particularly well and likely didn't need an additional 10k in their pockets. But I sure don't remember this level of pointed angst about it. Although - I wasn't here on this board.

Was their complete outrage over these high flying, high earners getting this extra cash? Or was everyone find to pocket their own 900-4k extra and call it good?

Giving someone more of his or her money back in his or her pocket is very different from excusing someone from a contractual obligation.

It's like me saying "oh this asshole got a $10k tax cut, where's my $10k pay rise?" It's chalk and cheese - it's a non sequitur.

And frankly if we HAD to relieve debt, I'd rather relieve medical debt or credit card debt for the poor, than student loan debt for kids who purported to be smart enough to make decisions about going to college.

[charis]

Forgive credit card debt of the poor? Lots of people with student loan debt are poor.  This is a weird thread.

[maisymouser]

One thing about this thread I don't feel is getting enough attention is the question of doing any of this by executive order...

Those in favor, do you really want to set the precedent that the executive branch can spend a trillion dollars without the consent of congress? Do you really want the next president you don't agree with to have that option?

+1

[ender]

I said it before but I support a one time forgiveness if and only if it is accompanied with a clear plan for the US government to stop guaranteeing student loans in the future.

There are numerous possibilities to that end.

But slapping a huge bandaid on the situation is going to result in the same issue again in 5-10 years.

[Gronnie]

As an example of other fiscal changes, when the tax rates changed:
   Tax Rate   Single   Married Filing Jointly
2017      39.6%   $418,401+   $470,701+
2020      37%   $518,401+   $622,051+

https://smartasset.com/taxes/trump-tax-brackets

a single person making 500k also got a 10k bonus.....but not one time, on a yearly basis going forward. now..... these are people I would say are doing particularly well and likely didn't need an additional 10k in their pockets. But I sure don't remember this level of pointed angst about it. Although - I wasn't here on this board.

Was their complete outrage over these high flying, high earners getting this extra cash? Or was everyone find to pocket their own 900-4k extra and call it good?

Not at all equivalent. Those people just had $10k less of their own money taken from them to give to others.

[FrugalToque]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

[MoseyingAlong]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

@FrugalToque Thank you for this and being so blunt.
I often fall on the side of "pay your bills" and "you took out the loan." A lot of that is due to returning to school about 7 years ago and seeing how so many of my fellow students were spending the loan money. It increased my cynicism.

This reminder of how many got started on the hamster wheel was needed. And you stated it so well.

[windytrail]

Focusing on college is the wrong move.

The idea that everyone should go to college does not accurately portray the range of jobs existing in our society. It ignores all types of trade jobs (welder, carpenter, etc), many of which pay a decent salary. For example, around here a union journeyman carpenter makes $52/hour and $31/hour for an apprentice carpenter (http://local22.org/2020_wage.pdf). I believe this ignorance is rooted in the tunnel vision of parents' expectations.

We have a moral duty to teach our children about the jobs necessary to sustain our society now and into the future. Yes, some of them require going to college. No, they will not all be performed on a computer.

[Bloop Bloop Reloaded]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

@FrugalToque Thank you for this and being so blunt.
I often fall on the side of "pay your bills" and "you took out the loan." A lot of that is due to returning to school about 7 years ago and seeing how so many of my fellow students were spending the loan money. It increased my cynicism.

This reminder of how many got started on the hamster wheel was needed. And you stated it so well.

What rubbish. If we raised the college starting age to 21 or 25 you'd still find some sort of structural reason to argue that these people have no individual agency despite having to register for SATs, see high school careers counsellors, and write admissions essays discussing why college suits them and why their personal values match the academic values of the institution.

I also didn't realise that the college put a gun to your head and forced you to double down on the degree after 1 or 2 semesters.

I wouldn't have an issue with fee relief for low-income students who dropped out due to adverse circumstances. That is totally understandable and those two criteria are relatively easy to administer. (Though I suspect there are already individual fee relief schemes for that.) Everyone else can take some personal responsibility.

[Paul der Krake]

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Yes, we suppress all stories about crushing student debt. Ain't no way they could possibly have heard of it before hand, because we didn't allow them to read news articles or watch TV before it was too late.
 
Oh look, a NY times article talking about student debt defaults from the year I was born, 1989:
https://www.nytimes.com/1989/06/02/us/us-sets-tough-penalties-for-student-loan-defaults.html?searchResultPosition=6

[Sid Hoffman]

One thing about this thread I don't feel is getting enough attention is the question of doing any of this by executive order...

Those in favor, do you really want to set the precedent that the executive branch can spend a trillion dollars without the consent of congress? Do you really want the next president you don't agree with to have that option?

Until it happens it's just a boogeyman. We spent 4 years with people saying Trump was about to declare nuclear war, marshal law, or whatever else by executive order that didn't happen. Now that Biden's president he's the new boogeyman that people declare will bypass congress for X, Y, or Z. Until it happens, it's not really something in your circle of concern nor control because it's just theories and what-ifs.

[Alternatepriorities]

One thing about this thread I don't feel is getting enough attention is the question of doing any of this by executive order...

Those in favor, do you really want to set the precedent that the executive branch can spend a trillion dollars without the consent of congress? Do you really want the next president you don't agree with to have that option?

Until it happens it's just a boogeyman. We spent 4 years with people saying Trump was about to declare nuclear war, marshal law, or whatever else by executive order that didn't happen. Now that Biden's president he's the new boogeyman that people declare will bypass congress for X, Y, or Z. Until it happens, it's not really something in your circle of concern nor control because it's just theories and what-ifs.

I did vote for Biden, but I concur that what decisions the president does or doesn't make in office is now outside of my control for the next four years... It seems he is hesitant or even opposed to issuing an EO on this matter but I don't have any influence on that at all.

What might possibly be within my control is convincing someone who thinks "student loan forgiveness is a worthy cause" to give further thought to the matter of how it's accomplished and the possible future repercussions. The steady transfer of power to the executive branch each time congress fails to shoulder their responsibly concerns me. So I thought I'd raise the point to my fellow citizens advocating for speeding up the process.

