The 2020 Presidential Election Primary Thread

[beefytee]

So awesome to judge mistakes other people made that you did not or had different circumstances than you did.

I get the concerns about it being poor policy to forgive student debt. But if your main objections are driven by others managing their finances like you did, you should have that shame attitude toward people who get upside down in the mortgage or can’t keep up with their medical bills, and most especially people who have too much credit card debt.

It’s easy to judge mistakes, sins or weaknesses others have that you don’t.

I'm trying to see the parallels to mortgages or medical bills.

Has anyone suggested an across the board wipe out of mortgage or medical debt?

[swampfrog]

Given that both situations are representative, to whom should the system cater?

I read a proposal once that such debt should be allowed to be discharged by bankruptcy, but the institution where the student is enrolled is on the hook for half of it. If institutions are charging outrageous tuition/fees for degrees which are not marketable, then they should be held liable. Right now the inflation of tuition in concert with the expansion of questionable degrees appears to be a scam built to steal future earnings from ignorant students and their families. The incentives are completely screwed up.

[Donuthole]

People who complain about student loans aren't usually complaining about the money they had to borrow to pay for the education--for the most part they understood that when they signed up and took the money. The complaints usually stem from the exorbitant interest they pay and how many of these loans are structured to roll unpaid interest into principal. Which is why twitter is full of "i've paid $1,200/mo for 10 years and my principal balance has gone up" stories. This is something they should have understood when they signed up for the loans, but I can somewhat understand the limited foresight in that respect. Still short sighted, but not as short sighted as "i didn't realize I would have to pay this all back" which is how it is being spun.

For all the reasons set forth by iminohanihonnighjin (sp?) and others, completely forgiving this debt would be a disaster. IMO, a much more realistic approach to student loans would be to provide a way for people to consolidate past loans at a reasonable interest rate--somewhere in the 3.5-5.0% range--and amortize them over a reasonable period of time. A loan modification, if you will.

As a part of this, the gov't would get out of the student loan market moving forward, and student loans would become subject to market volatility just like any other debt. Student loans would become much more difficult to come by, and might even have differing interest rates depending on the degree being sought. Colleges and universities would likely have to lower tuition as a result, and the DeVry/ITT Tech/U of Phoenix private schools would have to come back into the tuition stratosphere to remain competitive.

Yes, this is an oversimplification, but it's doable. And it's much more realistic than just forgiving 1.5 trillion in debt.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Agreed, DH.

[SeattleUte]

the government getting out of the student loan business would likely make it harder for universities to continue to increase tuition at rates so far above inflation.

So universities should be single payor? :roll eyes:

[frank ryan]

Yes, of course. Anyone who is not on board with forgiving student debt is a selfish, judgmental asshole.

Come on, Frank.

JL, I’ve said multiple times, that I accept there are legit policy reasons for opposing student loan forgiveness. Ffs, I’m not sure exactly sold on it.

But some of these posts about people with student loan have absolutely been judgmental and full of sweeping assumptions about those with debt.

[myboynoah]

So awesome to judge mistakes other people made that you did not or had different circumstances than you did.

I get the concerns about it being poor policy to forgive student debt. But if your main objections are driven by others managing their finances like you did, you should have that shame attitude toward people who get upside down in the mortgage or can’t keep up with their medical bills, and most especially people who have too much credit card debt.

It’s easy to judge mistakes, sins or weaknesses others have that you don’t.

Why would you assume that we don't have those weaknesses?

Frank, I can have sympathy for the situation in which people have placed themselves, or sadly, through bad luck, in which they find themselves. And I do.

Upside down mortgages? I guess we all run that risk, but getting a mortgage is a process that requires a person to meet certain thresholds that show that person has give this some thought and has the means to repay that mortgage.

Medical bills? This gets the most sympathy, and medical institutions often work with people to reduce or clear this debt.

But credit card debt and student loans get very little sympathy from me. People must know that when they spend money they don't have that at some time they will need to pay that back. Is that such a hard concept? Especially when others make the difficult choices to forgo immediate wants so that they don't burden themselves with such debt, or they at least take on a manageable load.

This is pretty basic "being a responsible member of society" stuff to me.

[frank ryan]

People who complain about student loans aren't usually complaining about the money they had to borrow to pay for the education--for the most part they understood that when they signed up and took the money. The complaints usually stem from the exorbitant interest they pay and how many of these loans are structured to roll unpaid interest into principal. Which is why twitter is full of "i've paid $1,200/mo for 10 years and my principal balance has gone up" stories. This is something they should have understood when they signed up for the loans, but I can somewhat understand the limited foresight in that respect. Still short sighted, but not as short sighted as "i didn't realize I would have to pay this all back" which is how it is being spun.

For all the reasons set forth by iminohanihonnighjin (sp?) and others, completely forgiving this debt would be a disaster. IMO, a much more realistic approach to student loans would be to provide a way for people to consolidate past loans at a reasonable interest rate--somewhere in the 3.5-5.0% range--and amortize them over a reasonable period of time. A loan modification, if you will.

As a part of this, the gov't would get out of the student loan market moving forward, and student loans would become subject to market volatility just like any other debt. Student loans would become much more difficult to come by, and might even have differing interest rates depending on the degree being sought. Colleges and universities would likely have to lower tuition as a result, and the DeVry/ITT Tech/U of Phoenix private schools would have to come back into the tuition stratosphere to remain competitive.

