Biden forgives $10,000 of student loan debt for millions of debtors

[anon_mlxxvlbug9dpa]

I'm using authoritarianism in the way it has been used to refer to Trump and DeSantis--one man usurping the democratic process to single-handedly enact disputed policy.

He--single-handedly--added over $300 billion to our federal deficit (in just the first year!). That's really not relevant at all?

Forgiving up to $20,000 in student debt could cost the U.S. $519 billion

Most of the benefit of erasing college loans would go to households earning below $88,000, new analysis finds.

www.cbsnews.com

Progressives don’t like that definition of authoritarianism.

 

[anon_mlxxvlbug9dpa]

Sure, I'd MUCH prefer congress pass laws. I'd also prefer they don't pass massive loopholes. If the courts rule he has this power, congress passing the law referenced by Forbes is to blame. If they rule he doesn't have the power, great. It is part of the reason I'm not a huge supporter of the bill. Laws should come out of the legislature.

As near as I can tell is that at least since Madison there has been a tug of war between the executive and the legislative on power.

But more than this one, congress giving the power to the president to engage militarily in the Middle East at the drop of a hat would be the first law I want to be removed for this reason.

I'm quite happy to let the court decide if he has the power.

I’m perfectly happy to remove that right yesterday.

 

[hoosboot]

I’m perfectly happy to remove that right yesterday.

A lot that we all seem to agree on in this thread.

I'm not a fan of this action. I think it's a hamfisted way to attack the problem and doesn't really produce enough actual benefit towards said problem. This is one part of Biden I dislike.

If overriding this comes with the added benefits that Marv seeks, I'd be fine with it...especially if there was Fed support for accompanying legal action against predatory financial actions in regard to college students. As mcm noted, there's a lot to attack there and the courts' response to it is pretty sad.

 

[jet812]

We should show similar outrage to the billionaires not paying their rightful share of taxes that would far exceed the $350 billion this maneuver creates.

But I think 0% interest would have been better than canceling the debt.

Nothing relevant about this comparison. What is “rightful share” can be debated. Not fulfilling a contract by paying off borrowed money is another….

 

[Joe_Hoopsier]

There is no possible way to express my level of contempt for this move.

 

[anon_mlxxvlbug9dpa]

A lot that we all seem to agree on in this thread.

I'm not a fan of this action. I think it's a hamfisted way to attack the problem and doesn't really produce enough actual benefit towards said problem. This is one part of Biden I dislike.

If overriding this comes with the added benefits that Marv seeks, I'd be fine with it...especially if there was Fed support for accompanying legal action against predatory financial actions in regard to college students. As mcm noted, there's a lot to attack there and the courts' response to it is pretty sad.

Yeah I’m with you all the way. We need a committee with teeth that tries to get their arms around tuition prices in the first place. This act, and we have to admit the timing and iffy legality stink, seems to do nothing really actionable other than spending money the government doesn’t have without fixing underlying issues.

At risk of taking it a step too far, this is what moderate conservatives feared with Biden and his need to pander to Gen Z with ham-fisted policy.

 

[zeke4ahs]

Biden cancels $10,000 in federal student loan debt for most borrowers

President Joe Biden announced he will forgive $10,000 in federal student debt for most borrowers.

www.cnbc.com

1. How does he have the power to do this? Under what law or Constitutional provision?

2. Isn't he just buying the votes of rich suburbanites (with taxpayer money) to the detriment of the working class?

Rich people don’t take out student loans.

 

[Marvin the Martian]

Yeah I’m with you all the way. We need a committee with teeth that tries to get their arms around tuition prices in the first place. This act, and we have to admit the timing and iffy legality stink, seems to do nothing really actionable other than spending money the government doesn’t have without fixing underlying issues.

At risk of taking it a step to far, this is what moderate conservatives feared with Biden and his need to pander to Gen Z with ham-fisted policy.

I don't disagree except to say politics is totally dysfunctional so no one will try to fix the underlying problems.

 

[anon_mlxxvlbug9dpa]

Rich people don’t take out student loans.

The ones that know how to hold tax shelters out of them do.

 

[kraft cheese+macaroni]

If the president came in and through a regulation or Executive Order forgave $350 billion legitimately owed by billionares under an Act of Congress, you can be damned sure I'd be showing similar outrage.

He doesn't have to do an executive order. The existing tax code is so corrupt that the mega wealthy pay far less than their fair share of taxes already. But we're cool with that on an annual basis.....but a one time forgiveness of student debt is the end of he world.

It's just more political bullshit. Money owns our politicians. Corporate greed over citizens. All day, every day.

 

[anon_mlxxvlbug9dpa]

I don't disagree except to say politics is totally dysfunctional so no one will try to fix the underlying problems.

