What is your opinion on student loan forgiveness?

[apl68]

I think it's wrong for the federal government to charge interest on loans which are investments in the future of the country.

If I want to do a PhD in "Klingon Studies", it's hard to see how that's an "investment in the future of the country". As long as students can study whatever they want, it's ludicrous to suggest that all of that is remotely equivalent in terms of its value to the entire nation.

The studies of social sciences and popular culture make excellent backgrounds for market researchers, human resources professionals, psychologists... you name it.

Absolutely, especially if I'm doing business with, or hiring, Klingons.

Marshwiggle, this arrogant dismissal of any education that isn't STEM as worthless is both offensive and, frankly, ignorant.

[ciao_yall]

I think it's wrong for the federal government to charge interest on loans which are investments in the future of the country.

If I want to do a PhD in "Klingon Studies", it's hard to see how that's an "investment in the future of the country". As long as students can study whatever they want, it's ludicrous to suggest that all of that is remotely equivalent in terms of its value to the entire nation.

The studies of social sciences and popular culture make excellent backgrounds for market researchers, human resources professionals, psychologists... you name it.

Absolutely, especially if I'm doing business with, or hiring, Klingons.

Or people who participate in that literary subculture in which Klingons play a social and political role that mirrors that of others in our actual social and political realms, thus using the power of metaphor to better understand and solve actual social and political problems.

[apl68]

It seems pretty clear, also, that the debt load is crushing. Something like 3/4 of all federal loans are currently either not being paid back at all, or are being paid back under partial relief programs like the IBR, which indicates that the debtor is under financial hardship. It's a concrete way to help a lot of people right now. Given the massive economic, political, and social benefits of a debt jubilee, it seems stupid not to do it.

I'm not at all bothered that a few freeloaders will win big. It's way more important to me that tens of thousands (or more) of people who are desperate and struggling will be materially helped. That's the whole point of having a government. If it can't do that, then you may as well not have one. Frankly, the argument that it shouldn't be done because you had to pay all of yours back is just childish, not to mention churlish.

I'd stop short of declaring an all-out jubilee year on student loans, but you're right that there's a huge amount of bad (in all senses of the word) student debt out there that it only makes sense to forgive.  Any system that isn't hopelessly bureaucratic and impossible for many deserving people to get relief through is going to let some freeloaders through as well.  It's just a cost of doing business.  That said, there need to be some safeguards in place, or there's going to be massive gaming of the system.

[marshwiggle]

I think it's wrong for the federal government to charge interest on loans which are investments in the future of the country.

If I want to do a PhD in "Klingon Studies", it's hard to see how that's an "investment in the future of the country". As long as students can study whatever they want, it's ludicrous to suggest that all of that is remotely equivalent in terms of its value to the entire nation.

The studies of social sciences and popular culture make excellent backgrounds for market researchers, human resources professionals, psychologists... you name it.

Absolutely, especially if I'm doing business with, or hiring, Klingons.

Marshwiggle, this arrogant dismissal of any education that isn't STEM as worthless is both offensive and, frankly, ignorant.

It isn't dismissal of any education that isn't STEM, it's the question of why and to what extent taxpayers should pay for education regardless of any obvious benefit to society. As others have noted, professional programs provide vast benefit to the individuals that take them, and even though society needs doctors, it's not clear that taxpayers should foot the bill for everyone going through medical school.

If "education" has automatic benefit to society, then why aren't music lessons, sports camps, arts lessons, and any other kind of instruction paid for by taxpayers? Clearly having people more cultured, healthy, etc. has benefits to society.

Since universities can come up with their own programs, like Klingon Studies, what is the evidence that those automatically produce so much more societal benefit than the other things I've mentioned above to have them paid for by taxpayers while the others are to be paid by the individual?

[dismalist]

Another point of contention over forgiveness could be push back on politicians from solid middle and lower-upper class taxpayers who scraped and saved and sacrificed to be able to pay for theirs children's education without them incurring debt--only to then turn around use their tax $$$ to pay for the education of those who racked up enormous loans--some, as we all know, sometimes irresponsibly in relation to future earning potential.

