idk . . . our daughter, who we've had to occasionally subsidize in spite of our being on very limited fixed SS incomes, went to school to learn coding. She's not PMC, but a single mom with two daughters, who has to juggle money each month to get by, even as she works a full time job (coding). She doesn't owe a great deal, but can never get past the minimum while the interest piles on. This will give her A LOT of relief, and it will give us some relief, too. Just sayin
To your second-to-last paragraph's point- from the perspective of someone who very much feels like the people in your last paragraph's point:
The Biden administration also recently announced a $7,500 subsidy for anyone buying an EV. Literally every single major automaker producing an EV this year raised the price of their vehicle exactly $7,500 (or more) in less than half a week of the announcement.
This was the market almost literally taking the administration by the shoulders and saying, "if you do THIS we will always, always, always do THIS."
So, all I see coming from this is A) college will now be more expensive because universities now understand that above a certain price point, it's meaningless; B) my taxes, which are already set to go up in several ways to pay for Biden's various social engineering programs, will go up again, in a rural household with under $100K combined family income, and C) a fraction of the people who already voted for Biden who were tweeting angrily for the past 2 years that he betrayed them by not canceling their debt (while I racked up an equal amount keeping our home and vehicles repaired and functional, things that are not sexy enough to be paid for by Uncle Joe with other people's money) but were distracted for a while by tweeting angrily that people who don't vaccinate for COVID should die in concentration camps will stop being angry at Biden long enough to vote for him. The people who continue to feel betrayed and the people who will end up footing the bill for this bribe- the middle class, NEVER the ultra-wealthy- weren't going to vote for him anyway, so fuck us. Acceptable losses.
This proposal will not help me, personally, my student debt is so huge and unyielding that even at the 20k (which I don’t qualify for) it wouldn’t cover a year’s interest.
The half measures are always more insulting than doing nothing.
Biden's behind the scenes handlers have made some very serious policy blunders since he took the oath, but this one takes the cake. (And hands it out a crumb at a time to a select few while others observe hungrily and resentfully.) I can't think of anything more ineffectual, ill timed, or politically divisive than that one.
But since it's so ridiculously transparent, so remarkably shameless, it makes me wonder if like many other Dem dangling carrots it "accidentally on purposely" slips from their hands and falls to the ground to be trodden to mush... because of that meany opposition party! They're why we can't have nice things!! It'll still deliver votes anyway. As with most Donkey Party political promises, it's the thought that counts. And winning the sympathy vote by calculated losing. No real actions that address the systemic problems are necessary.
"These results are based on responses from 903 Americans collected between August 24th and August 25th via the Premise smartphone application."
"Respondents were compensated for their completion of the survey through the Premise app."
"Despite overall approval of the plan, respondents had mixed feelings about the fairness of it.
A slight majority (53%) felt the program unfairly punishes Americans who do not currently have student loan debt.
49% of respondents agreed with the Republican National Committee's characterization of the program as a "bailout for the wealthy," aligning with the 51% who disagreed with the characterization."
As to Democratic chances in this election cycle, I think the overturning of Roe v Wade will have a far greater impact on voters--especially younger and newer voters, both female and male-than anger about student loan forgiveness.
After looking at the faculty parking lot for the executives for any university, it is usually easier to see where all that money is going; the upper admin seems to drive very nice cars, at least around here at our community college. Bloated administrations there and in Washinton, sponging money. That is part of the ruin of higher education imo. Best from the old lady in Oregon...
I completely agree, but I also think this take (which is pretty common on the American left from what I’ve seen) misses a few points.
Most young people I know have student debts. I worked in the trades and the number of people with bachelor’s and master’s degrees learning to be plumbers and electricians as sadly high. Sometimes a trade job is the only way to service the debt. So the divide between tradespeople/ rednecks and urban professionals is a very artificial division created and exploited by those who oppose student debt forgiveness. The poor and the blue collar workers are not free of student debt and few in the younger generations really care if some other young person gets bailed out and they don’t get theirs at the same time. Those crying about the unfairness of debt relief are overwhelmingly older people convinced that the debt crisis is the result of moral decay and not the result of socio-economic policies preying upon young people.
I have little sympathy for those who are so petty as to be angry because people in need were bailed out. To compare my friend who struggles with student loan payments after her husband developed an autoimmune disease and had to fight for years to get disability to bankers being bailed out is ridiculous. From a class analysis standpoint, student debt forgiveness gives working class people an advantage compared to the corporations that hold their debts. And that is a good thing. It won’t be entirely fair to everyone. But few things are. Should we oppose universal health care because it will disproportionately assist those who are obese smokers and shift costs onto fit, healthy people? That is a common argument in the US as well. This stirring up of petty grievance has always been a tactic to make the working class fight each other and not demand better conditions. And I don’t buy it any more when it comes to student loans than to “welfare queens” or any other category of the working class that is being held up as unworthy of aid.
