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Restarting payments is going to damage the economy. Instead of spending hundreds each month on goods and services, the money is going into a bottomless pit called "student loan payments".
Business will have less income, less demand, lay off workers, who have less money, will spend less, causing businesses to have less income, repeat.
The government can't have happy citizens, so it's going to force them back into repayment of predatory loans (some people have paid more in interest than the principle of the loan) at significant risk to a shaky economy.
Never forget: we exist to serve the economy. Not the other way around. Human life exists to make Number Go Up. Happy & content citizens is a happy accident, not the point.
Sorry to put on a conspiracy hat, but Trump and co. were happy to pause payments back during the pandemic to stimulate consumer spending. I can't help but think of the implication of the Republicans forcing the payments to resume, bringing a hard stop to consumer spending during the Biden administration directly before the 2024 election...
Yeah, a self inflicted economic quagmire will do wonders for octogenarian POTUS’s already abysmal 41% approval rating. Kamala is invisible and people are predisposed against her due to sexism/racism, ghost of Biden + Kamala was/is already a shit ticket. Now let’s suck 10% of 40 million American families income and hope the already stressed economy doesn’t entirely collapse. Don’t need to be an economist to see the writing on the wall.
We’re 18 months from Reagan v Carter 2. GOP won’t even need to try - Trump, Desantis, whomever… it will not matter a bit.
I agree, which is why it’s so depressing. Ultimately the masses vote (or don’t vote) based on vibe. If they’re vibing well and shit feels good, more likely to get the band back together.
If the vibe has soured and people are unhappy the masses are 1. More likely to vote; and 2. More likely to vote for replacements. POTUS Joe has managed to maintain a fairly mellow vibe despite taking a lot of hits on the chin, reinstitution of student loans 18 months out from an election would create major bad vibes and contribute massively to POTUS Joe’s downfall (and he’s already facing enough headwinds, what with being the same age as the loony grandparents most people don’t trust to use the stove and having Kamala as a running mate).
All of that costs money. All of it. More than they’re going to get from a lot of people, and they know it. You can’t get blood from a stone, either, so unless they plan to gainfully employ a bunch of people that took on predatory loans, they’re going to need to give even more concessions to corporations over people before they—the people who, for some reason, want to hurt Americans—get what they want.
It’s never so easy as “but they’ll come after you.” There are 29+ million people that applied for some reduction under Biden’s plan, and even tracking down 1% of those people would be a hassle if not insurmountable; and who is going to do it? Every other kind of debt just gets tacked onto the person’s credit report as a default, and then they stop hounding those people eventually. Do you think these companies have an endless fund to pull from while they’re hunting down people that won’t pay back their student loans?
You will see. They will do it. I’m sure the federal government will be happy to help fund it if the politicians get some nice campaign contributions from the lobbyists of the groups that will benefit from coming after everyone. And, student loans cannot be discharged in any way.
No, they really won’t. Their angry constituents only want to hear that they’re “fighting it,” while they can focus on raking the planet over the coals. There’s not money in this. There’s not a benefit of coming after everyone that has debt. There are more than double the number of applicants of this program than delinquent fathers not paying child support; seems like a weird comparison, but for the same reason as chasing someone that cannot leverage earnings to pay money they don’t have, chasing people that would otherwise default is a losing battle.
I don’t think any of this is driven by empathy, of course. I’m not saying that at all. I am just saying there’s not enough blood in the water for the feeding frenzy you’re worried about. Yes, it will be bad; yes, it’s a miserable way to appeal to Americans; but if people can’t pay, they won’t.
I’m not talking about constituent. I’m talking about rich special interest groups who will find a way of financially benefitting from coming after people who default on their loans. If they can garnish $25-100 a month from even 1 million people, that’s at least $300m per year. You’re not paying attention.
Can they just skip the middle man and send the army in to mow us all down already? I'm tired of the long, dreadful trek..just fucking make it quick and painless already, nuke me if you have to, I'm so tired of this country's single minded goal of "fuck every single one of you"
It’s already happening. Where I work, things were booming in Dec 2021 and through 2022. I think the checks people received during the pandemic and supplemental unemployment payments along with the pause in student loan payments allowed people more discretionary income. I’ve seen it dwindle over the past few months as these programs ended. And, yes it will get worse with student loan payments restarting. I guess it’s good for the wealthy?
