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Student Loan Reparations (Policy Talk)


bad_teammate

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5 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

Why should people have to pay massive banks loan money for having gone to public universities? 

Here's the obvious answer: they have to pay massive loans back because they took out massive loans.

So why did they have to take out massive loans?

1. Maybe they didn't. Maybe they made sub-optimal choices. Go to a juco then transfer in. That saves money.

2. Maybe they picked a bad major, i.e., one with limited earning potential. 

3. Maybe they went to an expensive state school, especially if you went to an out-of-state public university. 

4. Maybe they went to med school at good old State U. 

5. Maybe they went full retard and went to law school at State U.

6. Life is just unfair.

If your parent lets you take out "massive" loans while still going to a state school then they have failed (somewhat) as a parent. Especially if you majored in something like liberal arts.

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I'm not totally against loan forgiveness because of the pervasive effect student loan debt is having on the overall economy.  People are getting married later, having less kids, not buying homes, etc. all related in some form to student debt load.  Household formation and demographics are critical for long term economic growth.  And adding $1.5T on the debt pile when we are going to have long term low interest rates doesn't really move the needle for me. 

 

So, the whole reason against doing something like this is a) "not fair, I paid mine!" and b) doesn't solve the problem going forward.  

a.) I paid mine and I can get over the fairness aspect.  

b.) ?

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We should impose a wealth tax on the parents of children who had to take out loans. If they have assets above some level, the government confiscates a portion to pay off their children’s student loans. That way we get to stick to to the boomer parents first. Let’s see how far that gets us and then we can assess the other funding options. 

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1 minute ago, Fozzz said:

Or you can support wiping out student debt as the pragmatic choice given how such a policy would positively impact the economy.

 http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/rpr_2_6.pdf

Nice non-sequitur. We were discussing how to handle people who no longer carry any student debt because they already paid theirs off.

Solid work as usual, Fozzz.

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5 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

Don't forgive, but reduce interest. AOC was spot on about people not being able to begin their lives because of some fairly heavy debt loads right out of the gate.

And AOC (et al) are correct.

There is a wealth transfer to the student loan companies when that money could be going to things like mortgages and other sectors of the economy.

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Forgive all student loan debt to anyone who manages to graduate with honors and/or passes a subject matter test in their major with a 95% or better score.

Same thing retroactively for people who made similar grades in the past, or who can buck up and get that 95+% test score now.

Watch motherfuckers start knowing shit.

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14 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

 

Why should people have to pay massive banks loan money for having gone to public universities? 

They shouldn't.  The government should buy these loans from private lenders and eliminate the interest. 

People should have to honor the contracts they have made.  Millions of people entered these same contracts and paid their loans off.  Many of them aren't wealthy.  Now they will be paying the price for actually living frugally and honoring the contract they made.

Going forward, we should absolutely eliminate student loans.  We should ease loan repayments for past students by offering loan repayment based on income.  We don't even need to reinvent the wheel.  Many schools and states have loan forgiveness/repayment programs for people who enter non-profit work.  Just copy one of those and use income alone as the deciding factor in how much one must repay on his own.

Edited by FondrenRoad
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This is a pathetic pandering to buy votes. I’m an independent centrist. I just made my last loan payment after 15 years. I worked hard in school and worked hard after because I had skin in the game. When you make it free, you diminish the value. Should it be cheaper? Hell yes, but making it free makes it worthless.

Edited by NoRagrets
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1 minute ago, RDCanecutter said:

Forgive all student loan debt to anyone who manages to graduate with honors and/or passes a subject matter test in their major with a 95% or better score.

Do you really think that's a good idea?

I sure as hell don't.

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7 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Why do so many of b_t's ideas propose some form of collective self-flagellation?

 

BT is an older rich white dude living in Memorial.  The only rich people I know that feel the way he does are people that inherited money so they don't feel like they deserve it.  Don't know if that is his situation or not but it wouldn't surprise me.

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2 minutes ago, NoRagrets said:

This is a pathetic pandering to buy votes. I’m an independent centrist. I just made my last loan payment after 15 years. I worked hard in school and worked hard after because I had skin in the game. When you make it free, you diminish the value. Should it be cheaper? Hell yes, but making it free makes it worthless.