Also, another point to consider is that alternatives to student loans- the military or the trades- tend to far easier to access for men than for women. Last I looked into it, about 70% of the women in the armed forces reported experiencing sexual harassment or assault. And the trades are notorious for being difficult to break into as a woman. So I believe there is an unconsidered aspect here sexual politics of a college degree. To make a decent living as a female generally requires a college degree. And it has been shown that wages within professions decline as women enter the profession. How much of this crisis is simply a new way to handicap women relative to men by creating a “pay to play” system within professions where upper body strength is not a competitive advantage? Add in the wage gap, and you have a bunch of women paying student loan debt on their degree they needed to get an entry level psychology job and they are making- with a degree- what a man can make hiring himself out in front of Home Depot? And significantly less than a male high school drop-out can make doing odd jobs? But of course, it’s our “choice” to enter professions which are not hostile to women and thus to have to pay to play in those fields
"I have little sympathy for those who are so petty as to be angry because people in need were bailed out. To compare my friend who struggles with student loan payments after her husband developed an autoimmune disease and had to fight for years to get disability to bankers being bailed out is ridiculous. From a class analysis standpoint, student debt forgiveness gives working class people an advantage compared to the corporations that hold their debts. And that is a good thing. It won’t be entirely fair to everyone. But few things are. Should we oppose universal health care because it will disproportionately assist those who are obese smokers and shift costs onto fit, healthy people? That is a common argument in the US as well. "
So, so well said. Thank you. I too don't understand how anyone could be angry about this--especially those who should ostensibly know better. It does seem petty.
Cancelling student loan debt without taking a large chunk of change from the academia-industrial complex is like making whole the victims of a Ponzi scheme while forgetting to punish the actual Ponzi schemer.
All of this money flowed directly from the US govt into universities so they could build new gyms and other amenities, plus hire an entire army of administrators who are useless parasites in charge of Bias Response Teams and making sure every possible victim group gets its head patted and diaper changed.
If you're going to make the US govt pay for debt relief, taxing every university endowment has to be part of the program. Any other solution is just (another) massive multibillion dollar gift (sans strings attached) to all the various American corporations and hedge funds currently disguised as universities.
Like you I went to, and never was able to complete, a Christian college (I didn’t come out as gay, I came out a non-believer, and just couldn’t stomach writing papers for a religion class that was BS). I joined the Navy thinking they would as they said “pay for college” retroactively. Not so. I defaulted but got on a plan, but then years later, defaulted again because now I was a single mom making $11/hr baking at a Portland restaurant. I looked forward to my tax refund, it was $4000 or so. The first year they garnished it, I was in shock, and it sucked. But then I realized that maybe, this wasn’t as terrible as I’d thought...I had owed $12,000, and now it was down to $8,000. And, since I got maximum deductions on my wages, I was barely being taxed anyway, so the government was actually paying my debt for me. So, for the next two tax years, I did the same, filed my taxes knowing that the $4,000 would be garnished. My student loans of $12,000 paid off in 3 years. Unfortunately, I decided to try to finish my degree and took out more loans, so I think there’s a few thousand owing again.
I think you bring up rather good points about the scam that loans are. I had no idea what I was signing when my father told me to sign papers so I could go to school. And to paraphrase Good Will Hunting: why pay thousands of dollars for something you can pay for in late library fees to learn? That piece of paper (degree) is becoming as inflationary in value as money, and quite frankly, so-called educated/degreed are some of the most lacking in ability to reason or think for themselves. I have 7 siblings, all of whom have at least a Bachelors degree, and the ones who have masters and phd’s are more close minded and irrational, nevermind fundamentalist, in my family.
Empowering ones own sovereignty doesn’t just apply to ones body, but to ones own mind. Just as many give their power away to the sick care system, much of America is obsessed with giving away their power to the education system.
I was hoping that by the time my 4 yo is ready for college we'd have found a way to keep college costs down. This makes me less optimistic that this will happen.
In the intervening 13 years, I suspect higher ed in the U.S. will have collapsed into something far more smaller, sustainable, and functional again. In the meantime, take your 4 yo to the library.
An excellent analysis, and I like how you viewed the issue from the perspective of multiple groups in US society.