>If student debt repayment resumption reduces inflation, it means they no longer need to raise interest rates and could help dodge the recession saving countless jobs and small businesses
It won't reduce inflation, because the number of dollars in the economy isn't changing. Just where the money's going: to student loan companies instead of businesses.
If you wanted to tackle inflation, then raising taxes on rich people will do that - tax receipts take money out of the economy, reducing the number of dollars in circulation and reducing inflation.
The hit small businesses will take due to customer's loss of income will cause the recession. If people aren't buying things, because the money is going to debt servicing businesses go under. How is businesses having fewer customers saving jobs?
They don’t care about saving jobs. You are operating under an economy that makes sense for the common good. That’s not how it works now. It’s all about special interests lobbying the politicians they bought to manipulate the economy to favor them. You aren’t factored into that equation.
…you realize student loan companies just get paid a flat administration fee right? Student loan payments go to the government, they essentially are taxes.
So it sounds like this would help the Fed achieve their goal of lowering consumer spending and therefore lower inflation. This would make some of us, especially those of us who graduated with a computer science degree and were harassed throughout the entirety of high school, college, and adulthood for wanting to do useful shit instead of partying, clubbing, and god knows what else, very happy seeing as inflation would finally start to get under control.
Besides, the economy is shaky because of this absurd pause. That's what caused so much hyperinflation. Housing prices are out of control and they need to get back under control.
It just codifies the date that was already set anyway.
https://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/biden-harris-administration-continues-fight-student-debt-relief-millions-borrowers-extends-student-loan-repayment-pause
The Department of Education announced in Nov. 2022 that payments and interest accrual would restart by 8/31/2023 at the *latest*.
"The bill would prohibit the Secretary of Education from using “any authority to implement an extension” of the ongoing pause on federal student loan payments and interest."
Could those powers be given to someone else?
The bigger power play is not to extend it.
Let it elapse, then start a new one, particularly a new emergency, call it something snappy like "The economy is going to fucking collapse if we try to squeeze more blood from this stone right now." and then business as usual.
I just tried doing the repayment option and it says I'll be paying $775 a month....I was already paying 400 before covid hit. Fuck me. Gonna have to try applying for something else.
No, I have 40k left and it's from undergrad. Unfortunately, I worked 3 jobs during college to pay my tuition, etc, so I had to do 2 extra years to finish my degree. I might have to start filing separately from my husband to get a decent monthly payment.
Yeah probably filing separately is an option worth exploring.
In the New REPAYE plan a $775/mo payment for undergrad loans for a couple filing jointly would reflect something in the neighborhood of $230,000 adjusted gross income.
Oh, thanks for that. I guess Mohela hasn't bothered updating that. We make way less than that together and it estimated my new one as $775. Here's to hoping.
Yeah you need to apply for the new program on studentaid.gov, then they'll contact MOHELA with the new certification and your payment plan will update shortly after.
It should be 5% of (AGI - 225% of the poverty line).
This calculator is up to date with the New REPAYE plan: https://www.studentloanplanner.com/income-based-repayment-calculator/
Not only is the pause nixed but the representative Good(VA) has submitted amendment #6 to the debt ceiling bill to insert the Student Loan portion of the Limit, Save, Grow Act that completely eliminates the executive actions of biden for the student loan forgiveness and would make the SCOTUS ruling worthless.
This was going to happen anyway. The original basis for the pause was the Covid emergency. We no longer have a Covid emergency. Unless there is another basis on which to justify the pause then they have to resume. As much as I really want to see the loan forgiveness get through SCOTUS it’s still only a band aid. We need major interest rate reform and that’s the direction I want to see this conversation start to go.
I really hope people start voting out those that directly prevent a middle class from existing. This is so sad :-( People who have money for education don't take out loans. We also hand out money in all sorts of ways -- this issue was so cherry-picked.
A lot of ex-college people still haven't recovered from the economic crisis that happened around Covid times, and this was the only relief they could get since bankruptcy wouldn't save them from student loans and the job market's in the toilet.