This move is a political mistake. Gen Z doesn’t vote. Old people do and they won’t like this action.

 

[UncleMark]

I'm not a fan of this action. I think it's a hamfisted way to attack the problem and doesn't really produce enough actual benefit towards said problem. This is one part of Biden I dislike.

It's a sop to the left flank, nothing more.

The problem is huge. Way too much money is being doled out to way too many people for way too little benefit. There's no "solution" without an overhaul of the entire student loan industry. Me, I'd start with making them bankruptable, and going forward make the schools themselves resposible for the first 10%. Maybe we'd see fewer kids getting Comp Lit masters degrees at out of state schools.

 

[mcmurtry66]

Yeah I’m with you all the way. We need a committee with teeth that tries to get their arms around tuition prices in the first place. This act, and we have to admit the timing and iffy legality stink, seems to do nothing really actionable other than spending money the government doesn’t have without fixing underlying issues.

At risk of taking it a step to far, this is what moderate conservatives feared with Biden and his need to pander to Gen Z with ham-fisted policy.

@hoosboot - and there has to be more accountability with these schools and expectations. Wash U is right down the street from me. School has 15,000 students and a 15 billion dollar endowment. 15 billion! i know a ton of people who got their msw from there and came out with student loans. the school is 60k plus a year for undergrand. disjointed post but fault can be spread on this issue. in some ways i do feel badly for the students because they are young and don't always know or think far enough ahead and then they end up in a jam. it's their fault but damn they're young. punishing the rest of the taxpayers doesn't make sense. i just think, and i don't know how, there needs to be more accountability with these schools. tuition doesn't really make sense anymore for so many professions. and now education for the sake of edification. forget it. that's a luxury

 

[Spartans9312]

Rich people don’t take out student loans.

Define rich.

 

[kraft cheese+macaroni]

We also spend $800B a year on defense...and if we cut it just by 20% we'd still be the largest spender and more than 2x higher than the next largest defense spender.

U.S. DEFENSE SPENDING COMPARED TO OTHER COUNTRIES

 

[anon_6hv78pr714xta]

Rich people don’t take out student loans.

You're wrong.

Who owes the most in student loans: New data from the Fed

Recently released data from the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances confirm that upper-income households account for a disproportionate share of student loan debt—and an even larger share of monthly out-of-pocket student debt payments.

www.brookings.edu

"The highest-income 40 percent of households (those with incomes above $74,000) owe almost 60 percent of the outstanding education debt and make almost three-quarters of the payments. The lowest-income 40 percent of households hold just under 20 percent of the outstanding debt and make only 10 percent of the payments. It should be no surprise that higher-income households owe more student debt than others. Students from higher-income households are more likely to go to college in the first place. And workers with a college or graduate degree earn substantially more in the labor market than those who never went to college.

Source: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (2017, 2020), Survey of Consumer Finances 2016 and 2019, https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/scfindex.htm, calculations by the authors. Sample includes households age 25 or older who are not current students.

Likewise, education debt is concentrated in households with high levels of educational attainment. In 2019, the new Fed data show, households with graduate degrees owed 56 percent of the outstanding education debt—an increase from 49 percent in 2016. For context, only 14 percent of adults age 25 or older hold graduate degrees. The 3 percent of adults with professional and doctorate degrees hold 20 percent of the education debt. These households have median earnings more than twice as high as the overall median ($106,000 vs. $47,000 in 2019).

 

[Spartans9312]

File this under….government sucks.

 

[UncleMark]

Wash U is right down the street from me. School has 15,000 students and a 15 billion dollar endowment. 15 billion! i know a ton of people who got their msw from there and came out with student loans. the school is 60k plus a year for undergrand.

The schools most definitely need to be accountable.

This is ancient history, but some may remember back in the old days if you offered to pay cash for a car instead of financing it, you could strike a better deal. Why? Because way back then, the banks put the dealer "on the paper" for the first 10% of the loan or some such. Dealers had a stake in not selling people cars they couldn't afford. Something similar needs to be done with the schools and student loans.

 

[larsIU]

File this under….government sucks.

I'd file it more under "politicians suck".

 

[TDHoosier]

I'm stoked we have $1800 left on student loans for my wife who went back to school later in life. It would have been paid off had it not been for Covid now good old Joe is going to cover it for me (haven't read anything about it just assuming). I'm still voting Red in November but will take what he gives. lol

What a terrible move not sure who is advising him or for that matter who is running the show these days.

 

[Spartans9312]

I'd file it more under "politicians suck".

Well….

 

[mcmurtry66]

The schools most definitely need to be accountable.