Yes, this is an oversimplification, but it's doable. And it's much more realistic than just forgiving 1.5 trillion in debt.

I agree that reform instead of blanket forgiveness makes more sense. Also this student loan forgiveness stuff is Elizabeth Warren’s version of Trump’s wall. It won’t ever happen. Let’s agree that getting Betsy DeVos who favors Phoenix and Stevens Hennegar would a good step.

[Eddie]

There is not an easy answer to any of this.

I was one of the "responsible" people. I lived frugally, drove old cars, lived in crappy apartments, never went out to eat, wore hand-me-down clothes or stuff I got on the cheap places, and most of our vacations were camping - because we had a tent and sleeping bags were cheap.

And it lasted well beyond getting out of college - because I was dumb enough to pick a career in social work, that just doesn't pay well. Hell - I had a 4 year degree and a license and qualified for food stamps - not that we ever applied to receive them. Because I thought I was being responsible to provide for myself and my family.

I'll admit that in many ways I made choices in school and possibly in my career field based on what was interesting to me, but also what I could afford to pay for. Because I knew that my family couldn't help me pay for any of it.

I'm OK with my choices, though I won't say I never get jealous of others. But I'm in a pretty good place right now. That said - I love the idea of people going to school not having to base their decisions entirely on what they can afford like I did. Way too limiting.

I also had people I was in school with racking up student debt because they just couldn't POSSIBLY work while going to school, and they needed to buy that car, and what is school without the full experience of Spring Break somewhere fun. All things that I didn't and wasn't able to do. I mean, I was OK with them having the freedom to make their choices for themselves, but I just couldn't see going that far into debt for that long just because you don't want to have a job while in school or because you are burned out on school and need a nice vacation somewhere.

I've seen way too many people make similar decisions to mine - taking responsibility for their themselves - that I'd be one of the pissed off folks to learn that even though I did my best to not accumulate any debt while in school by making choices to live very frugally, I now get to pay for the student debt of someone who didn't make those same choices.

I happened to visit with the daughter of a BYU professor a while back - it's been 4-5 years, so I may have some of the details as to how things worked off just a little. And she's in her mid 40's now, so the story I'm telling happened a while ago.

She told me that because her dad was a BYU professor, she got tuition either free or very VERY reduced. So she was having a visit with her dad one afternoon and he asked her what she wanted to get her degree in. "Art history", she replied. He sat there pensively for a minute or two, then picked up the phone on his desk and called the registrars office. He told them that she was withdrawing from school and wouldn't be taking classes after all.

She sat there in shock, wondering what had just happened.

He told her "as soon as you find a degree that will lead to an actual career where you can earn and income and provide for yourself and your family, let me know and I'll call them back."

She told me that it was about a month later that she decided she was going to get an English degree and become a teacher.

I'm sure that Art History is something that we want to have people study and learn about. I'm sure we need some of those cultural studies in our world. But in many ways I agree with this gal's father - we need kids going to school not to just study something they find interesting, but studying something that can lead to a career and help them provide for themselves and their family.

Our schools are doing kids a HUGE disservice by selling them the idea of "find something you love and you'll never work a day in your life." I enjoy my work well enough - but not more than I would enjoy going fishing, traveling, or even working on a project at my house. Work is work. You shouldn't hate every minute of it - but for most folks it isn't what we would pick to do if we had a bunch of leisure time.

[frank ryan]

Why would you assume that we don't have those weaknesses?

Frank, I can have sympathy for the situation in which people have placed themselves, or sadly, through bad luck, in which they find themselves. And I do.

Upside down mortgages? I guess we all run that risk, but getting a mortgage is a process that requires a person to meet certain thresholds that show that person has give this some thought and has the means to repay that mortgage.

Medical bills? This gets the most sympathy, and medical institutions often work with people to reduce or clear this debt.

But credit card debt and student loans get very little sympathy from me. People must know that when they spend money they don't have that at some time they will need to pay that back. Is that such a hard concept? Especially when others make the difficult choices to forgo immediate wants so that they don't burden themselves with such debt, or they at least take on a manageable load.

This is pretty basic "being a responsible member of society" stuff to me.

You don't know what else that person is contending with. They might be doing the best they can. They might be doing better than you would if you were in their life circumstances. Being kind doesn't cost us much.

[Pelado]

You don't know what else that person is contending with. They might be doing the best they can. They might be doing better than you would if you were in their life circumstances. Being kind doesn't cost us much.

If there's something else that person is contending with that is more worthy of our sympathy and/or tax dollars, let's find out what that something else is and maybe help that person with it.

No need to be mean either way.

[The_Tick]

You don't know what else that person is contending with. They might be doing the best they can. They might be doing better than you would if you were in their life circumstances. Being kind doesn't cost us much.

1.5 Trillion dollars is much.

[Bo Diddley]

I worked full time while going to school.

[Walter Sobchak]

It would lead to many universities going bankrupt.

For undergrad courses, many universities are not much better than the local community college (BYU included) at less than half the cost (BYU excluded).

[BlueK]

So universities should be single payor? :roll eyes:

Uh, no. Not what I said, not even close. I think the easy money available to borrowers because of the government's help has helped create an artificial scenario which cushions universities from having to face some market forces every other industry does. I'm at least as libertarian as you on economics.