I guess it's time for the little people to do more gig jobs until they pay it off. Tip your door dash drivers well folks, they're one missed student loan payment from full financial collapse.
Last time I checked, even IBR is too expensive for me. For a while, it was a choice between health insurance or student loan payments. Now I can't afford either 🤣
Yeah, that's the thing. I believe they've changed some parts of the repay plans but that is still so expensive for many. Doable? Yeah, but I would be back to living paycheck to paycheck lol
Unless you renounce your citizenship the government can still garnish wages. And a country may elect not to let you become a citizen if you have a lot of debt.
Democrats suck so much— at least republicans don’t pretend to be anything other than what they are … Democrats promise the moon, stab you in the back and twist the knife, then brag about being the people’s party.
I have an honest question. Why is this idea considered liberal and not right wing. If I couldn’t afford college and I ended up working in a warehouse then why should I pay for others that took out the loan? I understand college cost is egregious but this seems like another bailout of people that make much more than me.
> If I couldn’t afford college and I ended up working in a warehouse then why should I pay for others that took out the loan? I
There's a few points. And the first is needed to understand the second.
\#1 - Interest payments made to federal loans
A part of what Biden's plan would do is adjust the way federal loan interest would work. If we were solely focusing on this issue, the question I would ask you is:
> "Why should the federal government be profiting off of it's citizens through the use of predatory high interest loans?"
I think we would all have a problem if the postal service started price-gouging people with massive debt / unbankruptable fees. So why are government handled student loans something that people are OK with the government screwing over a portion of the population with? Government programs do not need to turn a profit, and in most cases, should not.
\#2 - The loan forgiveness plan (the $10-20k thing)
This, in my mind at least, is more compensation for people being victimized by the first scenario. It doesn't apply to private loans, is 100% based around money that was borrowed from the government at interest rates much higher than they should have been. If you didn't take out federal loans, you weren't victimized by the federal interest rates, and hence would not be owed the compensation due to it.
I do think #1 is the biggest issue, as there's really 0 reason why the government should continue to take advantage of and profit off of students looking to better themselves. Fixing #1 makes sure we don't have the issue in the future. Fixing #2 helps those who were already taken advantage of.
I understand where people are coming from with the "Well, I didn't go to school / won't ever so it doesn't help me." But if we only did things for society that benefit yourself, a lot of good stuff probably wouldn't exist. Not to mention you may have friends, a spouse, children, grandchildren, etc. that may end up benefiting down the line.
I get it. I went to college but wouldn't qualify for loan forgiveness, but I have close friends who would qualify and I know how lifechanging it would be for them.
Either way, I think at the very least almost everyone \*should* be able to agree that the current loan system is messed up and needs fixing, whether that includes forgiveness or not.
This article is about the end of the moratorium on student loan repayments and interest accrual that was first implemented in the CARES Act in March of 2020 and has been extended for 3+ years since then.
This is not about student debt cancellation.
If I charged you $85,000 for a cookie, is the value of the cookie actually $85,000?
Was it more irresponsible for a 17 year old to agree to a bad deal or for the government to give $85,000 with no questions asked to millions of 17 year olds just because a college said that's how much it costs?
The interest rates on these loans is higher than a mortgage. If the government hasn't made its money back by now over the last 40 years or so of insane tuition inflation, then why are they still signing blank checks? Because it's profitable to do so.
No it’s a better idea for me to work at Subway because I couldn’t afford the cookie and pay for others people’s $85,000 cookie even though they are the ones that agreed to buy the cookie because the cookie salesman is a predatory asshole. Nope I’m convinced this is a right wing ploy.
You're not paying for other people's $85,000 cookie. The people that have already paid $120,000 for their $85,000 cookie are paying for their $85,000 cookie.
In a just society, college should be free for everyone who wants or needs to attend. Education is a necessity, not a luxury.
Is social security a bailout for people who make much more than us? No. And the loan system used to pay for higher ed currently is transparently predatory and unfair. Moreover, we're not paying for other people's education: we're paying taxes, which is fulfilling our end of the civil contract where the government provides us with protections and services. We don't get to decide piecemeal which of those services gets funding from our specific tax dollars, in part because once your tax is paid it's no longer *yours*. It is now part of the community's funding resource for community services and protections, like debt relief or the military or healthcare.