This is ancient history, but some may remember back in the old days if you offered to pay cash for a car instead of financing it, you could strike a better deal. Why? Because way back then, the banks put the dealer "on the paper" for the first 10% of the loan or some such. Dealers had a stake in not selling people cars they couldn't afford. Something similar needs to be done with the schools and student loans.

For sure. And honestly so much of a college and grad school is such a scam. it's a waste. maybe we need to revisit how we all view college and its gatekeeping impact. i know law school doesn't need to be three years. that third year is a waste. that's a 1/3 of your tuition. hell make students do an internship where they get paid and don't pay tuition for the third year.

 

[8Stars5Banners]

Didn't you read that only 10K would be waived, and only if you met all conditions?

So you did good in paying off 90K that you would have had to pay now, if you hadn't before.

10K isn't really much in an era where private schools are north of 65K per YEAR in tuition and fees.

I was just being snarky... or maybe just some mild sarcasm...

 

[Marvin the Martian]

@hoosboot - and there has to be more accountability with these schools and expectations. Wash U is right down the street from me. School has 15,000 students and a 15 billion dollar endowment. 15 billion! i know a ton of people who got their msw from there and came out with student loans. the school is 60k plus a year for undergrand. disjointed post but fault can be spread on this issue. in some ways i do feel badly for the students because they are young and don't always know or think far enough ahead and then they end up in a jam. it's their fault but damn they're young. punishing the rest of the taxpayers doesn't make sense. i just think, and i don't know how, there needs to be more accountability with these schools. tuition doesn't really make sense anymore for so many professions. and now education for the sake of edification. forget it. that's a luxury

I would say social workers are a group this will greatly benefit. We don't want to pay them, we want them well trained and knowledgeable.

It would be great to have a better system. We should make it easier for people to educate themselves. Not just at 4 year colleges, I suspect people leave culinary school with debt and that doesn't pay well early.

It would have been great if Congress could figure something out. I like the no interest loan idea as part of a solution. I think universities maybe should have tuition caps if they want federal aid.

PArt of this is on the students, dorm rooms have gone away for apartment style, no one wants to share rooms. I get that, we didn't want to, but it costs more.

 

[UncleMark]

For sure. And honestly so much of a college and grad school is such a scam. it's a waste. maybe we need to revisit how we all view college and its gatekeeping impact. i know law school doesn't need to be three years. that third year is a waste. that's a 1/3 of your tuition. hell make students do an internship where they get paid and don't pay tuition for the third year.

If I'd graduated, I would have had an A&S degree. It might have gotten me a better bartending job in Bloomington than I could get without it, but that's about it.

 

[hoosboot]

@hoosboot - and there has to be more accountability with these schools and expectations. Wash U is right down the street from me. School has 15,000 students and a 15 billion dollar endowment. 15 billion! i know a ton of people who got their msw from there and came out with student loans. the school is 60k plus a year for undergrand. disjointed post but fault can be spread on this issue. in some ways i do feel badly for the students because they are young and don't always know or think far enough ahead and then they end up in a jam. it's their fault but damn they're young. punishing the rest of the taxpayers doesn't make sense. i just think, and i don't know how, there needs to be more accountability with these schools. tuition doesn't really make sense anymore for so many professions. and now education for the sake of edification. forget it. that's a luxury

100%. But we're talking about the thing a huge number of people care about above anything else...their kids. And over the last forty+ years, the unending cultural drumbeat in this country has been "getting a college degree is how you get ahead." I can't really blame parents for falling for the grift that has been the skyrocketing tuition costs arms race.

College education has taken on many of the market distortions of medical care...it's hella-complex, shrouded in roadblocks to consistent and accurate information, clouded by different prices for different people, and approached like less of a shopping decision because of loaded emotional considerations.

I don't think what Biden has done is the answer, but I also think it's foolish to just throw up our hands and say, "you signed up for this crippling debt when you were 18 and knew nothing about the world and believed institutions had your best interest in mind, so f#ck off and pay the man."

If we can find a way to come to the aid of our large financial institutions when they screw up, we certainly can find ways to help twentysomethings drowning in college debt. It doesn't have to be aid where they have no skin in the game, but ways to help them course correct are important if we want to further the idea that subsequent generations get a shot at a better life than their parents.

 

[CO. Hoosier]

For sure. And honestly so much of a college and grad school is such a scam. it's a waste. maybe we need to revisit how we all view college and its gatekeeping impact. i know law school doesn't need to be three years. that third year is a waste. that's a 1/3 of your tuition. hell make students do an internship where they get paid and don't pay tuition for the third year.

How would like to be a kid just starting higher education snd having to take on a a student loan? I can’t conceive of a way to make this fair.

