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They can. There are government loan programs for cheap money to help buy a house. There are state and local programs in NJ at least where I can get you 27,000 in down-payment assistance towards a house that can be totally forgiven without making a single payment.
To be fair, this started happening in 2018 when the tax cuts were put in place and the companies had no other place to put their cash. This isn't new and just more evidence of "trickle down" being a complete farce.36Kevon said:
I don't understand how one person with a crapload of student debt can be considered "similarly situated" to someone that has already paid off their debts. Maybe at one time long ago you were similarly situated (although to some degree I'd push back on that too). But you're clearly not similarly situated now.
This seems like a really odd thing to say. One of the best arguments in favor of the social safety net is that sometimes people just get unlucky -- bad things happen to them for reasons outside their control. Somebody loses their job, gets sick, etc. and as a result they can't pay their bills. In a case like that, yeah sure "I can pay my bills so why can't this guy pay his?" sort of misses the point.
Replace the word "student" with "mortgage." It's the same argument, right?
Correct, people with mortgages are not similarly situated to people who have paid off their mortgages.
Some people have a hard time paying off their mortgage. Should the government therefore erase my mortgage?
What I mean by that is that similar people at around the same time took out similar loans. One pays it back, the other gets it forgiven because he/she could not or would not pay it back. The problem with fairness, of course for the sake of a safety net argument, is that the concept applies to people who simply would not. There's the rub. This shouldn't be that hard to explain to a person with an IQ of over 140 but damn if I aren't having the damndest time doing so.
The question of whether the government should ever help people struggling with their mortgages is a complicated one. But what I would say is a very bad way of looking at it is "we can't help the struggling people because they are similarly situated to non-struggling people."
Let's take it to the other thread. I'm writing up a short explanation of my thoughts, that might be helpful.
Forgive my car and house loan and I'll do my part to make this economy go boom too
Forgive my car and house loan and I'll do my part to make this economy go boom too
Gladly read it. Not sure what kind of response I can give, but I'll definitely read it.
But there are tons of people who paid off their student loans, and are struggling now due to Covid’s impact on the economy. But unfortunately since they paid off that particular debt, they don’t get any relief. If they could have predicted the future and put that money into Something else, perhaps they would have two bills paid off now or three?
Sure you do. If somebody pays off a $30K student loan, and then next week the government decides to erase student loans for everybody, the guy who paid off his loan essentially just set $30K on fire. I'm 100% sure you understand why that was an error, why it would tick a person off, and why it creates perverse incentives for borrowers.
Well...at the moment hasn't there been relief during Covid extending to January (and likely to be extended) already?
And those are great problems to fix on the student loan end. I’m not sure “the predatory nature” means there should be blanket forgiveness for those who haven’t paid them off while those who have are just told tough luck.
Sure...and I don't think I have ever or would ever advocate for a blanket forgiveness of things either. Im not all for a lot of it...just a difference in the nature of who is getting targeted for these loans and I don't think its that comparable.
Earlier I mentioned the prefrontal cortex - what is its purpose? when does it finish developing?
Fair point if that's not what you're advocating. We agree on that. I think THE problem is that the student loan programs are designed for 18 year old kids with no maturity, little or no long term thinking and no real gameplan. A lot of kid's are just excited to make friends and party. And we let those kids take out 10,000$ to 15,000$ loans for a year of partying.
I remember during the Primary debates: this was the only thing that seemed reasonable.
I agree, but what about the people and families who sacrificed to save and paid off their loans for the last 20 years? Should they get a tax credit or reimbursed?
I am on board with this idea. Then the students could more easily afford 2 years at a university.
No other place to put their cash.
Sorry if I gave you the impression that I didn't think there were exceptions to almost every rule...there are. And I say kudos to them
Companies like Costco didn’t give out special dividends 15 times their normal amount at any time during 2018. Or anytime in 2019. Or before sleepy was put in a position to raise the tax rate for qualified dividends from 15% to being taxed as regular income.
None of this changes the fact that this started happening after the tax cuts were implemented...this isn't new.Not to mention the vets who sacrificed 4+ years of their life in exchange for GI Bill.