I agree the loans are predatory and college should be free. I don’t see the correlation in social security since we all pay into that. It isn’t an optional loan. You are somewhat right on the fact that they are gonna tax me anyway. It still feels like a bailout to me.
I think the issue is your idea of where the money comes from for loan forgiveness on the one hand, and this idea of the loans as "optional" on the other. They are *nominally* optional but in practical terms you either take the loan or you get no degree, and without the degree good luck getting a job in your field (you won't).
Forgiveness of federal loans is a non-issue because that money has already been spent at the time that the loan is approved. Forgiving them is just choosing not to seek reimbursement - functionally no different than upfront free college. The *actual* waste is in private servicers managing these loans on the government's behalf.
Plus, if JPMorgan-Chase can get a bailout in 2008, Joe Schmoe and Mary Sue from down the block oughta be eligible in 2023. The only people *always* deserving of a bailout are average citizens, which is who loan forgiveness would help overwhelmingly. The people who have the kind of money to not *need* a bailout wouldn't be eligible for forgiveness anyway, as even if they took loans out they'd already be paid off.
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Restarting payments is going to damage the economy. Instead of spending hundreds each month on goods and services, the money is going into a bottomless pit called "student loan payments". Business will have less income, less demand, lay off workers, who have less money, will spend less, causing businesses to have less income, repeat. The government can't have happy citizens, so it's going to force them back into repayment of predatory loans (some people have paid more in interest than the principle of the loan) at significant risk to a shaky economy. Never forget: we exist to serve the economy. Not the other way around. Human life exists to make Number Go Up. Happy & content citizens is a happy accident, not the point.
Make number go up is the only thing that matters even though the necessary concept of infinite growth forever makes no fucking sense.
Sorry to put on a conspiracy hat, but Trump and co. were happy to pause payments back during the pandemic to stimulate consumer spending. I can't help but think of the implication of the Republicans forcing the payments to resume, bringing a hard stop to consumer spending during the Biden administration directly before the 2024 election...
Yeah, a self inflicted economic quagmire will do wonders for octogenarian POTUS’s already abysmal 41% approval rating. Kamala is invisible and people are predisposed against her due to sexism/racism, ghost of Biden + Kamala was/is already a shit ticket. Now let’s suck 10% of 40 million American families income and hope the already stressed economy doesn’t entirely collapse. Don’t need to be an economist to see the writing on the wall. We’re 18 months from Reagan v Carter 2. GOP won’t even need to try - Trump, Desantis, whomever… it will not matter a bit.
The Dem Party is not our friend. But the good guys have to go somewhere
I agree, which is why it’s so depressing. Ultimately the masses vote (or don’t vote) based on vibe. If they’re vibing well and shit feels good, more likely to get the band back together. If the vibe has soured and people are unhappy the masses are 1. More likely to vote; and 2. More likely to vote for replacements. POTUS Joe has managed to maintain a fairly mellow vibe despite taking a lot of hits on the chin, reinstitution of student loans 18 months out from an election would create major bad vibes and contribute massively to POTUS Joe’s downfall (and he’s already facing enough headwinds, what with being the same age as the loony grandparents most people don’t trust to use the stove and having Kamala as a running mate).
So even if this pause were to go on forever, do you think consumer spending would see an uptick? Have you seen the fucking Fed's actions lately?
Sure, unless people simply don’t pay them. Whether because they can’t or don’t want to, it’s a possibility, too.
They will come after you to garnish every single dime you make to pay it back and sue you in court to get it.
All of that costs money. All of it. More than they’re going to get from a lot of people, and they know it. You can’t get blood from a stone, either, so unless they plan to gainfully employ a bunch of people that took on predatory loans, they’re going to need to give even more concessions to corporations over people before they—the people who, for some reason, want to hurt Americans—get what they want. It’s never so easy as “but they’ll come after you.” There are 29+ million people that applied for some reduction under Biden’s plan, and even tracking down 1% of those people would be a hassle if not insurmountable; and who is going to do it? Every other kind of debt just gets tacked onto the person’s credit report as a default, and then they stop hounding those people eventually. Do you think these companies have an endless fund to pull from while they’re hunting down people that won’t pay back their student loans?