So K-12 education is worthless? That's a new one.

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Just now, NoRagrets said:

This is a pathetic pandering to buy votes. I’m an independent centrist. I just made my last loan payment after 15 years. I worked hard in school and worked hard after because I had skin in the game. American exceptionalism was built on the premise of hard work and sacrifice. When you make it free, you diminish the value. Should it be cheaper? Hell yes, but making it free makes it worthless.

I'd agree,  it is vote pandering  by many, but the costs for secondary schools have become absurd.  

No, you don't make it free, but you do reward kids who excel, that's a good carrot to dangle.  State schools should not be expensive for in state kids.  Student loans should be low interest.

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6 minutes ago, 'stache said:

So K-12 education is worthless? That's a new one.

Sick burn except...

you're paying for that “free” education through exorbitant property values and taxes in the “good” public districts. The barriers to entry for quality public education are quite expensive.

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3 minutes ago, NoRagrets said:

 

Sick burn except...

you're paying for that “free” education through exorbitant property values and taxes in the “good” public districts. The barriers to entry for quality public education are quite expensive.

I'd rather have a state income tax than our bullshit property taxes.

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i bought my laptop for $1500 but later on i saw that it was only selling for $1000.  when should i expect my laptop reparations?

seriously though, this should start with interest reimbursement, or, you know, nothing.  nobody was tricked into this, and people aren't "owed" things just because others may receive them in the future.  then we can complain to our children and explain to them how good they have it.

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6 minutes ago, formermav43 said:

“Victims of unfree college?” “Reparations?” It’s pretty audacious to use that sort of loaded terminology and then accuse others of making emotional arguments. 

It's all about victimhood dontcha'know........

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1 hour ago, David Dennison said:

If you are paying off a student loan, you aren't wealthy. You make a good salary.

I’m wealthy.  I have loans at just over 2%. I’m not paying them off.  If the people investing my money aren’t making 2% they’re fired.  

 

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48 minutes ago, babysdaddy said:

BT is an older rich white dude living in Memorial.  The only rich people I know that feel the way he does are people that inherited money so they don't feel like they deserve it.  Don't know if that is his situation or not but it wouldn't surprise me.

i just assumed he lived in a commune somewhere in central california.

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53 minutes ago, RDCanecutter said:

Forgive all student loan debt to anyone who manages to graduate with honors and/or passes a subject matter test in their major with a 95% or better score.

Same thing retroactively for people who made similar grades in the past, or who can buck up and get that 95+% test score now.

Watch motherfuckers start knowing shit.

Watch Universities assure that everyone passes every test with 95% or better to keep that sweet, sweet cash flowing in.

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53 minutes ago, FondrenRoad said:

They shouldn't.  The government should buy these loans from private lenders and eliminate the interest. 

Why should someone have to pay the government for services they should have received without additional payment?

Quote

People should have to honor the contracts they have made. 

Even contracts made under duress or contracts whose terms were misrepresented?

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12 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

Why should someone have to pay the government for services they should have received without additional payment?

Even contracts made under duress or contracts whose terms were misrepresented?

Because that is the system that was in place and that others counted upon existing. We should have always had universal healthcare too, but when that happens, nobody is going to go back in time and repay people for surgeries from a decade ago.

Student 1
-takes 30k loan
-gets job paying 30k and makes 50k within 10 years
-lives with roommates, eats at home, doesn't go out much, shops at Marshall's
-still drives the same piece of shit car he had as a freshman in college
-pays off loan according to given terms in 10 years.

Student 2
-takes 30k loan
-gets job paying 30k and makes 50k within 10 years
-gets his own apartment.
-goes out often.
-has 3 new car leases in that 10 year period.
-makes interest only payments on his loan sometimes, but other times has it in forbearance.  He does enough to keep it off his credit report.
-still owes nearly the full balance of his loan 10 years later.

Santa BT comes in and pays Student 2's loan off and laughs in Student 1's face for wasting the last 10 years of his life paying off his loan.