[Sid Hoffman]

What might possibly be within my control is convincing someone who thinks "student loan forgiveness is a worthy cause" to give further thought to the matter of how it's accomplished and the possible future repercussions. The steady transfer of power to the executive branch each time congress fails to shoulder their responsibly concerns me. So I thought I'd raise the point to my fellow citizens advocating for speeding up the process.

The people who support $50k loan forgiveness aren't financially intelligent people like you'll find on MMM. Hop on twitter, or tik tok, or imgur, or any alternative news sites that appeal to the under 25 crowd (soon to be the largest voting bloc in the nation) and you'll find that there's massive support for not only loan forgiveness, but making all school (meaning every type of school/college) tuition free for everyone.

[DadJokes]

Curious how people reconcile the big no on student loan forgiveness stance while being hunky dory with millionaires retiring and engineering their taxable income to be low and cash in on large ACA subsidies?

Sure, I'll take a stab.

I don't think millionaires should be able to get those subsidies, but that's not going to stop me from taking advantage of every legal loophole I can.

[JGS1980]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

Right on +1

I'm not at all surprised by the survey results. This is an extremely fiscally conservative forum, after all.

[KarefulKactus15]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

Right on +1

I'm not at all surprised by the survey results. This is an extremely fiscally conservative forum, after all.

Society told other lies as well.

"Renting is throwing money away"
"Buy as much house as you can afford"

Should we bail out those folks as well?

I'm super biased (obviously). I've seen so many people who were too good to live at home and go to the in state school, or do community college -> transfer to 4 year. It's almost free on that path.

Instead I know many who went out of state or out of town for the party life instead of the financially responsible route. I know someone who pretty much declined a full ride cause they didn't like the colors of the local university.

[chemistk]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

Right on +1

I'm not at all surprised by the survey results. This is an extremely fiscally conservative forum, after all.

Society told other lies as well.

"Renting is throwing money away"
"Buy as much house as you can afford"

Should we bail out those folks as well?

I'm super biased (obviously). I've seen so many people who were too good to live at home and go to the in state school, or do community college -> transfer to 4 year. It's almost free on that path.

Instead I know many who went out of state or out of town for the party life instead of the financially responsible route. I know someone who pretty much declined a full ride cause they didn't like the colors of the local university.

I fully agree with what Toque said, and he definitely summarized it better than I could.

To Kroaler's (and others') points above - these KIDS haven't even fully matured yet. At 16/17 (when you start to shop yourself around to colleges), your brain is years away from fully developing.

To compare the choices that KIDS are making at 16/17/18 to the decision to rent, or to homebuying isn't even in the same ballpark.

Again, anecdotes are a dime-a-dozen in contentious issues, but when I was nearing graduation from high school, my parents not only told me I MUST go to college, but they also then told me that I MUST take out loans because neither I nor they would be able to afford to pay in full for college.

At 17, I cared more about going to work to make money, and hanging out with my friends.

My situation is so fucking far from unique, the exact same thing happened to my wife (you MUST go to school).

Asking a hormone-addled, exhausted teenager to make a decision that will literally alter the trajectory of their life, and then saddling them with $30k+ in loans that they will carry for their entire lives, is absurd.

I would never expect taxpayers to take on the entire burden of the nation's student loan debt, and I don't have an easy answer, but I do agree that this forum leans hard toward fiscal conservatism and I think that can create blinders to the shitty circumstances that, in this case, both the higher education machine and the US Government itself caused.

[slappy]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

How does this loan forgiveness "fix it" though?

[Bloop Bloop Reloaded]

Again, anecdotes are a dime-a-dozen in contentious issues, but when I was nearing graduation from high school, my parents not only told me I MUST go to college, but they also then told me that I MUST take out loans because neither I nor they would be able to afford to pay in full for college.

At 17, I cared more about going to work to make money, and hanging out with my friends.

This is your parents' issue then.

[chemistk]

Again, anecdotes are a dime-a-dozen in contentious issues, but when I was nearing graduation from high school, my parents not only told me I MUST go to college, but they also then told me that I MUST take out loans because neither I nor they would be able to afford to pay in full for college.

At 17, I cared more about going to work to make money, and hanging out with my friends.

This is your parents' issue then.

And conveniently it became my issue at 21, whether or not I was prepared. As I said upthread, I wouldn't benefit from this program for two separate reasons. And by no means do I believe parents, or even the (then) kids that are saddled with debt deserve a free pass.

In fact, I don't know how much this program would actually help. The crux of my argument is that the higher education machine is disgustingly predatory and the US Government not only facilitated the result we have today, but they are just as culpable as the colleges and universities who see teens as a meal ticket to boost revenues.

Yeah, fiscal responsibility is paramount, but just dismissing major issues with a hand-wave of "they should have thought it through" or whatever one-line justification is pretty cold.

Fiscal responsibility and personal accountability don't just magically materialize, and just because it's "not my problem" now doesn't mean the implications of a whole-society failure to educate kids to be responsible and accountable won't affect all of us in the future. Not just in the US either.

[StarBright]

I fully agree with what Toque said, and he definitely summarized it better than I could.

To Kroaler's (and others') points above - these KIDS haven't even fully matured yet. At 16/17 (when you start to shop yourself around to colleges), your brain is years away from fully developing.

To compare the choices that KIDS are making at 16/17/18 to the decision to rent, or to homebuying isn't even in the same ballpark.

Again, anecdotes are a dime-a-dozen in contentious issues, but when I was nearing graduation from high school, my parents not only told me I MUST go to college, but they also then told me that I MUST take out loans because neither I nor they would be able to afford to pay in full for college.

At 17, I cared more about going to work to make money, and hanging out with my friends.

My situation is so fucking far from unique, the exact same thing happened to my wife (you MUST go to school).

Asking a hormone-addled, exhausted teenager to make a decision that will literally alter the trajectory of their life, and then saddling them with $30k+ in loans that they will carry for their entire lives, is absurd.