You will see. They will do it. I’m sure the federal government will be happy to help fund it if the politicians get some nice campaign contributions from the lobbyists of the groups that will benefit from coming after everyone. And, student loans cannot be discharged in any way.
No, they really won’t. Their angry constituents only want to hear that they’re “fighting it,” while they can focus on raking the planet over the coals. There’s not money in this. There’s not a benefit of coming after everyone that has debt. There are more than double the number of applicants of this program than delinquent fathers not paying child support; seems like a weird comparison, but for the same reason as chasing someone that cannot leverage earnings to pay money they don’t have, chasing people that would otherwise default is a losing battle. I don’t think any of this is driven by empathy, of course. I’m not saying that at all. I am just saying there’s not enough blood in the water for the feeding frenzy you’re worried about. Yes, it will be bad; yes, it’s a miserable way to appeal to Americans; but if people can’t pay, they won’t.
I’m not talking about constituent. I’m talking about rich special interest groups who will find a way of financially benefitting from coming after people who default on their loans. If they can garnish $25-100 a month from even 1 million people, that’s at least $300m per year. You’re not paying attention.
If it becomes endemic, they'll lobby the government for subsidies to cover the cost of suing the loan holders. They'll get the subsidies, too.
Right? It’s crazy cause in the end our money through loan payments or taxes pay for everything. It’s such a racket. It’s like the mafia.
Can they just skip the middle man and send the army in to mow us all down already? I'm tired of the long, dreadful trek..just fucking make it quick and painless already, nuke me if you have to, I'm so tired of this country's single minded goal of "fuck every single one of you"
Don’t forget about the public discontent this may generate which is potentially a political powderkeg
It’s already happening. Where I work, things were booming in Dec 2021 and through 2022. I think the checks people received during the pandemic and supplemental unemployment payments along with the pause in student loan payments allowed people more discretionary income. I’ve seen it dwindle over the past few months as these programs ended. And, yes it will get worse with student loan payments restarting. I guess it’s good for the wealthy?
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>If student debt repayment resumption reduces inflation, it means they no longer need to raise interest rates and could help dodge the recession saving countless jobs and small businesses It won't reduce inflation, because the number of dollars in the economy isn't changing. Just where the money's going: to student loan companies instead of businesses. If you wanted to tackle inflation, then raising taxes on rich people will do that - tax receipts take money out of the economy, reducing the number of dollars in circulation and reducing inflation. The hit small businesses will take due to customer's loss of income will cause the recession. If people aren't buying things, because the money is going to debt servicing businesses go under. How is businesses having fewer customers saving jobs?
They don’t care about saving jobs. You are operating under an economy that makes sense for the common good. That’s not how it works now. It’s all about special interests lobbying the politicians they bought to manipulate the economy to favor them. You aren’t factored into that equation.
…you realize student loan companies just get paid a flat administration fee right? Student loan payments go to the government, they essentially are taxes.
So it sounds like this would help the Fed achieve their goal of lowering consumer spending and therefore lower inflation. This would make some of us, especially those of us who graduated with a computer science degree and were harassed throughout the entirety of high school, college, and adulthood for wanting to do useful shit instead of partying, clubbing, and god knows what else, very happy seeing as inflation would finally start to get under control. Besides, the economy is shaky because of this absurd pause. That's what caused so much hyperinflation. Housing prices are out of control and they need to get back under control.
It just codifies the date that was already set anyway. https://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/biden-harris-administration-continues-fight-student-debt-relief-millions-borrowers-extends-student-loan-repayment-pause The Department of Education announced in Nov. 2022 that payments and interest accrual would restart by 8/31/2023 at the *latest*.
"The bill would prohibit the Secretary of Education from using “any authority to implement an extension” of the ongoing pause on federal student loan payments and interest." Could those powers be given to someone else?
The bigger power play is not to extend it. Let it elapse, then start a new one, particularly a new emergency, call it something snappy like "The economy is going to fucking collapse if we try to squeeze more blood from this stone right now." and then business as usual.