Furthermore, the terms were not misrepresented and nobody was under duress.

Edited by FondrenRoad
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1 minute ago, FondrenRoad said:

Because that is the system that was in place and that others counted upon existing. 

This is literally the same argument conservatives use to oppose basically every single progressive proposal imaginable, so congratulations.

"That's the way it was, deal with it" isn't an argument. It's a way to avoid discussion.

Quote

Santa BT comes in and pays Student 2's loan off and laughs in Student 1's face for wasting the last 10 years of his life paying off his loan.

Emotionalist bullshit. #sad

Also, extremely misleading. I am in favor of the reparations program outlined in the OP, which would pay Student 1 as well.

Quote

Furthermore, the terms were not misrepresented and nobody was under duress.

You think the 17/18/19-year-old kids who took on these loans really understood what they meant and that the larger social message of "college will make you rich" was accurate and true?

Are you Mike Rowe?

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17 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

Why should someone have to pay the government for services they should have received without additional payment?

Even contracts made under duress or contracts whose terms were misrepresented?

how do you (or we, as a people) determine what falls under this umbrella?

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7 minutes ago, FondrenRoad said:

Because that is the system that was in place and that others counted upon existing. We should have always had universal healthcare too, but when that happens, nobody is going to go back in time and repay people for surgeries from a decade ago.

Student 1
-takes 30k loan
-gets job paying 30k and makes 50k within 10 years
-lives with roommates, eats at home, doesn't go out much, shops at Marshall's
-still drives the same piece of shit car he had as a freshman in college
-pays off loan according to given terms in 10 years.

Student 2
-takes 30k loan
-gets job paying 30k and makes 50k within 10 years
-gets his own apartment.
-goes out often.
-has 3 new car leases in that 10 year period.
-makes interest only payments on his loan sometimes, but other times has it in forbearance.  He does enough to keep it off his credit report.
-still owes nearly the full balance of his loan 10 years later.

Santa BT comes in and pays Student 2's loan off and laughs in Student 1's face for wasting the last 10 years of his life paying off his loan.

Furthermore, the terms were not misrepresented and nobody was under duress.

That’s BT in a nutshell.  

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1 hour ago, BrickHorn said:

Pay for everyone’s college, retroactively?  This is starting to sound like a gift exchange where everyone gives each other cash. What’s the fucking point?

 

1 hour ago, bad_teammate said:

No. Loans they had to pay back.

The underlying concept is that we should have been properly subsidizing education this whole time, so all we need to do now is pay back what people had to take out in loans because it wasn't subsidized properly.

 

1 hour ago, Blotto said:

Why does it matter if you paid for college out of pocket or took out loans. In both scenarios, education wasn't properly subsidized. If we are talking fairness, why should a person be punished because they and their family had the foresight to ensure they could pay for an education. Why does the opportunity cost of the exaggerated expense of education not apply to people that paid out of pocket? We want to be fair after all.

Still waiting for a response on this one, bad_teammate 

 

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Just now, bad_teammate said:

This is literally the same argument conservatives use to oppose basically every single progressive proposal imaginable, so congratulations.

No it isn't.  Conservatives want to keep the future fucked up.  You are conflating the future with the past.  We can and should have pretty much every single progressive proposal in the future.  What we shouldn't do is worry about changing the past.  Its not only a waste of money and time that would be better spent on making a better future, it also sets the precedent that no agreement ever really matters.  Never honor any contract and maybe someone will fix it for you.

We should have universal healthcare as well.  We shouldn't go back in time and pay off every past paid or unpaid healthcare cost under the old system.  Do you want to reimburse people for all healthcare premiums since the advent of private healthcare insurance when you implement Medicare for All?  Funny how I've never seen that proposal anywhere.  I just see elitists wanting to pay off college for other elitists. 

Or how about potential student 3 who didn't go to college because he didn't want to take on student loans and who is now 65?  Do you pay him for an entire career of lost income because of that decision?

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10 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

This is literally the same argument conservatives use to oppose basically every single progressive proposal imaginable, so congratulations.