I would never expect taxpayers to take on the entire burden of the nation's student loan debt, and I don't have an easy answer, but I do agree that this forum leans hard toward fiscal conservatism and I think that can create blinders to the shitty circumstances that, in this case, both the higher education machine and the US Government itself caused.

I'm so glad you brought up the above (which I bolded and enbiggened)!

Late adolescence (16-18) is a time of brain rewiring/growth specifically related to the prefrontal cortex and risk/reward calculations and long term planning. A 17 year old brain doesn't take in or process information (particularly negative information) the same way a fully matured brain does.

This is just SO important for public policy because in the last 10 years we've learned that 18 year old brains just aren't capable of making the same decisions as 25 year old brains.

I really wanted to highlight your excellent point (and toque's great post!) because I think it is really relevant part of the larger picture.

 

 

[maisymouser]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

How does this loan forgiveness "fix it" though?

This is exactly my (and several others') thoughts upthread that have yet to be addressed.

The question posed is "do you support a one-time 10-50K student loan forgiveness as an executive order". Proponents of forgiveness on this thread are calling any objection to such an order unsympathetic to the plights of student loan holders. Like if I don't believe an executive order should be used to dish out a bunch of money this one time to a select group of people then I am a horrible person for not caring about the issue, or I don't believe there are major and fatal flaws to the system as it stands.

I bet that if you took the "No" voters here and asked them whether they support long-term college education and loan reform, you would get very different responses. Posing policy change that isn't a band-aid over a bullet hole would be much more conducive to supporting those entrenched in outstanding loans AS WELL AS those facing a decision on whether to attend college in the future.

[GuitarStv]

I just heard that 43% of student loan holders never actually finished their degree. That's horrifying.

To me, this means that a lot of those folks probably weren't ready for college, and probably shouldn't have been accepted. They certainly would not have been accepted if the schools themselves were liable for their debt as opposed to, say, the federal government. The system failed them, not the other way around.

What would be the grounds for rejecting them as applicants? Most college applicants look similar on paper and it would be hard to predict who will leave without finishing since there are many reasons, one big one being the cost (hence the loans).

So an A/B HS student with a 1300 SAT score is basically a coin flip to graduate college in 6 years? Seems like that's some shitty predictive validity.

Great data driven post! Those metrics may not be everything, but they certainly show a trend, right? I can’t tell you where to draw the line, but right now there are no lines at all. There aren’t even any discussions about drawing lines. That’s a systematic failure in the US. 18 yo needs 30K federal loan with a 2.5 gpa to go to a shoddy private school. Sure! Sign them up!!!

I think the post above is misrepresenting the data actually.  There's a pretty clear trend of higher SAT scores and higher grades leading to college graduation.  In the data we have, the right most column groups together all scores higher than 1100.  1300 is MUCH higher than 1100 (twice the range as the earlier categories), so  I'd expect if we had more data points that the chance of graduating for a student with a score like this and who gets As and Bs to be higher than the 57% given.  (Although we would need better granularity to tell for sure.)

[JGS1980]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

How does this loan forgiveness "fix it" though?

This is exactly my (and several others') thoughts upthread that have yet to be addressed.

The question posed is "do you support a one-time 10-50K student loan forgiveness as an executive order". Proponents of forgiveness on this thread are calling any objection to such an order unsympathetic to the plights of student loan holders. Like if I don't believe an executive order should be used to dish out a bunch of money this one time to a select group of people then I am a horrible person for not caring about the issue, or I don't believe there are major and fatal flaws to the system as it stands.

I bet that if you took the "No" voters here and asked them whether they support long-term college education and loan reform, you would get very different responses. Posing policy change that isn't a band-aid over a bullet hole would be much more conducive to supporting those entrenched in outstanding loans AS WELL AS those facing a decision on whether to attend college in the future.

Is there an appetite in congress to complete comprehensive reform? Could anything pass the muster of 60 votes? I think Biden should try, but if he gets stonewalled he should just forgive 10K and move on. I guess there's the politics of what should be done, and then there's the politics of what can be done.

See also; Immigration Reform, Healthcare Reform, Infrastructure Investment, Voting Rights, Minimum Wage, etc... very few people would argue that the above issues don't need addressed. Yet, nothing at all was addressed on these matters over the last 10 years.

P.S. Maisy, I brought up my own student loans (and support for forgiveness) as a counterargument to you bringing up your own loans as a reason not to support forgiveness.

JGS

[Samuel]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

Most of a society? 20% of US adults have student loans. 48% of those loans are for graduate school, which is not generally something a 17 year old is tricked in to. More than 50% of college students graduate with less than $20,000 in loans (30% with zero). There absolutely are people in over their heads who need help but the devil in the "student loan crisis" is definitely in the details.

I agree we have systemic problems needing to be fixed and a certain relatively small number of borrowers in truly over their heads who need extra help, but blanket loan forgiveness is a rather lazy and wasteful approach that avoids actually fixing the systemic problems. Blanket loan forgiveness is remarkably regressive, disproportionately giving higher earning folks relief they don't typically need. Existing Income Driven Repayment programs that cap payments and forgive balances after 20 or 25 years are better at providing targeted relief to the truly struggling than blanket forgiveness would be. Those programs should be simplified and expanded, along with caps on interest rates, tuition hikes, etc, that would start to control the spiraling costs.

A good overview of the regressive nature of blanket loan forgiveness: https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/12/28/student-loan-forgiveness-repayment-income-regressive/

I suspect at least some of the fervor on the left for loan forgiveness is fueled by general frustrations with the overall lack of progress on most all of their other priorities. Forgiveness feels like something of a "magic wand" policy that sidesteps the hard work of actually fixing the underlying problems. I see why it would be tempting to employ that wand but it's not particularly good governance.

[maisymouser]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

How does this loan forgiveness "fix it" though?

This is exactly my (and several others') thoughts upthread that have yet to be addressed.

