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I attended the same college twice. Once in the early 1990s and once in the early 2010s. The first time around, tuition was around $2700 a year and the cost of my books was maybe $160 altogether per semester. The second time around, tuition was over $7000 a year and books were maybe $160... per book!
In that same time period, the number of students attending the college more than doubled. However, the increase in attendance wasn't because the town the college was located in had grown, or because the town's character had changed. This town's population had dropped by over a third in the last twenty or thirty years, and its jobs had disappeared even more dramatically. Most of the new student demographic seemed to be middle-aged, un- and underemployed workers, and less academically-inclined young people from disadvantaged backgrounds.
There was one other change I noticed, as well. The school's academic requirements seemed a LOT more lenient. Now, I'm all for encouraging people to pursue their dreams, but when you haven't passed Introductory Algebra in four tries, and you're taking out 4500 dollars in student loans per semester to try for a degree, why is the school letting you try a fifth time? When you can't spell or write in complete sentences, what are you doing in English Composition... II? A disturbing amount of the stuff we went over in my classes in 2010 seemed to be the same stuff I'd learned in high school back in the 1980s.
I learned a lot that wasn't in the syllabus, though. I talked to a LOT of students, especially the younger ones. I spent many hours online researching student demographics, the cost of college, the student loan industry, and especially the previously unregulated "private" student loan industry.
What I have discovered is this: Our younger generations have had it drilled into their heads for years that in order to "be" anything, you have to go to college. Other paths to success, such as entrepreneurship, apprenticeship, and the military don't get the same airtime. At the same time, job market conditions have deteriorated, leaving lots of people of ALL ages with uncertain futures and frankly, no real idea what to do with themselves other than to try for a fresh start back in school. And it seems like people in charge of the higher education and banking industries have taken this situation and used it to their unfair advantage. Just where is all that extra revenue going? I'm sure the vast majority of higher education professors and professionals truly do have their students' best interests at heart, but somewhere, somehow, things have gone terribly wrong. Yes, students should read the fine print, but no one should get chained to a lifetime of debt slavery over a college degree that seems to mean less and less every day.
I feel that our young people are graduating with WAY too much debt, and that reform is desperately needed in the financial aid/student loan system. A bit more rigor in academic curriculums, tighter standards of progress for financial aid/student loan eligibility, discounted tuition for EVERYONE with excellent grade point averages, lowered interest rates (Elizabeth Warren wants rates tied to the rates big banks get when borrowing and I think that's a great idea), and at least some student loan dischargability in bankruptcy all seem like good places to start.
If you have anywhere near 200k in students loans and you don't MD after your name then you have made some very bad choices in your education and your finances. From the sounds of some of these posts the first classes that should be taken is simple math and simple finance. We built a new house last year for a little less than 200k, I couldn't imagine having that kind of student debt to pay back but then again I wouldn't have unless i would have went to med school.
The max lifetime student loan amount through the government is 138k unless you are a medical student then its 224K, how does one get 200K in students loans for a non MD degree unless they went through outside institutions?
I am talking about 200k through the life of a loan that one pays back. After interest and what not that number is pretty easy to reach.
I attended the same college twice. Once in the early 1990s and once in the early 2010s. The first time around, tuition was around $2700 a year and the cost of my books was maybe $160 altogether per semester. The second time around, tuition was over $7000 a year and books were maybe $160... per book!
In that same time period, the number of students attending the college more than doubled. However, the increase in attendance wasn't because the town the college was located in had grown, or because the town's character had changed. This town's population had dropped by over a third in the last twenty or thirty years, and its jobs had disappeared even more dramatically. Most of the new student demographic seemed to be middle-aged, un- and underemployed workers, and less academically-inclined young people from disadvantaged backgrounds.
There was one other change I noticed, as well. The school's academic requirements seemed a LOT more lenient. Now, I'm all for encouraging people to pursue their dreams, but when you haven't passed Introductory Algebra in four tries, and you're taking out 4500 dollars in student loans per semester to try for a degree, why is the school letting you try a fifth time? When you can't spell or write in complete sentences, what are you doing in English Composition... II? A disturbing amount of the stuff we went over in my classes in 2010 seemed to be the same stuff I'd learned in high school back in the 1980s.
I learned a lot that wasn't in the syllabus, though. I talked to a LOT of students, especially the younger ones. I spent many hours online researching student demographics, the cost of college, the student loan industry, and especially the previously unregulated "private" student loan industry.
What I have discovered is this: Our younger generations have had it drilled into their heads for years that in order to "be" anything, you have to go to college. Other paths to success, such as entrepreneurship, apprenticeship, and the military don't get the same airtime. At the same time, job market conditions have deteriorated, leaving lots of people of ALL ages with uncertain futures and frankly, no real idea what to do with themselves other than to try for a fresh start back in school. And it seems like people in charge of the higher education and banking industries have taken this situation and used it to their unfair advantage. Just where is all that extra revenue going? I'm sure the vast majority of higher education professors and professionals truly do have their students' best interests at heart, but somewhere, somehow, things have gone terribly wrong. Yes, students should read the fine print, but no one should get chained to a lifetime of debt slavery over a college degree that seems to mean less and less every day.