Exceptions to the rule.Sorry if I gave you the impression that I didn't think there were exceptions to almost every rule...there are. And I say kudos to them
Yes...there were multiple times people discussed the stock buy backs after the tax cuts and how corporations were not "trickling down" income but using it in other ways.Sorry if I gave you the impression that I didn't think there were exceptions to almost every rule...there are. And I say kudos to them
To be more fair, the retroactive tax hikes were part of the Trump "tax cut" from the beginning, but since they'll go into effect after he's gone (gee, I wonder how he chose January 2021?), those that will get screwed will blame the administration in power, while McConnell will block any middle-class tax relief from coming to the Senate floor.
Not the thread to be getting into actual details my friend. Still waiting for the goalposts to be shoved around and land on a resting place before responding to some of the other stuff going on in here
Agree with your assessment. That was our experience as well when our son was registering for classes this fall. We had to go through all of the financial aid mularkey even though our 529 plan was covering most of the cost. But its tempting to use those available loan funds to cover room and board. Having that loan availability might encourage a student to attend a school and live on campus as opposed to attending another school as a commuter. The available federal loan amounts are relatively small. But the private funding can be considerably more and its essentially federally backed as it cant be discharged either, to my knowledge. Removing the provision that prevents student loans from being discharged in bankruptcy proceedings would impact the student lending industry and by extension the cost of college. Colleges can essentially charge whatever they want right now because virtually anyone can qualify for loans both federal and private to cover the cost. there is no incentive for colleges to make tuition more affordable. Just the opposite exists right now as schools offer ever more amenities to students.
Why does government need to provide additional funding? Government is already subsidizing Community College and Technical Schools. It costs $2500 a year to attend our local community college. I will grant you that we need more technical schools or we need an expansion of technical programs offered in the community colleges but based on my experience as a parent with a child in CC its pretty affordable as it is. Or is $2500 a year too big an ask?Godsbrother said:
I agree with most of this, but not the conclusion. The higher ed bubble was going to burst and that timeline has escalated on account of the rona. You're right about the top schools, but the rest? That isn't what's happening. Expect to see a wave of school closures sometime this decade. There's lots of reasons to explain the unreasonably high costs and certainly a component of it was from trying to keep up with the joneses over the last couple decades, but most of these places are not printing money. I won't cite a number because I'd be making it up, but I'd be surprised if most are in the black right now.
Being educated and skilled is good for the individual first and foremost. Is $2500 a year too much to invest in ones self? Because education and skills training is an investment in yourself before it ever becomes good for the country.
Its not only the top schools, although I will concede that its most glaring at the top schools. Other schools are adding amenities to both campus housing, dining and recreation in order to attract students and the dollars that come with them. There are a host of schools that have sprawling aquatic centers with lazy rivers and slides that rival the aquatic facilities at many resorts. Many of them are state schools. There is alot of expense in maintaining these kinds of facilities and the students bear the costs in either increased tuition rates or additional activity fees. Most student loans dont differentiate between tuition or room, board and fees. Interestingly enough the 529 plan we invested in for our kids does. It only covers tuition.
You're not wrong that some schools are spending frivolously and that those costs are being passed down to students, but you're over estimating how common this is across the industry.
I think this is a really interesting question and I don't know where I land.
Govt. should subsidize K -12. If you can prove your merit at that level, than you can get loans for college and pay them off like I did...nothing wrong with that. I'm a 1%er and I'm not 50 yet. I had no advantages.
I've asked this question a billion times on this forum, though not in as nice a way. I have never gotten a meaningful answer to it. I've posed the question to all my educator family/friends and they at least acknowledge it's a completely arbitrary line that's being drawn. In my view, we need to educate people to whatever level it takes for them to be competitive in our global economy. That's the world we are forced to live in and I believe our country has a duty to help its citizens thrive in that environment. We do it for multinational corporations, so we should do it for individuals. If someone can make a cogent argument for why they believe that line is high school I'm all ears.
It’s an interesting question. K-12 was set up long ago, the world has changed, the resources required to field a competitive workforce have changed, why shouldn’t we change with it? K-14, reflecting the increased complexity of the world, makes complete sense to me, likely for the exact same reasons we decided on going to 12 in the first place, it met the needs of the workforce at the time.