The question posed is "do you support a one-time 10-50K student loan forgiveness as an executive order". Proponents of forgiveness on this thread are calling any objection to such an order unsympathetic to the plights of student loan holders. Like if I don't believe an executive order should be used to dish out a bunch of money this one time to a select group of people then I am a horrible person for not caring about the issue, or I don't believe there are major and fatal flaws to the system as it stands.

I bet that if you took the "No" voters here and asked them whether they support long-term college education and loan reform, you would get very different responses. Posing policy change that isn't a band-aid over a bullet hole would be much more conducive to supporting those entrenched in outstanding loans AS WELL AS those facing a decision on whether to attend college in the future.

Is there an appetite in congress to complete comprehensive reform? Could anything pass the muster of 60 votes? I think Biden should try, but if he gets stonewalled he should just forgive 10K and move on. I guess there's the politics of what should be done, and then there's the politics of what can be done.

See also; Immigration Reform, Healthcare Reform, Infrastructure Investment, Voting Rights, Minimum Wage, etc... very few people would argue that the above issues don't need addressed. Yet, nothing at all was addressed on these matters over the last 10 years.

P.S. Maisy, I brought up my own student loans (and support for forgiveness) as a counterargument to you bringing up your own loans as a reason not to support forgiveness.

JGS

All good points. Put in this light it does seem reasonable and logical to be pro-forgiveness. My gut reaction is that we shouldn't be kicking the can down the road on ANY of these reforms. I am no expert in politics, but I can't imagine that loan forgiveness will do anything to actually catalyze what really needs to happen in that domain. Thus, I feel that it is counterproductive and am against it.

[Bloop Bloop Reloaded]

I suspect at least some of the fervor on the left for loan forgiveness is fueled by general frustrations with the overall lack of progress on most all of their other priorities. Forgiveness feels like something of a "magic wand" policy that sidesteps the hard work of actually fixing the underlying problems. I see why it would be tempting to employ that wand but it's not particularly good governance.

A great point, well made.

Some people just clamour so much for perceived equality that they lose sight of the forest for the trees.

Sometimes you have to let people live with the consequences of their choices. We've all made mistakes. I certainly have my regrets, both financial and non-financial. It seems strange to me that we would rehabilitate some mistakes and not others. For sure, if it's causing crippling debt or other threat to life or safety, those mistakes should be forgiven, and I'd be in favour of a student debt amnesty for impoverished students suffering mentally or physically due to the indebtedness. But a general forgiveness for a large cohort that doesn't necessarily need it (in fact some with student debt presumably are happy with that debt since their degree will increase lifetime earnings) - whilst doing nothing to reward those students who haven't made mistakes - seems incredibly unfair to me.

[stoaX]

Curious how people reconcile the big no on student loan forgiveness stance while being hunky dory with millionaires retiring and engineering their taxable income to be low and cash in on large ACA subsidies?

Sure, I'll take a stab.

I don't think millionaires should be able to get those subsidies, but that's not going to stop me from taking advantage of every legal loophole I can.

And that highlights the difference between the proposed idea of student loan forgiveness and ACA subsidies.  One is an idea being debated, the other has been the law for years.  If you want health insurance and it isn't available through an employer, you have little choice except to purchase it thru the ACA.  And if you're income falls in the right range, you get the subsidies.  If you lie and say you're income will be too high for the subsidies, you will get the subsidies retroactively when you file your taxes. 

Also, is there a good word or phrase that distinguishes between someone who has $1 million in assets and someone who has $900,000,000?  The use of the word "millionaires" in the posts above seems like it is aimed more a those with several million dollars or more. 

After all, if you are retired and your income is what you can get from just $1 million, the 4% rule suggests a $25,000 annual spend - that's a far cry from the "sipping champagne on your yacht" lifestyle that people associate with "millionaires".    I would suggest "multi-millionaires" but at $2,000,000 the 4% rule yields $50,000 per year - still not enough to conjure up visions of decadent wealth. 

[EvenSteven]

Curious how people reconcile the big no on student loan forgiveness stance while being hunky dory with millionaires retiring and engineering their taxable income to be low and cash in on large ACA subsidies?

Sure, I'll take a stab.

I don't think millionaires should be able to get those subsidies, but that's not going to stop me from taking advantage of every legal loophole I can.

And that highlights the difference between the proposed idea of student loan forgiveness and ACA subsidies.  One is an idea being debated, the other has been the law for years.  If you want health insurance and it isn't available through an employer, you have little choice except to purchase it thru the ACA.  And if you're income falls in the right range, you get the subsidies.  If you lie and say you're income will be too high for the subsidies, you will get the subsidies retroactively when you file your taxes. 

Also, is there a good word or phrase that distinguishes between someone who has $1 million in assets and someone who has $900,000,000?  The use of the word "millionaires" in the posts above seems like it is aimed more a those with several million dollars or more. 

After all, if you are retired and your income is what you can get from just $1 million, the 4% rule suggests a $25,000 annual spend - that's a far cry from the "sipping champagne on your yacht" lifestyle that people associate with "millionaires".    I would suggest "multi-millionaires" but at $2,000,000 the 4% rule yields $50,000 per year - still not enough to conjure up visions of decadent wealth.

I like that this comment was made on a thread about college education.

(meant as a lighthearted joke, not mean spirited ridicule)

[MoseyingAlong]

After all, if you are retired and your income is what you can get from just $1 million, the 4% rule suggests a $25,000 annual spend - that's a far cry from the "sipping champagne on your yacht" lifestyle that people associate with "millionaires".    I would suggest "multi-millionaires" but at $2,000,000 the 4% rule yields $50,000 per year - still not enough to conjure up visions of decadent wealth.

Hey, can you explain this part to me?
4% of a $1M is $40K.
And even for a single person, if it was all taxable, the fed taxes would be a little over $3K.
So where'd the other $12K go?

[ditheca]

After all, if you are retired and your income is what you can get from just $1 million, the 4% rule suggests a $25,000 annual spend...

4% of $1 million is $40,000, which is enough to retire comfortably almost anywhere* in America.

