The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt • Hacker News Board

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#121

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:22 PM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #69

austenallred wrote: post #12

The thing that irks me about this the most is how it's the people who were doing exactly what they were told that got hurt the most. The good kids who went to the best school they could get in to, studied whatever they were interested in, and if that thing happened to be literature or women's studies or a wide number of other things you might just spend the next 20 years figuring out how to live with debt you can't p…

> The thing that irks me about this the most is how it's the people who were doing exactly what they were told that got hurt the most. The good kids who went to the best school they could get in to, studied whatever they were interested in, and if that thing happened to be literature or women's studies or a wide number of other things you might just spend the next 20 years figuring out how to live with debt you can't…

[deleted]

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#122

Post by epalmer » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:24 PM UTC

austenallred wrote: post #12

The thing that irks me about this the most is how it's the people who were doing exactly what they were told that got hurt the most. The good kids who went to the best school they could get in to, studied whatever they were interested in, and if that thing happened to be literature or women's studies or a wide number of other things you might just spend the next 20 years figuring out how to live with debt you can't p…

Also there is a lack of youth going into the trades. Welding, electrical, plumbing, appliance repair etc. We have devalued those careers and now they just don't have enough apprentices.

I'm a fan of what Mike Rowe is doing to raise awareness around the trades. http://profoundlydisconnected.com/foundation/

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#123

Post by TheAdamAndChe » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:26 PM UTC

r_smart wrote: post #98

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree 100%. Out of my 4 years of high school, which included several AP classes, the best class I ever took was personal finance. It taught me how to manage money, calculate the cost of retirement, and think about what money is in the first place. Without the class, I would have severely suffered once I got on my own. The year after I graduated, the school removed the class because they felt it was irrelevant. The…

I really doubt there's some cabal of rich people that don't want others to understand interest. If anything, it would be to their advantage to have more potential business partners floating around out there. I think the reality is more likely that people working in schools are public employees, they tend to be apathetic or hostile towards capitalism, and not terribly interested in boring business stuff. These are the…

Public employees in most other developed countries seem to do a pretty good job, though. Why do you think they succeed where America fails?

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#124

Post by Kinnard » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:27 PM UTC

ThrustVectoring wrote: post #118

College is a positional good, so "Is college worth it" is a question with two answers. Let me explain. The first question is "as an individual job-seeker, is college worth it to me personally ". Which it probably still is - there's very real discrimination against folks without a degree. The second question is "for job-seekers as a class , does college help them". Which it almost certainly isn't - there's a huge amou…

That's a great idea, like the ban the box campaigns to prevent discrimination against ex-con's:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ban_the_Box http://bantheboxcampaign.org/

I bet some sort of uncollege[1] labor group that calls out and rallies/lobbies against discrimination would be effective too.

[1] https://www.facebook.com/groups/UnCollegeNetwork

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#125

Post by jknoepfler » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:29 PM UTC

austenallred wrote: post #12

The thing that irks me about this the most is how it's the people who were doing exactly what they were told that got hurt the most. The good kids who went to the best school they could get in to, studied whatever they were interested in, and if that thing happened to be literature or women's studies or a wide number of other things you might just spend the next 20 years figuring out how to live with debt you can't p…

This rings completely false to me. I went to college the first time in 2000. At that time, it was common knowledge that a liberal arts degree was a portal to either grad school, professional school (law mostly), or a low wage job, unless you distinguished yourself and made your own way. Law school was already flooded, and graduate schools were already overproducing phds.

I chose to go into graduate school in philosophy, but along the way I also decided to not take out any debt, go to a public university, and to work my ass off. Why? Because I knew I couldn't afford debt of I didn't make it, and I knew I'd have to be summa cum laude with killer letters of recommendation to make it.

How did I know all that? It seemed like common sense to me, but I probably did some research and talked to people. And of course my grandmother wanted to know how I was going to make a living.

And I did make it, but I dropped out of the phd program, took out some loans, and got a freaking csci degree that paid the loans off with a signing bonus, because I discovered that I can't stand academia. Go figure.

This was just... Common sense to me. Don't burn money to do something with low returns. Do burn money to get a valuable degree with returns. Above all, think.

At the time, as now, I feel a great deal of contempt (an ugly, evil emotion to be sure) for people who take out massive debt to be molly-coddled at a private liberal arts college with a sticker price approaching MIT and no connection to the real world, or who fund their entire college degree with loans and no work (i worked through both degrees). I try to convert that into compassion or sympathy, but I haven't found success yet.