As far as well-paid professionals with advanced degrees--IF this were to be attempted, it would be easy enough to limit forgiveness to undergraduate programs or to exclude professional programs (MBA, PA, DPT, MD, DO, JD, etc.)  where the debt incurred is perhaps reasonable to a degree (pun intended)?? Honestly, what carpenter wants to hear his tax money is being spent to finance the education of doctors and lawyers?

Not that anybody like that actually cares, but you could educate them about (1) how federal government finances actually work, and (2) how much (/little) of student loan debt is currently being repaid in other words, their opposition should stretch to the current system, and various forgiveness plans wouldn't change a whole lot financially, but would make a huge difference in terms of human suffering).

But since the argument is childish and churlish, and not offered in good faith, I don't think anyone should worry about it. (Of course, that's not how it plays out in real life.)

Here's how federal government finances work:

The forgiveness that  is being implemented piecemeal gets added to government debt. That has to be serviced, now by taxpayers and their children instead of the beneficiaries of the loans.

The human suffering can be alleviated by allowing bankruptcy, as with any other loan. Then, taxpayers would be paying for alleviation of suffering only, not transferring sums to the non-suffering.

[Sun_Worshiper]

I think some degree of forgiveness under some set of circumstances is fine, but just cancelling debt with no rhyme or reason doesn't make any sense.

There is also the supply side problem: Reduce loans distributed in the first place and people won't have so much debt. I remember when I was in grad school I applied for a loan and they gave me twice as much as I had asked for. Fortunately I had the sense to go complain but a lot of people (including 20 year old Sun_Worshiper) would have taken that money.

[marshwiggle]

I think some degree of forgiveness under some set of circumstances is fine, but just cancelling debt with no rhyme or reason doesn't make any sense.

One issue that hasn't been raised yet is the wide gap in effort by students, even in the same program. Should the taxpayers be on the hook for the student who got hungover and never came to class and failed out? Why?

[mahagonny]

Unsurprisingly, I'm all for it. It seems like a good move to me, both economically and politically.

I think it's wrong for the federal government to charge interest on loans which are investments in the future of the country.

Whatever the benefit to society in income, innovation, standard of living, life expectancy, taxes collected, culture etc. is offset by the damage to race relations coming from higher education.

[apl68]

I think some degree of forgiveness under some set of circumstances is fine, but just cancelling debt with no rhyme or reason doesn't make any sense.

One issue that hasn't been raised yet is the wide gap in effort by students, even in the same program. Should the taxpayers be on the hook for the student who got hungover and never came to class and failed out? Why?

In principle no, but in practice how would the authorities find out who was guilty of that sort of activity, and who wasn't?  Assuming the worst of anybody who failed to complete a course of study wouldn't be fair, as there are many circumstances beyond students' control that could lead to failure.  Putting the burden of proof on former students to prove that they weren't guilty of such things would weed out a lot of deadbeats, but it would also risk weeding out students who made a good-faith effort to go to college and were defeated by illness, family issues, etc. 

Of course we could simplify things by making student loan forgiveness conditional on actually completing a degree.  But, again, that would leave many former students out in the cold for situations that weren't their fault.  Ideally decisions like this would be made on a case-by-case basis, but trying to do that risks creating a big, cumbersome, expensive bureaucratic nightmare.

There are no easy answers here.  I do know this--there's no way to keep at least some undeserving cases from getting through, unless one writes the rules so stringently that large numbers of more deserving students will end up getting filtered out too.  Like I said above, some relief going to the wrong people is going to be a cost of doing business.  Keeping that cost down is a legitimate concern when writing guidelines and determining policy.  But so is trying to assist as many people as possible who actually need it.

[marshwiggle]

There are no easy answers here.  I do know this--there's no way to keep at least some undeserving cases from getting through, unless one writes the rules so stringently that large numbers of more deserving students will end up getting filtered out too.  Like I said above, some relief going to the wrong people is going to be a cost of doing business.  Keeping that cost down is a legitimate concern when writing guidelines and determining policy.  But so is trying to assist as many people as possible who actually need it.

Going forward, the best way to do that would be to advise large numbers of people not to go to university in the first place; the time they waste can't be "forgiven", even if the money can.

[Anon1787]

Where would any of us be today without a college degree or beyond?

A college degree is necessary for some professions and occupations like a college instructor, but its necessity is greatly exaggerated. Using BLS numbers an economist a while back estimated that about 33% of college graduates were working in jobs that BLS listed as not requiring a bachelor's degree (it's not just your starving PhD student working as a barista @ Starbucks).