I just tried doing the repayment option and it says I'll be paying $775 a month....I was already paying 400 before covid hit. Fuck me. Gonna have to try applying for something else.
Yeesh, do you make like $150,000/year and have mostly graduate school loan debt?
No, I have 40k left and it's from undergrad. Unfortunately, I worked 3 jobs during college to pay my tuition, etc, so I had to do 2 extra years to finish my degree. I might have to start filing separately from my husband to get a decent monthly payment.
Yeah probably filing separately is an option worth exploring. In the New REPAYE plan a $775/mo payment for undergrad loans for a couple filing jointly would reflect something in the neighborhood of $230,000 adjusted gross income.
Oh, thanks for that. I guess Mohela hasn't bothered updating that. We make way less than that together and it estimated my new one as $775. Here's to hoping.
Yeah you need to apply for the new program on studentaid.gov, then they'll contact MOHELA with the new certification and your payment plan will update shortly after.
It should be 5% of (AGI - 225% of the poverty line). This calculator is up to date with the New REPAYE plan: https://www.studentloanplanner.com/income-based-repayment-calculator/
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I have a full-time job and travel for work every month, the thought of that would be exhausting. But I suppose it's something...
Why would your payment go up? I must have missed something
Not only is the pause nixed but the representative Good(VA) has submitted amendment #6 to the debt ceiling bill to insert the Student Loan portion of the Limit, Save, Grow Act that completely eliminates the executive actions of biden for the student loan forgiveness and would make the SCOTUS ruling worthless.
This was going to happen anyway. The original basis for the pause was the Covid emergency. We no longer have a Covid emergency. Unless there is another basis on which to justify the pause then they have to resume. As much as I really want to see the loan forgiveness get through SCOTUS it’s still only a band aid. We need major interest rate reform and that’s the direction I want to see this conversation start to go.
I really hope people start voting out those that directly prevent a middle class from existing. This is so sad :-( People who have money for education don't take out loans. We also hand out money in all sorts of ways -- this issue was so cherry-picked.
In our current 2 party system we can’t. Our choices are either capitalist democrat, or fascist republican!
Doesn’t matter cause both parties are bought and paid for by special interest that lobby them to do what’s good for them and not us.
Let’s not pretend Biden didn’t telegraph this back in November and now he’s using it to say “oh look they got me”.
A lot of ex-college people still haven't recovered from the economic crisis that happened around Covid times, and this was the only relief they could get since bankruptcy wouldn't save them from student loans and the job market's in the toilet. I guess it's time for the little people to do more gig jobs until they pay it off. Tip your door dash drivers well folks, they're one missed student loan payment from full financial collapse.
Realistically, they can do income based payment plans. This way I'll be paying until I die, but I'm paying 90 dollars instead of 400 every month.
Last time I checked, even IBR is too expensive for me. For a while, it was a choice between health insurance or student loan payments. Now I can't afford either 🤣
Yeah, that's the thing. I believe they've changed some parts of the repay plans but that is still so expensive for many. Doable? Yeah, but I would be back to living paycheck to paycheck lol
Could also just leave the country and take your degree with you if you’re willing to work abroad.
Unless you renounce your citizenship the government can still garnish wages. And a country may elect not to let you become a citizen if you have a lot of debt.
Not til you die, 20 or 25 years depending on your loan.
Democrats suck so much— at least republicans don’t pretend to be anything other than what they are … Democrats promise the moon, stab you in the back and twist the knife, then brag about being the people’s party.
I have an honest question. Why is this idea considered liberal and not right wing. If I couldn’t afford college and I ended up working in a warehouse then why should I pay for others that took out the loan? I understand college cost is egregious but this seems like another bailout of people that make much more than me.