 

[UncleMark]

I would say social workers are a group this will greatly benefit. We don't want to pay them, we want them well trained and knowledgeable.

But not at 60K/yr from a private college. That's a huge problem.

 

[Joe_Hoopsier]

It was just announced, Tuition cost for 2023 just went up $10,000.

Lets Go Brandon.

 

[mcmurtry66]

100%. But we're talking about the thing a huge number of people care about above anything else...their kids. And over the last forty+ years, the unending cultural drumbeat in this country has been "getting a college degree is how you get ahead." I can't really blame parents for falling for the grift that has been the skyrocketing tuition costs arms race.

College education has taken on many of the market distortions of medical care...it's hella-complex, shrouded in roadblocks to consistent and accurate information, clouded by different prices for different people, and approached like less of a shopping decision because of loaded emotional considerations.

I don't think what Biden has done is the answer, but I also think it's foolish to just throw up our hands and say, "you signed up for this crippling debt when you were 18 and knew nothing about the world and believed institutions had your best interest in mind, so f#ck off and pay the man."

If we can find a way to come to the aid of our large financial institutions when they screw up, we certainly can find ways to help twentysomethings drowning in college debt. It doesn't have to be aid where they have no skin in the game, but ways to help them course correct are important if we want to further the idea that subsequent generations get a shot at a better life than their parents.

agreed on all fronts

 

[Spartans9312]

It was just announced, Tuition cost for 2023 just went up $10,000.

Lets Go Brandon.

Fact. Government involvement increases the cost.

 

[dbmhoosier]

For sure. And honestly so much of a college and grad school is such a scam. it's a waste. maybe we need to revisit how we all view college and its gatekeeping impact. i know law school doesn't need to be three years. that third year is a waste. that's a 1/3 of your tuition. hell make students do an internship where they get paid and don't pay tuition for the third year.

Cmon man. I took bass fishing one semester at IU. It was very valuable.

 

[UncleMark]

Fact. Government involvement increases the cost.

I think one of the biggest problems is the cost of their IT support staff. Those guys knock down the big money.

 

[Spartans9312]

I think one of the biggest problems is the cost of their IT support staff. Those guys knock down the big money.

Probably Marv

 

[UncleMark]

Probably Marv

I rest my case.

 

[mcmurtry66]

How would like to be a kid just starting higher education snd having to take on a a student loan? I can’t conceive of a way to make this fair.

I think you have a few paths. You can get really far ahead in soccer without being 6'8 black and an incredible athlete. i'm only sort of kidding. there's a lot of money and opps in the left handed sports. So there's one avenue to money. If you are blessed with really good grades you can get a scholly for academics. If you are living in abject poverty you can get dough. if you have really rich parents you are set.

so it seems like the middle class and lower middle class are the ones in a bind. there's also juco and your local college. you can go to saint louis community college and then the university of missouri saint louis and live at home and get a degree for about $25,000. Real miserable but doable. my best friend did that. he had the same anderson consulting, people soft, sap, oracle, accenture career path as those who went to wash u

 

[hoosboot]

The schools most definitely need to be accountable.

This is ancient history, but some may remember back in the old days if you offered to pay cash for a car instead of financing it, you could strike a better deal. Why? Because way back then, the banks put the dealer "on the paper" for the first 10% of the loan or some such. Dealers had a stake in not selling people cars they couldn't afford. Something similar needs to be done with the schools and student loans.

An interesting thing with car loans is that dealerships appear to rarely want you to pay cash any more because it wipes out one of their revenue streams. We consistently have been given higher prices in cash deals than with in-house financing deals since the automakers are doing a lot of their own financing.

 

[UncleMark]

An interesting thing with car loans is that dealerships appear to rarely want you to pay cash any more because it wipes out one of their revenue streams. We consistently have been given higher prices in cash deals than with in-house financing deals since the automakers are doing a lot of their own financing.

Oh yes. I was talking about back in the ancient times when I was just a youngster. Nowadays the dealer makes more on the financing than on the sale.

 

[larsIU]

An interesting thing with car loans is that dealerships appear to rarely want you to pay cash any more because it wipes out one of their revenue streams. We consistently have been given higher prices in cash deals than with in-house financing deals since the automakers are doing a lot of their own financing.

It's not just the captive financers. The dealerships themselves have incentive laden deals with specific financial institutions (banks, CUs, finance companies, etc.) to push their financing.

We literally could have bought a car cash (we're not rich, it was a moment in time thing) but the dealership said even if you wanted to, just finance it and pay it off after four payments.

 

[Marvin the Martian]

I rest my case.

I do get paid in big bucks, but no one will accept them. They seem to demand "real" dollars.