* except HCOL metropolises

[HPstache]

After all, if you are retired and your income is what you can get from just $1 million, the 4% rule suggests a $25,000 annual spend - that's a far cry from the "sipping champagne on your yacht" lifestyle that people associate with "millionaires".    I would suggest "multi-millionaires" but at $2,000,000 the 4% rule yields $50,000 per year - still not enough to conjure up visions of decadent wealth.

Dividing by 40 != multiplying by 0.04

[Sid Hoffman]

See also; Immigration Reform, Healthcare Reform, Infrastructure Investment, Voting Rights, Minimum Wage, etc... very few people would argue that the above issues don't need addressed. Yet, nothing at all was addressed on these matters over the last 10 years.

Healthcare wasn't touched for 10 years because the ACA had just been passed, so you're playing games with that one. Immigration got the DACA, infrastructure got TONS of spending post-recession, voting is already a right for all citizens and administrated by states/cities/counties, minimum wage is similarly covered by the states, counties, and cities. You can't say "nothing was addressed" when you start listing off things that already had action taken as well as things addressed at the state level. It doesn't make sense to have the same minimum wage in San Francisco as you have in Columbus, Ohio, which is why California has its own ($13/hr) and San Francisco has its own ($16.07) above California's, each separate from the $8.80/hour in Ohio.

Immigration and healthcare are issues that have to be addressed at the federal level, there's no way around that. For basically everything else you listed though it's up to the states and many of them have passed laws for all the things you listed and much, much more in the last 10 years. That's one of the greatest things about state governments. All powers that the federal government doesn't have exclusive control over the states are free to take up for themselves. That's America, and it's honestly wonderful. I think too many people are trying to make national issues out of problems that need to be solved at the state and city level.

[seattlecyclone]

I guess I still think that targeting student loan holders is very suboptimal.

Someone starting college without a ton of money to pay for school can choose from one of two paths.

Path A: Work full-time in a restaurant or retail store or similar lower-skilled job to pay the bills while also attending school. Your grades and time to graduation will probably suffer as a result of spending so much of your time working, but at least you'll graduate with minimal debt.
Path B: Take out maximal loans so that you can focus as much as possible on studying. You'll probably have higher grades and graduate sooner, qualifying for a better job afterward, but you'll have a bunch of loans to pay off once that happens.

Neither path is inherently right or wrong. Everyone will pick one based on their own assessment of which one will best help them achieve their life goals. Different trade-offs exist, you can take a look at them, and make a decision that seems good at the time.

It would be one thing for our elected leaders to say "hey, we didn't subsidize public university tuition enough in recent years, sorry about that, everyone who attended college recently gets a $10,000 tax break this year to make up for it." It's another thing entirely to say "hey people who picked Path B, here's $10,000. People who picked Path A, you get nothing." That completely upends the incentive structure after the fact, and will rightly be seen as unfair by all the people who picked Path A.

For the record I do believe that (public) university tuition should be cheaper, and that grant-based financial assistance should be more available for those who need it. I also think that changing the rules of the game a few years after the game is over should be avoided if at all possible. In this situation I think a better way should be found. Current student loan balance is a poor proxy for the amount someone has been affected by high tuition in the recent past.

[Wolfpack Mustachian]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

You put it "bluntly" and yet by doing so, you paint a nuanced picture with a broad brush that does not fit the facts. You present the entire situation as an ethical argument - people done a disservice need a moral wrong to be righted, and yet as Samuel described, many people do not fit the narrative you painted - they weren't just 16 year olds making a one time poor financial decision - they continued on to graduate school, after surely having known a little more about the world then. Then, on top of that, it ignores the statistics that people who went to college even who didn't finish are from an overall standpoint not significantly worse off than people who didn't, and people who actually finished are much better off from a career earnings and net worth standpoint. We're going to make a sweeping decision to pay off college debt for people who many times, weren't naive 16 year olds making poor decisions who even if they were, are actually often times as good or better off doing it than not doing it. Yeah, that sounds like a good use of money.

[stoaX]

Curious how people reconcile the big no on student loan forgiveness stance while being hunky dory with millionaires retiring and engineering their taxable income to be low and cash in on large ACA subsidies?

Sure, I'll take a stab.

I don't think millionaires should be able to get those subsidies, but that's not going to stop me from taking advantage of every legal loophole I can.

And that highlights the difference between the proposed idea of student loan forgiveness and ACA subsidies.  One is an idea being debated, the other has been the law for years.  If you want health insurance and it isn't available through an employer, you have little choice except to purchase it thru the ACA.  And if you're income falls in the right range, you get the subsidies.  If you lie and say you're income will be too high for the subsidies, you will get the subsidies retroactively when you file your taxes. 

Also, is there a good word or phrase that distinguishes between someone who has $1 million in assets and someone who has $900,000,000?  The use of the word "millionaires" in the posts above seems like it is aimed more a those with several million dollars or more. 

After all, if you are retired and your income is what you can get from just $1 million, the 4% rule suggests a $25,000 annual spend - that's a far cry from the "sipping champagne on your yacht" lifestyle that people associate with "millionaires".    I would suggest "multi-millionaires" but at $2,000,000 the 4% rule yields $50,000 per year - still not enough to conjure up visions of decadent wealth.

I like that this comment was made on a thread about college education.

(meant as a lighthearted joke, not mean spirited ridicule)

I wish I could say I was drinking when I did that "math" but sadly I wasn't.  I can't even blame my education - it was certainly better than that.  Mea culpa!

[Bloop Bloop Reloaded]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

You put it "bluntly" and yet by doing so, you paint a nuanced picture with a broad brush that does not fit the facts. You present the entire situation as an ethical argument - people done a disservice need a moral wrong to be righted, and yet as Samuel described, many people do not fit the narrative you painted - they weren't just 16 year olds making a one time poor financial decision - they continued on to graduate school, after surely having known a little more about the world then. Then, on top of that, it ignores the statistics that people who went to college even who didn't finish are from an overall standpoint not significantly worse off than people who didn't, and people who actually finished are much better off from a career earnings and net worth standpoint. We're going to make a sweeping decision to pay off college debt for people who many times, weren't naive 16 year olds making poor decisions who even if they were, are actually often times as good or better off doing it than not doing it. Yeah, that sounds like a good use of money.