I truly wonder about the democrats and the Republicans, surely both must see that their respective policies and cultural proposition only seek to further divide American Society against itself. I suppose it is an excellent strategy; divide the middle class and the lower class, so they can never united and demand proper changes against the interests of the super upper class. The 95% divided against itself so the top 5% can rule
idk . . . our daughter, who we've had to occasionally subsidize in spite of our being on very limited fixed SS incomes, went to school to learn coding. She's not PMC, but a single mom with two daughters, who has to juggle money each month to get by, even as she works a full time job (coding). She doesn't owe a great deal, but can never get past the minimum while the interest piles on. This will give her A LOT of relief, and it will give us some relief, too. Just sayin
To your second-to-last paragraph's point- from the perspective of someone who very much feels like the people in your last paragraph's point:
The Biden administration also recently announced a $7,500 subsidy for anyone buying an EV. Literally every single major automaker producing an EV this year raised the price of their vehicle exactly $7,500 (or more) in less than half a week of the announcement.
This was the market almost literally taking the administration by the shoulders and saying, "if you do THIS we will always, always, always do THIS."
So, all I see coming from this is A) college will now be more expensive because universities now understand that above a certain price point, it's meaningless; B) my taxes, which are already set to go up in several ways to pay for Biden's various social engineering programs, will go up again, in a rural household with under $100K combined family income, and C) a fraction of the people who already voted for Biden who were tweeting angrily for the past 2 years that he betrayed them by not canceling their debt (while I racked up an equal amount keeping our home and vehicles repaired and functional, things that are not sexy enough to be paid for by Uncle Joe with other people's money) but were distracted for a while by tweeting angrily that people who don't vaccinate for COVID should die in concentration camps will stop being angry at Biden long enough to vote for him. The people who continue to feel betrayed and the people who will end up footing the bill for this bribe- the middle class, NEVER the ultra-wealthy- weren't going to vote for him anyway, so fuck us. Acceptable losses.
This proposal will not help me, personally, my student debt is so huge and unyielding that even at the 20k (which I don’t qualify for) it wouldn’t cover a year’s interest.
The half measures are always more insulting than doing nothing.
Your last sentence rings so true!
Any little bit helps.
Biden's behind the scenes handlers have made some very serious policy blunders since he took the oath, but this one takes the cake. (And hands it out a crumb at a time to a select few while others observe hungrily and resentfully.) I can't think of anything more ineffectual, ill timed, or politically divisive than that one.
But since it's so ridiculously transparent, so remarkably shameless, it makes me wonder if like many other Dem dangling carrots it "accidentally on purposely" slips from their hands and falls to the ground to be trodden to mush... because of that meany opposition party! They're why we can't have nice things!! It'll still deliver votes anyway. As with most Donkey Party political promises, it's the thought that counts. And winning the sympathy vote by calculated losing. No real actions that address the systemic problems are necessary.
https://apnews.com/press-release/pr-newswire/6000b0f013b93096a5a0c5180ca8b0e2
"These results are based on responses from 903 Americans collected between August 24th and August 25th via the Premise smartphone application."
"Respondents were compensated for their completion of the survey through the Premise app."
"Despite overall approval of the plan, respondents had mixed feelings about the fairness of it.
A slight majority (53%) felt the program unfairly punishes Americans who do not currently have student loan debt.
49% of respondents agreed with the Republican National Committee's characterization of the program as a "bailout for the wealthy," aligning with the 51% who disagreed with the characterization."
As to Democratic chances in this election cycle, I think the overturning of Roe v Wade will have a far greater impact on voters--especially younger and newer voters, both female and male-than anger about student loan forgiveness.
After looking at the faculty parking lot for the executives for any university, it is usually easier to see where all that money is going; the upper admin seems to drive very nice cars, at least around here at our community college. Bloated administrations there and in Washinton, sponging money. That is part of the ruin of higher education imo. Best from the old lady in Oregon...
Your thesis makes intuitive sense, and I would have assumed it too be true, but I saw this:
https://mobile.twitter.com/arindube/status/1563603302566113282
So maybe it isn't.
I completely agree, but I also think this take (which is pretty common on the American left from what I’ve seen) misses a few points.
Most young people I know have student debts. I worked in the trades and the number of people with bachelor’s and master’s degrees learning to be plumbers and electricians as sadly high. Sometimes a trade job is the only way to service the debt. So the divide between tradespeople/ rednecks and urban professionals is a very artificial division created and exploited by those who oppose student debt forgiveness. The poor and the blue collar workers are not free of student debt and few in the younger generations really care if some other young person gets bailed out and they don’t get theirs at the same time. Those crying about the unfairness of debt relief are overwhelmingly older people convinced that the debt crisis is the result of moral decay and not the result of socio-economic policies preying upon young people.
I have little sympathy for those who are so petty as to be angry because people in need were bailed out. To compare my friend who struggles with student loan payments after her husband developed an autoimmune disease and had to fight for years to get disability to bankers being bailed out is ridiculous. From a class analysis standpoint, student debt forgiveness gives working class people an advantage compared to the corporations that hold their debts. And that is a good thing. It won’t be entirely fair to everyone. But few things are. Should we oppose universal health care because it will disproportionately assist those who are obese smokers and shift costs onto fit, healthy people? That is a common argument in the US as well. This stirring up of petty grievance has always been a tactic to make the working class fight each other and not demand better conditions. And I don’t buy it any more when it comes to student loans than to “welfare queens” or any other category of the working class that is being held up as unworthy of aid.