"That's the way it was, deal with it" isn't an argument. It's a way to avoid discussion.

Emotionalist bullshit. #sad

Emotionalism, 

“Conservatives make this sane argument” is also not an argument.

And this entire thread is emotionalist, beginning with its title.

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6 minutes ago, American Swindle said:

College tuition's sky rocketed already due to government backing of the institutions that finance the loans, what do you think is going to happen when it's "free?"

And my answer's a big Hell No.  Higher education and the loans associated with them are a scam that the Colleges have capitalized from due to cronyism. How the hell else is an 18 yo with no credit at all given a loan for 50k+$ at 4% interest rates?  Government backs loan, you can't discharge it in bankruptcy court, and institutions bear ZERO RISK, so they jack the tuition up and make all that money.

Man, it's as if the government creates these problems, but now you want them to bail out those that were suckered by the scam.  The issue is with the scammers not the scammed.

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“Conservatives make this sane argument” is also not an argument.
And this entire thread is emotionalist, beginning with its title.
My favorite b_t "everyone else is being emotional while I'm being rational" moment was when he immediately bought Sabrina Erdely's story in Rolling Stone hook, line, and sinker then proceeded to berate everyone whose bullshit detector was actually functional.

It's his go to move. It's his personal "every accusation is a confession" moment except it repeats.
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1 minute ago, FondrenRoad said:

What we shouldn't do is worry about changing the past.

Ah, so you're arguing that money I spent in the past has no relevance to the present or future?

I would disagree. I think $50k spent on repaying loans could've been invested in real estate, or a business (either your own or someone else's), or myriad other things that would have, if done, made someone's life better. Opportunity costs are real things and I don't think they are a myth.

4 minutes ago, FondrenRoad said:

Never honor any contract and maybe someone will fix it for you.

You're not answering my question, Mike Rowe.

You think the 17/18/19-year-old kids who took on these loans really understood what they meant and that the larger social message of "college will make you rich" was accurate and true?

Quote

We should have universal healthcare as well.  We shouldn't go back in time and pay off every past paid or unpaid healthcare cost under the old system.  Do you want to reimburse people for all healthcare premiums since the advent of private healthcare insurance when you implement Medicare for All?  Funny how I've never seen that proposal anywhere. 

Start a thread, let's talk about it.

Quote

I just see elitists wanting to pay off college for other elitists. 

Ah yes... the campaign for the elite by the elite. You've nailed it.

Quote

 Or how about potential student 3 who didn't go to college because he didn't want to take on student loans and who is now 65?  Do you pay him for an entire career of lost income because of that decision?

That's an interesting question. Is there a way to easily make that determination? Are you offering that because you see it as a problem to be addressed or just throwing out red herrings?

13 minutes ago, henrygandorf said:

how do you (or we, as a people) determine what falls under this umbrella?

We figure out what is necessary for a healthy and functioning society and then provide it to everyone. Education is universally accepted as a right.

6 minutes ago, Blotto said:

Still waiting for a response on this one, bad_teammate 

I apologize for the poor service, sir, I have a lot of tables full of furious centrists demanding attention and I hope you satisfy your needs soon.

As for your paragraph, I don't know what you mean by "punish". Could you explain what the "punishment" is?

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7 minutes ago, formermav43 said:

“Conservatives make this sane argument” is also not an argument.

And this entire thread is emotionalist, beginning with its title.

A reparation, in legal terms, is (typically) money paid as compensation for a loss. I apologize if the proper use of a term hurt your feelings.

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2 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

I apologize for the poor service, sir, I have a lot of tables full of furious centrists demanding attention and I hope you satisfy your needs soon.

"everyone who doesn't completely agree with me is a centrist."

i like when you mix in some of your greatest hits along with stuff off the new album.

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1 minute ago, henrygandorf said:

k-12?  public college?  private college?  junior college?  grad school?

which are you asking about?

Any of it. You tell me.

You were (perhaps disingenuously) expressing confusion as to how we could possibly determine whether or not education is a service we should expect to receive. I'm trying to figure out what you actually think and believe about your own supposed concern.

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