The other thing is, from a moral framework why do we have to pay money to rescue others from their bad choices?

If their bad choices have led to malnutrition or lack of shelter we should pay money to fund services to lift them out of that...but otherwise...if it just causes inconvenience or financial loss (but without penury), why do we rectify it?

I can spot many bad choices, investing and otherwise, that have caused me financial loss too. Can I get a refund for the bad shares I invested in as a 19 year old with no market experience? Or what about the classes I failed in college...I want a refund for that too. Oh and the shitty video games I bought as a kid, I want my $60 back.

[stoaX]

After all, if you are retired and your income is what you can get from just $1 million, the 4% rule suggests a $25,000 annual spend - that's a far cry from the "sipping champagne on your yacht" lifestyle that people associate with "millionaires".    I would suggest "multi-millionaires" but at $2,000,000 the 4% rule yields $50,000 per year - still not enough to conjure up visions of decadent wealth.

Hey, can you explain this part to me?
4% of a $1M is $40K.
And even for a single person, if it was all taxable, the fed taxes would be a little over $3K.
So where'd the other $12K go?

The explanation is easy - I messed up!

[Fishindude]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

Very well put.
I agree in most cases, poor parenting leads to these student loan problems.

[ChpBstrd]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

Very well put.
I agree in most cases, poor parenting leads to these student loan problems.

What happens when there is no choice? No cheap colleges and no way to pay other than taking loans? What does a good parent do then, recommend a kid not go to college?

What's the root cause?

[slappy]

I'll be blunt about this.

You tell a 16 or 17 year old: "You must go to college if you want a good job."
Then you tell them: "Borrowing money to invest in your education is a good idea."
You hammer this idea in their impressionable brains for years.

Meanwhile, you haven't imbued them with any responsibility.
I mean, they still need to raise their hands and ask permission to go pee.

And then, these kids who aren't entrusted with the capacity of their own bladders, having accrued all this debt that you, the adults, told them it was a good idea to take on, are being told, "Hey, personal responsibility! Pay the fuck up, you mooch!  You shouldn't have taken that loan!"

No.

You, the adults who raised them.
You, the society who taught them.
You take the responsibility.
You pay up.
You shouldn't have given children such bad advice.

When one person makes a mistake, we can pretend it's a "personal responsibility" problem.
When most of a society goes that way?
It's a systemic problem and the system owes them to fix it.

Toque.

Very well put.
I agree in most cases, poor parenting leads to these student loan problems.

What happens when there is no choice? No cheap colleges and no way to pay other than taking loans? What does a good parent do then, recommend a kid not go to college?

What's the root cause?

Yes, in that scenario, a parent would help the child do some sort of analysis to determine if college makes sense. Or they can at least talk through other options, such as community college (does community college not exist in this example? you said no cheap colleges, so I wasn't sure what you meant). Of course this makes a lot of assumptions about the parents' own ability, but I guess that's a topic for another thread about the root cause.

There are so many things that get presented in this forum and in life that are not just one option or the other. The options here are not "go to college with huge loans" or "don't go to college". Surely there is some option in between those that can be acceptable.

[simonsez]

I fully agree with what Toque said, and he definitely summarized it better than I could.

To Kroaler's (and others') points above - these KIDS haven't even fully matured yet. At 16/17 (when you start to shop yourself around to colleges), your brain is years away from fully developing.

To compare the choices that KIDS are making at 16/17/18 to the decision to rent, or to homebuying isn't even in the same ballpark.

Again, anecdotes are a dime-a-dozen in contentious issues, but when I was nearing graduation from high school, my parents not only told me I MUST go to college, but they also then told me that I MUST take out loans because neither I nor they would be able to afford to pay in full for college.

At 17, I cared more about going to work to make money, and hanging out with my friends.

My situation is so fucking far from unique, the exact same thing happened to my wife (you MUST go to school).

Asking a hormone-addled, exhausted teenager to make a decision that will literally alter the trajectory of their life, and then saddling them with $30k+ in loans that they will carry for their entire lives, is absurd.

I would never expect taxpayers to take on the entire burden of the nation's student loan debt, and I don't have an easy answer, but I do agree that this forum leans hard toward fiscal conservatism and I think that can create blinders to the shitty circumstances that, in this case, both the higher education machine and the US Government itself caused.

I'm so glad you brought up the above (which I bolded and enbiggened)!

Late adolescence (16-18) is a time of brain rewiring/growth specifically related to the prefrontal cortex and risk/reward calculations and long term planning. A 17 year old brain doesn't take in or process information (particularly negative information) the same way a fully matured brain does.

This is just SO important for public policy because in the last 10 years we've learned that 18 year old brains just aren't capable of making the same decisions as 25 year old brains.

I really wanted to highlight your excellent point (and toque's great post!) because I think it is really relevant part of the larger picture.

 

So by this rationale, it seems better to delay college rather than send unprepared brains/kids to college and then have them tricked with loans and then debate forgiving all or part of them?  Or am I misreading what you're implying?  What are you suggesting these teenagers do until their brains are developed?  Military?  Flip burgers?  Everyone starts in the trades?  Expand duration of secondary school? 

I tend to think generally that kids electing to go to community college rather than a 4 year university is a good idea for many for several reasons - but it's still college level coursework (but at least the financial penalty is much less severe).  Do you think these teenagers who might not have the brain development for a 4 year university at age 17-18 are better suited for community college or is that decision-making too rigorous as well?

I would think parents could already have talks with their kids about delaying tertiary education.  Clearly that's not happening on a wide enough scale to have only those prepared to tackle all of the challenges college presents to be the ones attending.  What kinds of public policy are you suggesting?

[JGS1980]

I fully agree with what Toque said, and he definitely summarized it better than I could.