Also, another point to consider is that alternatives to student loans- the military or the trades- tend to far easier to access for men than for women. Last I looked into it, about 70% of the women in the armed forces reported experiencing sexual harassment or assault. And the trades are notorious for being difficult to break into as a woman. So I believe there is an unconsidered aspect here sexual politics of a college degree. To make a decent living as a female generally requires a college degree. And it has been shown that wages within professions decline as women enter the profession. How much of this crisis is simply a new way to handicap women relative to men by creating a “pay to play” system within professions where upper body strength is not a competitive advantage? Add in the wage gap, and you have a bunch of women paying student loan debt on their degree they needed to get an entry level psychology job and they are making- with a degree- what a man can make hiring himself out in front of Home Depot? And significantly less than a male high school drop-out can make doing odd jobs? But of course, it’s our “choice” to enter professions which are not hostile to women and thus to have to pay to play in those fields
"I have little sympathy for those who are so petty as to be angry because people in need were bailed out. To compare my friend who struggles with student loan payments after her husband developed an autoimmune disease and had to fight for years to get disability to bankers being bailed out is ridiculous. From a class analysis standpoint, student debt forgiveness gives working class people an advantage compared to the corporations that hold their debts. And that is a good thing. It won’t be entirely fair to everyone. But few things are. Should we oppose universal health care because it will disproportionately assist those who are obese smokers and shift costs onto fit, healthy people? That is a common argument in the US as well. "
So, so well said. Thank you. I too don't understand how anyone could be angry about this--especially those who should ostensibly know better. It does seem petty.
Cancelling student loan debt without taking a large chunk of change from the academia-industrial complex is like making whole the victims of a Ponzi scheme while forgetting to punish the actual Ponzi schemer.
All of this money flowed directly from the US govt into universities so they could build new gyms and other amenities, plus hire an entire army of administrators who are useless parasites in charge of Bias Response Teams and making sure every possible victim group gets its head patted and diaper changed.
If you're going to make the US govt pay for debt relief, taxing every university endowment has to be part of the program. Any other solution is just (another) massive multibillion dollar gift (sans strings attached) to all the various American corporations and hedge funds currently disguised as universities.
Like you I went to, and never was able to complete, a Christian college (I didn’t come out as gay, I came out a non-believer, and just couldn’t stomach writing papers for a religion class that was BS). I joined the Navy thinking they would as they said “pay for college” retroactively. Not so. I defaulted but got on a plan, but then years later, defaulted again because now I was a single mom making $11/hr baking at a Portland restaurant. I looked forward to my tax refund, it was $4000 or so. The first year they garnished it, I was in shock, and it sucked. But then I realized that maybe, this wasn’t as terrible as I’d thought...I had owed $12,000, and now it was down to $8,000. And, since I got maximum deductions on my wages, I was barely being taxed anyway, so the government was actually paying my debt for me. So, for the next two tax years, I did the same, filed my taxes knowing that the $4,000 would be garnished. My student loans of $12,000 paid off in 3 years. Unfortunately, I decided to try to finish my degree and took out more loans, so I think there’s a few thousand owing again.
I think you bring up rather good points about the scam that loans are. I had no idea what I was signing when my father told me to sign papers so I could go to school. And to paraphrase Good Will Hunting: why pay thousands of dollars for something you can pay for in late library fees to learn? That piece of paper (degree) is becoming as inflationary in value as money, and quite frankly, so-called educated/degreed are some of the most lacking in ability to reason or think for themselves. I have 7 siblings, all of whom have at least a Bachelors degree, and the ones who have masters and phd’s are more close minded and irrational, nevermind fundamentalist, in my family.
Empowering ones own sovereignty doesn’t just apply to ones body, but to ones own mind. Just as many give their power away to the sick care system, much of America is obsessed with giving away their power to the education system.
I was hoping that by the time my 4 yo is ready for college we'd have found a way to keep college costs down. This makes me less optimistic that this will happen.
In the intervening 13 years, I suspect higher ed in the U.S. will have collapsed into something far more smaller, sustainable, and functional again. In the meantime, take your 4 yo to the library.
An excellent analysis, and I like how you viewed the issue from the perspective of multiple groups in US society.
I truly wonder about the democrats and the Republicans, surely both must see that their respective policies and cultural proposition only seek to further divide American Society against itself. I suppose it is an excellent strategy; divide the middle class and the lower class, so they can never united and demand proper changes against the interests of the super upper class. The 95% divided against itself so the top 5% can rule