I feel that our young people are graduating with WAY too much debt, and that reform is desperately needed in the financial aid/student loan system. A bit more rigor in academic curriculums, tighter standards of progress for financial aid/student loan eligibility, discounted tuition for EVERYONE with excellent grade point averages, lowered interest rates (Elizabeth Warren wants rates tied to the rates big banks get when borrowing and I think that's a great idea), and at least some student loan dischargability in bankruptcy all seem like good places to start.
I agree, and we will likely see some kind of reform in the near future.
"Because it is" doesn't explain anything. Do you know that in order to file bankruptcy with student loans under chapter 7 they must prove undue hardship using what is called the brunner test. This test is next to impossible to prove and your chances of success are very very low.....most lawyers won't even touch your case with chapter 7 and student loans. Another big reason people are against bankruptcy is because they had to pay it back so should everyone else. Interesting how they only say that about student loans. Doesn't it seem odd to you a year after the 2005 bankruptcy protection act was enacted that salliemae went private or that a class action lawsuit has been filed with sallie every year since it has been privatized. Are you saying because having a college education will guarantee(or improve there chances) them a salary that they can use to pay off those student loans that we should treat them different? That they should be a slave to the debt for ever because there is no statue of limitations? Lets say someone doesn't have health insurance and gets cancer, surely they will run a bill of six figures....and that can be discharged. I would say your health is far more important than student loans. What about someone who runs up 100k in credit cards and buys jewelry and flat screens, shouldn't they have to pay that back too?
Also credit cards were the highest debt amount for a while until student loans took over and now is over 1 trillion dollars. Its interesting how credit card debt was so large for so long and still is, and yet people didn't, and still don't abuse it.
Yep. I find it puzzling as well. It's not like banks repossess people's vacations and nice dinners and all the stuff they ran up on their credit cards. In fact, it used to be pretty common for people who had the means to pay of SLs with credit cards, then turn around and file BK. Lawyers, mostly (if memory serves).
The whole "you cannot repossess an education" argument is bull****, basically.
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With other debts, such as a house, there is something physical that can be repossessed. With education, the asset that is paid for cannot be lost. Maybe if the creditor was allowed to perform a frontal lobotomy on the debtor then the loans could be discharged.
In more practical terms, if student loans were able to be discharged through bankruptcy, then the rates would go way up and no one would lend to "at risk" applicants, drastically reducing many people's access to education.
Not true. There are plenty of things that can be discharged in a BK that cannot be repossessed.
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Anyone who grows up in the US knows college isn't free. When reading the posts written by the belly-achers who apparently were surprised to learn it has to be paid for. It doesn't seem to matter how much is said, they still float around with that gooney expression complaining about the cost. If a person graduates and still can't comprehend it, mistakes happened somewhere along the way. I am SICK of the carping. Imo, I think the loan recipients have made it so clear they wanted the benefits without the payback. I pray daily they do not get a reprieve.
That's rather nasty of you. Why do you care?
I don't think that loan recipients want freebies. I think they want fair interest rates and tuition that doesn't rise so sharply every year that they are in school that it takes more and more money each year to finish a degree. I think they want the same protections that any other human being in this country gets when taking out a loan of ANY kind. They want to know that, should they find themselves completely unable to pay back these loans (or any remaining balance of these loans) that they don't wind up in what is the equivalent of debtors prison.
What's so horrid about that?
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No one is forced to take a loan or attend college, it's a choice. If some has literally forced you to sign a loan paper the you need to get the authorities involved
Nobody is forced to buy a house. Or a car. Or take a vacation and put it on their Amex.
Yet, if that turns out to be a bad financial decision, you can file bankruptcy.
With education, even if you do NOT finish a degree due to mounting debt?
You are STUCK paying for it. Period. You cannot repo knowledge, but can you repo that trip to Europe that cost 10k and the wardrobe that went with it?
Nope.
People can go out and buy a fortune in diamonds and sell them to their friends... then, years later if they cannot pay the bill? They can file for bankruptcy.
I wish everyone that is so gung ho about this situation could appreciate the gravity of having ANY kind of debt in this country that can NEVER be discharged. There have been other examples... hospital bills? Yep... hell, you can go get cosmetic surgery and stiff your doctor on the bill and still be able to file BK on it, too.
Are they out repossessing nose jobs someplace? Fake boobs?
NO.
And you know a nose job and fake boobs has helped someone get a job before. So have designer clothes and dental veneers. So the argument that education is the most valuable commodity on earth and thereby should never have BK protection for student loan indebtedness is CRAZY.
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