To Kroaler's (and others') points above - these KIDS haven't even fully matured yet. At 16/17 (when you start to shop yourself around to colleges), your brain is years away from fully developing.

To compare the choices that KIDS are making at 16/17/18 to the decision to rent, or to homebuying isn't even in the same ballpark.

Again, anecdotes are a dime-a-dozen in contentious issues, but when I was nearing graduation from high school, my parents not only told me I MUST go to college, but they also then told me that I MUST take out loans because neither I nor they would be able to afford to pay in full for college.

At 17, I cared more about going to work to make money, and hanging out with my friends.

My situation is so fucking far from unique, the exact same thing happened to my wife (you MUST go to school).

Asking a hormone-addled, exhausted teenager to make a decision that will literally alter the trajectory of their life, and then saddling them with $30k+ in loans that they will carry for their entire lives, is absurd.

I would never expect taxpayers to take on the entire burden of the nation's student loan debt, and I don't have an easy answer, but I do agree that this forum leans hard toward fiscal conservatism and I think that can create blinders to the shitty circumstances that, in this case, both the higher education machine and the US Government itself caused.

I'm so glad you brought up the above (which I bolded and enbiggened)!

Late adolescence (16-18) is a time of brain rewiring/growth specifically related to the prefrontal cortex and risk/reward calculations and long term planning. A 17 year old brain doesn't take in or process information (particularly negative information) the same way a fully matured brain does.

This is just SO important for public policy because in the last 10 years we've learned that 18 year old brains just aren't capable of making the same decisions as 25 year old brains.

I really wanted to highlight your excellent point (and toque's great post!) because I think it is really relevant part of the larger picture.

 

So by this rationale, it seems better to delay college rather than send unprepared brains/kids to college and then have them tricked with loans and then debate forgiving all or part of them?  Or am I misreading what you're implying?  What are you suggesting these teenagers do until their brains are developed?  Military?  Flip burgers?  Everyone starts in the trades?  Expand duration of secondary school? 

I tend to think generally that kids electing to go to community college rather than a 4 year university is a good idea for many for several reasons - but it's still college level coursework (but at least the financial penalty is much less severe).  Do you think these teenagers who might not have the brain development for a 4 year university at age 17-18 are better suited for community college or is that decision-making too rigorous as well?

I would think parents could already have talks with their kids about delaying tertiary education.  Clearly that's not happening on a wide enough scale to have only those prepared to tackle all of the challenges college presents to be the ones attending.  What kinds of public policy are you suggesting?

Who here, Simon, is arguing that we should stop educating children? What a straw man.

What folks are arguing is that you shouldn't systematically saddle a 17 yo or 18 yo with life changing debt just because its easy to do so.

18 yo "adults" with zero income aren't allowed the get a car loan for a new Tesla without co-signatures in the US, but sign 'em right up for 40K in loans just because it's for education.

I agree it starts at home, but we mustachians have to agree we are a minority in the US and in the world.

[chemistk]

Agreed JGS -

Whether or not you went to college in the 90's - 00's, and if you did, whether or not you personally experienced it, college is "sold" to kids as an experience first. There's literature on academics and course offerings, but just as much time (or for some schools, more) is spent on selling to kids why this particular college/university will be a better experience than all the other crappy second-rate ones you've looked at.

Look at the magnet schools - the Ivy League and the NCAA D1 championship schools - there's no shortage of marketing to kids to try and sell them on the idea that they "get" to be "part of the experience", whether that experience is sitting around grassy manicured lawns in the northeast or watching your team win the championship for the nth time.

It's marketing, to get you (or your kids) to attend, so that your tuition dollars can feed the machine.

There's nothing inherently wrong about schools jockeying for students to attend - that's how the system is designed.

What's wrong is that the crux of the argument to attend often has nothing to do with the real reason to attend.

Worse, what's wrong is the narrative that "you MUST go to College NOW". It's as if we expect that at 17, a Junior in high school, knows exactly what they want to do. There was a time in the distant past where there were far fewer career paths, and most kids knew much earlier what they liked or what they would be good at.

[slappy]

I fully agree with what Toque said, and he definitely summarized it better than I could.

To Kroaler's (and others') points above - these KIDS haven't even fully matured yet. At 16/17 (when you start to shop yourself around to colleges), your brain is years away from fully developing.

To compare the choices that KIDS are making at 16/17/18 to the decision to rent, or to homebuying isn't even in the same ballpark.

Again, anecdotes are a dime-a-dozen in contentious issues, but when I was nearing graduation from high school, my parents not only told me I MUST go to college, but they also then told me that I MUST take out loans because neither I nor they would be able to afford to pay in full for college.

At 17, I cared more about going to work to make money, and hanging out with my friends.

My situation is so fucking far from unique, the exact same thing happened to my wife (you MUST go to school).

Asking a hormone-addled, exhausted teenager to make a decision that will literally alter the trajectory of their life, and then saddling them with $30k+ in loans that they will carry for their entire lives, is absurd.

I would never expect taxpayers to take on the entire burden of the nation's student loan debt, and I don't have an easy answer, but I do agree that this forum leans hard toward fiscal conservatism and I think that can create blinders to the shitty circumstances that, in this case, both the higher education machine and the US Government itself caused.

I'm so glad you brought up the above (which I bolded and enbiggened)!

Late adolescence (16-18) is a time of brain rewiring/growth specifically related to the prefrontal cortex and risk/reward calculations and long term planning. A 17 year old brain doesn't take in or process information (particularly negative information) the same way a fully matured brain does.

This is just SO important for public policy because in the last 10 years we've learned that 18 year old brains just aren't capable of making the same decisions as 25 year old brains.

I really wanted to highlight your excellent point (and toque's great post!) because I think it is really relevant part of the larger picture.

 

So by this rationale, it seems better to delay college rather than send unprepared brains/kids to college and then have them tricked with loans and then debate forgiving all or part of them?  Or am I misreading what you're implying?  What are you suggesting these teenagers do until their brains are developed?  Military?  Flip burgers?  Everyone starts in the trades?  Expand duration of secondary school? 