Fine. Maybe when they just graduated from college, they were working as baristas. But in 5 years, who will be managing the store, district, marketing... who has a career path?

The broader point is that the number of graduates is outpacing the number of jobs that truly need a bachelor's degree and that employers have been using a bachelor's degree as a cheap way to discover work habits and abilities. So producing more college graduates may make the task of hiring easier for employers but it's expensive for workers (out-of-pocket costs plus opportunity costs) and the government.

I think it's wrong for the federal government to charge interest on loans which are investments in the future of the country.

If I want to do a PhD in "Klingon Studies", it's hard to see how that's an "investment in the future of the country". As long as students can study whatever they want, it's ludicrous to suggest that all of that is remotely equivalent in terms of its value to the entire nation.

From what I gather the student loan default rate is highest (26%) among people with degrees from nonselective colleges who major in the arts and humanities.

A solution would be to require borrowers to buy insurance (like mortgage insurance) and charge based on default rates.

[apl68]

There are no easy answers here.  I do know this--there's no way to keep at least some undeserving cases from getting through, unless one writes the rules so stringently that large numbers of more deserving students will end up getting filtered out too.  Like I said above, some relief going to the wrong people is going to be a cost of doing business.  Keeping that cost down is a legitimate concern when writing guidelines and determining policy.  But so is trying to assist as many people as possible who actually need it.

Going forward, the best way to do that would be to advise large numbers of people not to go to university in the first place; the time they waste can't be "forgiven", even if the money can.

Agreed.  As much as some of us would like to see more people get a higher education in principle, in practice we've had far too many students pushed into higher ed in recent years who were essentially set up to fail.  Expensively.  I appreciate how realistic our local high school guidance counselor is in trying to steer students who clearly aren't academically inclined into alternative work tracks.  We need more of that.

We also need to take steps to make sure that we never see a recurrence of the situation some years back where huge corporate bottom-feeders like University of Phoenix conned large numbers of unprepared students into borrowing billions of dollars to attend courses that they either couldn't pass or that were of little benefit to anybody except the schools offering them.  Those poorly-regulated vocational schools were where the real large-scale waste and fraud were taking place, not the alleged worthless English lit majors and such.

[marshwiggle]

There are no easy answers here.  I do know this--there's no way to keep at least some undeserving cases from getting through, unless one writes the rules so stringently that large numbers of more deserving students will end up getting filtered out too.  Like I said above, some relief going to the wrong people is going to be a cost of doing business.  Keeping that cost down is a legitimate concern when writing guidelines and determining policy.  But so is trying to assist as many people as possible who actually need it.

Going forward, the best way to do that would be to advise large numbers of people not to go to university in the first place; the time they waste can't be "forgiven", even if the money can.

Agreed.  As much as some of us would like to see more people get a higher education in principle, in practice we've had far too many students pushed into higher ed in recent years who were essentially set up to fail.  Expensively.  I appreciate how realistic our local high school guidance counselor is in trying to steer students who clearly aren't academically inclined into alternative work tracks.  We need more of that.

We also need to take steps to make sure that we never see a recurrence of the situation some years back where huge corporate bottom-feeders like University of Phoenix conned large numbers of unprepared students into borrowing billions of dollars to attend courses that they either couldn't pass or that were of little benefit to anybody except the schools offering them.  Those poorly-regulated vocational schools were where the real large-scale waste and fraud were taking place, not the alleged worthless English lit majors and such.

Quite possibly, but the zeitgeist promoted by governments and the post-secondary institutions themselves encouraging everyone to go basically opened the door and rolled out the red carpet for the exploiters.

[mamselle]

Yes, and every time someone tried to put accreditation blocks in place to stop or regulate them, they (and, one suspects, some of their highly-placed cronies) squealed like stuck pigs about it.

Pearson is (I suspect) tangled up with them as well. Wherever there's educational fraud, their books show up.

I'd guess collusion on getting pathways to more student pockets might have attracted them, too.

M.

[ergative]

If "education" has automatic benefit to society, then why aren't music lessons, sports camps, arts lessons, and any other kind of instruction paid for by taxpayers?

My dude, our society refuses to fund health care. Your argument is not terribly persuasive here.