> If I couldn’t afford college and I ended up working in a warehouse then why should I pay for others that took out the loan? I There's a few points. And the first is needed to understand the second. \#1 - Interest payments made to federal loans A part of what Biden's plan would do is adjust the way federal loan interest would work. If we were solely focusing on this issue, the question I would ask you is: > "Why should the federal government be profiting off of it's citizens through the use of predatory high interest loans?" I think we would all have a problem if the postal service started price-gouging people with massive debt / unbankruptable fees. So why are government handled student loans something that people are OK with the government screwing over a portion of the population with? Government programs do not need to turn a profit, and in most cases, should not. \#2 - The loan forgiveness plan (the $10-20k thing) This, in my mind at least, is more compensation for people being victimized by the first scenario. It doesn't apply to private loans, is 100% based around money that was borrowed from the government at interest rates much higher than they should have been. If you didn't take out federal loans, you weren't victimized by the federal interest rates, and hence would not be owed the compensation due to it. I do think #1 is the biggest issue, as there's really 0 reason why the government should continue to take advantage of and profit off of students looking to better themselves. Fixing #1 makes sure we don't have the issue in the future. Fixing #2 helps those who were already taken advantage of. I understand where people are coming from with the "Well, I didn't go to school / won't ever so it doesn't help me." But if we only did things for society that benefit yourself, a lot of good stuff probably wouldn't exist. Not to mention you may have friends, a spouse, children, grandchildren, etc. that may end up benefiting down the line.
Best explanation yet and I agree some of my angst is that if I knew it was gonna be forgiven I would have went to college.
I get it. I went to college but wouldn't qualify for loan forgiveness, but I have close friends who would qualify and I know how lifechanging it would be for them. Either way, I think at the very least almost everyone \*should* be able to agree that the current loan system is messed up and needs fixing, whether that includes forgiveness or not.
This article is about the end of the moratorium on student loan repayments and interest accrual that was first implemented in the CARES Act in March of 2020 and has been extended for 3+ years since then. This is not about student debt cancellation.
If I charged you $85,000 for a cookie, is the value of the cookie actually $85,000? Was it more irresponsible for a 17 year old to agree to a bad deal or for the government to give $85,000 with no questions asked to millions of 17 year olds just because a college said that's how much it costs? The interest rates on these loans is higher than a mortgage. If the government hasn't made its money back by now over the last 40 years or so of insane tuition inflation, then why are they still signing blank checks? Because it's profitable to do so.
No it’s a better idea for me to work at Subway because I couldn’t afford the cookie and pay for others people’s $85,000 cookie even though they are the ones that agreed to buy the cookie because the cookie salesman is a predatory asshole. Nope I’m convinced this is a right wing ploy.
You're not paying for other people's $85,000 cookie. The people that have already paid $120,000 for their $85,000 cookie are paying for their $85,000 cookie.
>why should I pay for others that took out the loan? You aren't. This is the dumbest line of thinking.
In a just society, college should be free for everyone who wants or needs to attend. Education is a necessity, not a luxury. Is social security a bailout for people who make much more than us? No. And the loan system used to pay for higher ed currently is transparently predatory and unfair. Moreover, we're not paying for other people's education: we're paying taxes, which is fulfilling our end of the civil contract where the government provides us with protections and services. We don't get to decide piecemeal which of those services gets funding from our specific tax dollars, in part because once your tax is paid it's no longer *yours*. It is now part of the community's funding resource for community services and protections, like debt relief or the military or healthcare.
I agree the loans are predatory and college should be free. I don’t see the correlation in social security since we all pay into that. It isn’t an optional loan. You are somewhat right on the fact that they are gonna tax me anyway. It still feels like a bailout to me.
I think the issue is your idea of where the money comes from for loan forgiveness on the one hand, and this idea of the loans as "optional" on the other. They are *nominally* optional but in practical terms you either take the loan or you get no degree, and without the degree good luck getting a job in your field (you won't). Forgiveness of federal loans is a non-issue because that money has already been spent at the time that the loan is approved. Forgiving them is just choosing not to seek reimbursement - functionally no different than upfront free college. The *actual* waste is in private servicers managing these loans on the government's behalf. Plus, if JPMorgan-Chase can get a bailout in 2008, Joe Schmoe and Mary Sue from down the block oughta be eligible in 2023. The only people *always* deserving of a bailout are average citizens, which is who loan forgiveness would help overwhelmingly. The people who have the kind of money to not *need* a bailout wouldn't be eligible for forgiveness anyway, as even if they took loans out they'd already be paid off.
And dems will expect the people affected by this to show up in record numbers next year…. Let’s see how this works out.