Sign the petition to end student debt and save the economy!

Someone Who Went to College wrote:

There's nothing "wrong" with working at Jamba Juice when you're 18, I'm sure lots of us had jobs like that. But when you're 18 or 28, going to college is a helluva lot more appealing than working at the mall for minimum wage. People that say otherwise have never worked minimum wage.

If you are still making minimum wage at age 28, you have problems that can't be solved by going to college! Get creative. Creativity, skills, and drive are how people get ahead in this world.

And even if you lack talent, hard work can get you there. Bill collectors, garbage collectors, plumbers, restaurant managers, bartenders, sales reps, flight attendants - all jobs that don't require a degree - make more money than teachers.

I paid off my student loans and received zero financial aid. No free ride for me. So, no free ride for you.

Those that want a free ride when young need to pay it back later. How about reduced retirement from companies you work for, social security and medicaid benefits?

gc wrote:

I tracked down all the links. Basically, ex-students would have to pay 10% of income over 150% of the poverty level ($16,500 in 2011) for 10 years to be forgiven all outstanding student loans. I would not be in favor of that.

I'd really prefer to see someone turn up the heat on universities to reduce the cost of education.... that's really where the problem lies. There are lots of ways to reduce education costs, but universities have been raising the cost of tuition faster than the inflation rate for at least the past 20 years. Why do universities never get mentioned for RAISING THE COST of tuition in the first place?

One theory is that colleges can raise tuition and fees because they know Congress will just okay more money for student loans.

Colleges also probably offer too many courses that are not academic quality (see women's studies and ethnic studies as a good start). Also, too much duplication at state universities where colleges near one another offer the exact same courses. Wasteful.

Colleges are also on a spending spree to make new stuff and spend a fortune recruiting new students (and doing far less to keep the ones that were recruited).

Higher ed in the US is the best in the world (more depth than any place else) but is also very screwed up.

They already have a program in place now called the Income Based Repayment Plan or IRB. It was started in 2007 and offers that forgiveness. It is unclear at this point whether or not those forgiven amounts will be taxable when the time comes.

http://studentaid.ed.gov/PORTALSWebApp/students/english/IBRPlan.jsp

http://studentaid.ed.gov/PORTALSWebApp/students/english/PayAsYouEarn.jsp

Its not a theory its supply and demand.

The supply side is limited by the tremendous costs associated with open a new school or even increasing class size.

The demand side is the near term is supported by the large birth rate in the early 90s. For the longer term the demand for college education is extremely inelastic. Meaning it takes a massive change in price for there to be a significant effect on the amount supplied. Even if tuition was to increase 10 percent enrollment would probably barely change.

The only way to reduce the costs over the long term is to reduce the ability of people to spend infinite on their education.

College loans are extremely risky and just like the sub-prime mortgages should be issued sparingly. At least sub prime mortgages have collateral, and am somewhat based on the ability to pay it back. Government loans are by every metric of debt the most unsafe. No collateral, less you make more you can loan, reduced interest rates, dont have to start paying for years.How come banks are extremely irresponsible for making risky bets yet most people student loans as a government responsibility.

Don't take this as anti-student loans. Im just against the government making risker bets then wall street. There is nothing wrong with a person taking up to a 100 grand in debt to get a solid education that will yield an ability to pay it back. That being said no one should ever have over 100 thousand in debt, if you need to borrow that much you need to rethink your college choice. Also if the field of study as a average grad salary of 35000 or less you really need to reconsider your major.

I never took on any debt as a student - not a penny. Part of that was my money, part of that was from my family, and part of that was from academic scholarships.

If we can forgive student debt, I think my family and I should get a rebate. After all, we paid tens of thousands for me to go to good programs. So, we should at least be refunded for the interest we could have made on that money had I instead taken out student loans and been forgiven them.

Nah nah wrote:

This is dumb. If people stopped blindly going to college immediately after high school without knowing specifically what they were going to college for, then there wouldn't be so much debt.

I say that graduating high school seniors should have to work for at least a year before they are allowed to go to college and take on so much debt.

That year off should give them some perspective and time to plan out their future. No more "l'll figure out what I want to major in later, no big deal".

I agree fully with this statement. Every high school grad should work a year or two as a fast food/grocery store/construction pee-on to see what the world is really like before entering college. I know that my time spent working a crappy job since dropping out is really making me appreciate the value of a college degree (the right kind, that is). I do agree with the posters who said that loan forgiveness should not be blind. For example, someone who attended an expensive private school while earning a liberal arts degree with nothing of employment value added on to it should not qualify for loan forgiveness.

Whether or not you all think that a person "deserves" to have their debt forgiven, people are going to start defaulting and it is going to hurt the economy. Regardless of who deserves what, something must be done.

This is kind of like the universal healthcare argument. Deciding against universal healthcare doesn't keep uninsured people from getting injured/sick and going to the doctor. You're trying to keep people from getting something you don't think they deserve, but you're going to pay in one way or another anyway.

pay for it one way or another wrote:

Whether or not you all think that a person "deserves" to have their debt forgiven, people are going to start defaulting and it is going to hurt the economy. Regardless of who deserves what, something must be done.

This is kind of like the universal healthcare argument. Deciding against universal healthcare doesn't keep uninsured people from getting injured/sick and going to the doctor. You're trying to keep people from getting something you don't think they deserve, but you're going to pay in one way or another anyway.

Yeah the something that must be done is the federal government needs to stop issuing loans. Then people wouldn't be defaulting. For the people already in debt the negative effect on the economy is not greater than the longer term negative effect of forgiving loans. Also i find it hard to believe that the current student debt will weigh too much on the economy its only at like 7 percent of GDP. The national and local debt is on the order of 150 percent of GDP and nothing much is being done about that.

I am all for forgiving these loans, on one condition...there needs to be an option. I can either pay off my student loan as agreed, or I can have it erased and I will report to Basic Training at one of the Military Services, to be followed by a term of service equal to the length of time it will take me to earn the total amount of my student loan plus interest.

Ya Ya Ya wrote:

I am all for forgiving these loans, on one condition...there needs to be an option. I can either pay off my student loan as agreed, or I can have it erased and I will report to Basic Training at one of the Military Services, to be followed by a term of service equal to the length of time it will take me to earn the total amount of my student loan plus interest.

Yeah, I can see this. Really, there should be no free money. Even welfare recipients should have to do community service or something.