I tend to think generally that kids electing to go to community college rather than a 4 year university is a good idea for many for several reasons - but it's still college level coursework (but at least the financial penalty is much less severe).  Do you think these teenagers who might not have the brain development for a 4 year university at age 17-18 are better suited for community college or is that decision-making too rigorous as well?

I would think parents could already have talks with their kids about delaying tertiary education.  Clearly that's not happening on a wide enough scale to have only those prepared to tackle all of the challenges college presents to be the ones attending.  What kinds of public policy are you suggesting?

Who here, Simon, is arguing that we should stop education children? What a straw man.

What folks are arguing is that you shouldn't systematically saddle a 17 yo or 18 yo with life changing debt just because its easy to do so.

18 yo "adults" with zero income aren't allowed the get a car loan for a new Tesla's without co-signatures in the US, but sign 'em right up for 40K in loans just because it's for education.

I agree it starts at home, but we mustachians have to agree we are a minority in the US and in the world.

I feel like the argument about 18 year old and mental maturity also plays into other things too, like the military, or the smoking age. If we are saying that 18 year olds aren't mature enough to sign for student loans, how can say they are old enough to make even bigger life changing decisions, like entering the military?

[therethere]

I took out five figures in loans and began attending college at 17. I could not drive legally after 9pm until I turned 18. But, I was supposed to know better apparently?

[simonsez]

I fully agree with what Toque said, and he definitely summarized it better than I could.

To Kroaler's (and others') points above - these KIDS haven't even fully matured yet. At 16/17 (when you start to shop yourself around to colleges), your brain is years away from fully developing.

To compare the choices that KIDS are making at 16/17/18 to the decision to rent, or to homebuying isn't even in the same ballpark.

Again, anecdotes are a dime-a-dozen in contentious issues, but when I was nearing graduation from high school, my parents not only told me I MUST go to college, but they also then told me that I MUST take out loans because neither I nor they would be able to afford to pay in full for college.

At 17, I cared more about going to work to make money, and hanging out with my friends.

My situation is so fucking far from unique, the exact same thing happened to my wife (you MUST go to school).

Asking a hormone-addled, exhausted teenager to make a decision that will literally alter the trajectory of their life, and then saddling them with $30k+ in loans that they will carry for their entire lives, is absurd.

I would never expect taxpayers to take on the entire burden of the nation's student loan debt, and I don't have an easy answer, but I do agree that this forum leans hard toward fiscal conservatism and I think that can create blinders to the shitty circumstances that, in this case, both the higher education machine and the US Government itself caused.

I'm so glad you brought up the above (which I bolded and enbiggened)!

Late adolescence (16-18) is a time of brain rewiring/growth specifically related to the prefrontal cortex and risk/reward calculations and long term planning. A 17 year old brain doesn't take in or process information (particularly negative information) the same way a fully matured brain does.

This is just SO important for public policy because in the last 10 years we've learned that 18 year old brains just aren't capable of making the same decisions as 25 year old brains.

I really wanted to highlight your excellent point (and toque's great post!) because I think it is really relevant part of the larger picture.

 

So by this rationale, it seems better to delay college rather than send unprepared brains/kids to college and then have them tricked with loans and then debate forgiving all or part of them?  Or am I misreading what you're implying?  What are you suggesting these teenagers do until their brains are developed?  Military?  Flip burgers?  Everyone starts in the trades?  Expand duration of secondary school? 

I tend to think generally that kids electing to go to community college rather than a 4 year university is a good idea for many for several reasons - but it's still college level coursework (but at least the financial penalty is much less severe).  Do you think these teenagers who might not have the brain development for a 4 year university at age 17-18 are better suited for community college or is that decision-making too rigorous as well?

I would think parents could already have talks with their kids about delaying tertiary education.  Clearly that's not happening on a wide enough scale to have only those prepared to tackle all of the challenges college presents to be the ones attending.  What kinds of public policy are you suggesting?

Who here, Simon, is arguing that we should stop education children? What a straw man.

What folks are arguing is that you shouldn't systematically saddle a 17 yo or 18 yo with life changing debt just because its easy to do so.

18 yo "adults" with zero income aren't allowed the get a car loan for a new Tesla's without co-signatures in the US, but sign 'em right up for 40K in loans just because it's for education.

I agree it starts at home, but we mustachians have to agree we are a minority in the US and in the world.

I was just asking for clarification about brain development and what that means in practical terms.  I've never considered that and am curious how that would impact policy as mentioned by @StarBright .  I didn't argue stopping education.  I was asking since college is "sold" to kids (and parents!) as an experience first - to explore delaying or other options.  I don't think it's 4 year university with loans up to your eyeballs or nothing when you're 18.  I certainly thought so at one time and still took the plunge.  I don't think the particular policy that is the subject of this thread is the best way to handle this issue.

I mean, I certainly wasn't prepared for the financial impact of going to university (nor were my parents) and just borrowed for the whole schmear.  I/we were ignorant at the time but even still knew this would have to be paid back "someday".  In fact this ignorance is what pushed me later on to be interested in personal finance as I didn't want my future adult self to be as clueless about retirement and other finance matters as I was when I entered college (or for any future kids to be in the dark as well).  My parents' brains were completely developed, perhaps mine wasn't but we were both bad with the time value of money and opportunity costs involved.  I'm still paying my loans back and am against any type of largescale student loan forgiveness (especially one coming from an exec order).  While this is just my opinion, I (and my parents) should've known better.  I am against it for multiple reasons but that doesn't mean I'm against other policies, ways of changing the system, expectations, teenage personal finance planning becoming the norm in public schools, counseling, parental guidance, allocation of public funds, how loans are distributed, interest rates, etc.  This is a serious issue and while I personally think I should've known better, there are myriad ways to address it rather than a one-time Band-Aid that will have to be repeatedly applied on the taxpayer's dime.  I just think the specific subject of this topic would be bad policy.  By the results of the poll, nearly 3/5 agree with that.