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#126

Post by RUG3Y » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:30 PM UTC

This is a bit tangential to the conversation, but relevant: I have an art degree. I was pushed into getting any degree. I'm a part of that same generation that was told to go to college at all costs, even if you don't know what you want to do with yourself. Fast forward 11 years, and I've just finally paid my student loans off.

Now I'm in this situation: I'm not doing a whole lot with art, and I'm trying to break into software development. Do I need a CS degree? Any opinions? I'm thinking about going back to school but the thought of possibly having more debt is not something I'm interested in. I'm having a hard time finding even junior level jobs that are interested in people without degrees. I'm a fairly competent programmer as-is, self taught.

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#127

Post by giardini » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:32 PM UTC

chestervonwinch wrote: post #43

> debt significantly hurts your chances of buying a home 60k in the hole still from undergrad loans. The thought of taking out a mortage after this debt is finished is not appealing. "hurts my chances"? Sure, that's one way to put it.

It may not be to your advantage to buy a home. Once you do, you're tied forever to the local economy. Ofttimes once many people move to an area and buy homes at artificially-inflated prices, the local economy tanks and everyone is stuck with their overpriced home. Look at the people in cities (in Montana, North Dakota, West Texas) caught up in the fracking boom - they're stuck with thousands of overpriced homes now.

If you rent, you can move easily to an area that is growing.

https://www.google.com/search?q=buying+a+home+is+not+worth+i...

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#128

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:37 PM UTC

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #41

r_smart wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my favorite things to knock on about is how we live in a capitalist society but our compulsory education doesn't ever address basic finance & economics. Most of these kids have no idea what interest is or what their post graduation payments are going to be like unless they've had the fortune of a knowledgeable parent or teacher taking the time to explain things. It's kind of shameful to me that I was 30 years…

I agree 100%. Out of my 4 years of high school, which included several AP classes, the best class I ever took was personal finance. It taught me how to manage money, calculate the cost of retirement, and think about what money is in the first place. Without the class, I would have severely suffered once I got on my own. The year after I graduated, the school removed the class because they felt it was irrelevant. The…

[deleted]

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#129

Post by mywittyname » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:37 PM UTC

reader5000 wrote: post #46

treehau5 wrote: post #45

Did any of these kids (and I am one of them, graduated in 2013) stop and think that paying 50-70k a year after room and board to attend a university was insane? I had the option to go to a nice university, and maybe my horizons would have been expanded, maybe they wouldn't, but at the end of the day I am happy where I ended up and I went to community college for 2 years, and the public state university, for the remai…

I agree, the taxpayers were pretty stupid for taking on the risk that kids wont be able to pay on their student loans. Too bad for the taxpayer!

The government only took on $32k of the risk, that's where federal aid caps for undergrad.

It's private banks that are more than happy to sink kid's futures prospects by lending them that extra $50, 60, 70 thousand dollars or more (and to take their parents down with them).

Re: The Lasting Consequences of Student Debt

#130

Post by Retric » Tue, Apr 04, 2017, 4:38 PM UTC

pc86 wrote: post #101

Retric wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it has less to do with viable job creation than wider political issues. It's cheap to open an office in Iowa, but talent/upper middle class people don't want to move there. Not simply because of social issues, but because companies don't pay enough. IE if I can save 20% of 150k moving to a cheap location is only viable if I can save 30k not just 20% of a lower salary.

$100k in Iowa will go a lot farther than $200k in San Francisco, and if you can get $200k in SF you can almost certainly get a similar job making $100k (or more) in rural Iowa. Now, if you don't want to do that because "gross, it's Iowa" and NYC or SF is objectively a more enjoyable environment for a 20-something single software developer, that's fine. But that's a choice and at that point you're simply deciding to l…

If I can save X dollars per year in San Francisco then I need to be able to save X dollars per year in Iowa not just live similar lifestyles on less money. Because savings has ZERO cost of living adjustments. Further, Social Security has zero cost of living adjustments so if your making less than the cap that has long term consequences. If your saving 15% at 200k that's 30% at 100k for the same net savings. While a 100k lifestyle in Pennsylvania may be like a 200k lifestyle in SF a 70k lifestyle in Pennsylvania is probably not like a 170k lifestyle in SF.

This is most apparent when you travel as a hotel in Europe does not give a discount because your living in the Midwest. Further, someone may be willing to live in an efficiency when that's saving 10k/year, but not when it's saving 3k/year.