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More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

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Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#311

Post by iambateman »

srj wrote: post #228
Overtonwindow wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Woah what loan are you speaking of??? My federal loan was about 3% in 2005.

Federal loan rate history: http://www.finaid.org/loans/historicalrates.phtml I consolidated but I know that some of mine were at 6.8% fixed thanks to this lovely change: 2006-07: Replacement of separate variable in-school/grace and repayment rates on the Stafford Loan with a single fixed rate of 6.8%. Replacement of variable interest rates on the PLUS Loan with a fixed rate of 8.5% (FFELP) and 7.9% (DL).

If you don't mind, was refinancing a good move for you? What rate were you able to get it down to?

We're at 6.8% right now.

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#312

Post by madengr »

grahamburger wrote: post #229
guelo wrote: post #21

There's a simple solution, the Feds should cutoff loans for schools that don't get their students jobs. The government are the only ones that are able to accurately calculate which schools are completely worthless. In fact they should take it one step further and advertise to the whole world what percentage of students get jobs in their studied field and the average starting salary. That would finally put some market…

I also think there's a simple solution, but entirely different from the one you propose. I wish that k-12 would focus on job prep. Most jobs really don't need specialized degrees - If our public schools were worth a damn there's no reason kids couldn't graduate ready to work. Leave university for highly specialized fields and intellectual pursuits. I think it's a shame that our public school system is failing kids so…

Back when I was in HS (1990) our VoTech program taught me the equivalent of an AA in electronics. That program was scrapped; what a shame.

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#313

Post by iambateman »

kaonashi wrote: post #147
oldmanjay wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What sort of belief should I start from to be able to decide that people taking a loan they can't afford bear no responsibility? I imagine it's the same sort of thinking that leads to calling a property they never actually paid for theirs but I am not sure and when I am not sure, I ask.

They both bear responsibility, but only one party got the bailout.

I hear what you're saying, but bankruptcy is most certainly a bailout relative to debtors prison.

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#314

Post by thatcat »

Camillo wrote: post #209
beatpanda wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is insulting. What choice do you think these kids have? A university degree is the only gateway to social mobility available to most young people in the United States, and at current prices, most of them can't actually afford it. What do you expect the kids to do? "Gee, I guess I'll just have to spend the rest of my life in the service industry, making other people rich." Give me a break. Of course they're going…

Social mobility means that people who have talent and work hard can get to a higher class even if they were born in a lower class. It cannot possibly mean that the entire population is going to become college professors, while nobody does service jobs any more.

University professors usually have a phd, no one is suggesting everyone get a phd, yet.

Does Saas count as a service job?

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#315

Post by pmiller2 »

industriousthou wrote: post #261
pmiller2 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A big problem is that at age 17, all of the adults are saying go to college & take out these loans. Guidance councilors, teachers, parents. The most compliant high schoolers will just do what they are told without thinking about it further. > I imagine this will start changing. When I was a kid, that group of adults had the benefit of cheap degrees. Today, now that group of adults is us and we did not go to school…

Non-college grad here (well, AA from a community college, but that doesn't really count). I get the impression that that some kids did really challenging programs or went to prestigious schools and that paid off really well, but a lot of kids bought into the "college = success" mantra. Every authority figure they knew was telling them that this was the only way to be successful and the schools were jacking up tuition…

> I get the impression that that some kids did really challenging programs or went to prestigious schools and that paid off really well, but a lot of kids bought into the "college = success" mantra.

Challenging programs have relatively little to do with it. It's almost 100% about the prestigious schools and the networks that come along with them: the old "it's not what you know; it's who you know," deal.

> All that said, I wish someone would have shown me the value of a really high-end education and helped me attain one.

Education is always valuable. It's schooling that's not always worthwhile.

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#316

Post by mr_turtle »

manyxcxi wrote: post #308
industriousthou wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Non-college grad here (well, AA from a community college, but that doesn't really count). I get the impression that that some kids did really challenging programs or went to prestigious schools and that paid off really well, but a lot of kids bought into the "college = success" mantra. Every authority figure they knew was telling them that this was the only way to be successful and the schools were jacking up tuition…

> This is really a shocking dereliction of duty on the part of teachers and guidance counselors. Playing devil's advocate for a second, what if the teachers and guidance counselors still believe it to be true? They're likely from a previous generation or two, where simply having a college degree opened up most doors. Then again, what if having a college degree really is still better than not? You don't have to spend…

This makes no sense. Are you telling me high school teachers and counselors are telling students to go to colleges without factoring in costs/financial aid packages/ROI?

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#317

Post by rlucas »

warmblood wrote: post #304
sdegutis wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, screw the modern "higher education" system. It's a business, pure and simple, designed to milk out every penny from kids and their parents, as much as humanly possible while still being "legal". It wasn't always so unbalanced, but that's the way it is today, and that's a crying shame.

Many would say that it's actually designed to milk the pennies from the federal government by proxy of the student and parent with a significant markup. This is somewhat worse than simply taking from individuals because it implies a systemic breakage that someone is taking advantage of, possibly using political influence to keep that breakage from being fixed.

This. Although I am a believer in and a onetime recipient of federal student aid, there's no denying that there exists an educational-financial-industrial complex which needs to churn through new student borrowers as the substrate for keeping uncle sam's cash flowing. Very similar to the Medicare and 401k industries in a way, given their ostensible social goals, the massive government supplied sums involved, and the need to attach these sums to individual names and lives.

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#318

Post by needcaffeine »

iambateman wrote: post #311
srj wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Federal loan rate history: http://www.finaid.org/loans/historicalrates.phtml I consolidated but I know that some of mine were at 6.8% fixed thanks to this lovely change: 2006-07: Replacement of separate variable in-school/grace and repayment rates on the Stafford Loan with a single fixed rate of 6.8%. Replacement of variable interest rates on the PLUS Loan with a fixed rate of 8.5% (FFELP) and 7.9% (DL).

If you don't mind, was refinancing a good move for you? What rate were you able to get it down to? We're at 6.8% right now.

When I consolidated my loans, they became fixed at 6.8%. Meanwhile my wife was lazy and did nothing and then the great recession happened and her loans have been at 3% for years and years.

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#319

Post by finance-geek »

mr_turtle wrote: post #316
manyxcxi wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is really a shocking dereliction of duty on the part of teachers and guidance counselors. Playing devil's advocate for a second, what if the teachers and guidance counselors still believe it to be true? They're likely from a previous generation or two, where simply having a college degree opened up most doors. Then again, what if having a college degree really is still better than not? You don't have to spend…

This makes no sense. Are you telling me high school teachers and counselors are telling students to go to colleges without factoring in costs/financial aid packages/ROI?

They are saying that teachers/counselors are viewing it from their baked-in perspective formed 30 years ago...back when you could graduate with a bachelor's degree, end up in a school job that gave you a life-long pension and healthcare.

I think it is difficult for someone from my parent's generation, who had so many benefits (no offshore competition, defined benefits pensions, lifetime pensions, etc) to understand how tough life is now. You hear about it, but until you struggle with it it is difficult to know.

Re: More Than 40% of Student Borrowers Aren’t Making Payments

#320

Post by michaelbuddy »

Some universities have, and this surprised me, a ratio of student to employee 1:1 On top of that you have the upkeep, all the program costs facilities costs are insane. This is not sustainable. It simply cannot work when many people haven't seen a legitimate increase in their wages for years.
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