The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe • Hacker News Board

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#91

Post by sdfsaf » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:45 PM UTC

war1025 wrote: post #58

ikeyany wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For starters, H1Bs are cheaper to hire. Also, they're more desperate to stay in the US, so they won't demand too much and won't walk away from poor conditions. That also fixes with the population issue since middle class Americans can't really afford to have kids.

Middle class Americans can absolutely afford to have kids. People in certain metros maybe can't afford it, but living there is often a choice they explicitly make, or at the very least talk themselves into. Sure you make half as much working somewhere else, but the cost of living is also a quarter as much.

A quarter? Dream on. We're living in the Midwest with an East coast salary (remote).

I have no idea how other ppl here afford kids and manage to save. We spend $30k on day care and another $12k on health premiums alone.

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#92

Post by leakybit » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:45 PM UTC

hobofan wrote: post #49

lemcoe9 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is "do a coding bootcamp" the common refrain from tech workers trying to help non-tech people?

Because the barrier to entry is still quite low. While maybe not "Anyone who could spell HTML could get a job" low, as said in another comment here, it's still so low that I'd wager a decently clever person with a good 3 month bootcamp can get a _entry-level_ job.

I would say the entry level market for devs is very saturated.

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#93

Post by zaroth » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:45 PM UTC

I’m looking at the Underemployment vs Unemployment of Recent College Grads graph, and then the following graph of Unemployment of Young Workers vs Recent Grads and they seem like they should share one of the curves in common, but the graphs are different?

Underemployment rates for non-farm jobs in the US, 2005–2018 — Unemployment of Recent Grads

Vs

Unemployment rates for non-farm jobs in the US, 2005–2018 — Recent Graduates

The drop in the Unemployment rate for “All Young Workers” since 2011 however is staggering.

IMO a non-dischargable loan should have a correspondingly extremely low interest rate, but I think there has to be a bright line drawn at forgiving principal except in the case of fraud on the part of the educator or the loan servicer.

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#94

Post by ericd » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:48 PM UTC

mamon wrote: post #81

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That used to be called a "liberal education", which meant an education that was appropriate for free men, as opposed to slaves, who would be trained in a trade. Today, that corresponds to pursuing knowledge if you don't need the money . If you do, pursue something that pays. (Pursue as much knowledge as you can work in around the edges, but the main focus has to be on something that pays.)

Ok, so are you saying that there should be no student loans on humanities degrees? Because that's the logical conclusion of what you're saying here. Would it make sense for the government to make a list of fields where they do back up student loans (which would probably be mostly STEM fields)?

Perhaps the loan requirements should be more stringent on fields that are unlikely to support repayment for people that aren’t in a financial position to repay them? Not very different to lending in other areas of life.

Or remove the non-dischargeability and the govt backing at the same time, and let interest rates and lending requirements fall where they may.

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#95

Post by jjwhitaker » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:49 PM UTC

howard941 wrote: post #61

lemcoe9 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the vast majority of the customers that walk through these buy-here pay-here places' doors already have loans on their vehicle and are looking to upgrade. "Kelly Blue Book" is not a phrase used very often by their salespeople; the customer base seems to be much more interested in the appearance of the cars than the financial utility of them.

You weren't touting KBB and that's good. Kelly Blue Book is a great trademark and marketing tool but the preferred industry reference is The Black Book https://www.blackbook.com/

KBB is still in use. NADA Guides is often referred to before BB, in my experience, but is pretty close to KBB values.

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#96

Post by bdamm » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:51 PM UTC

lemcoe9 wrote: post #26

joelbluminator wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can't a 28 American with an English major do a coding bootcamp and find an entry level job? I'm sure if he's reasonable intelligent and ambitious he can. There aren't that many h1b's around competing with him, most American jobs aren't h1b jobs.

Why is "do a coding bootcamp" the common refrain from tech workers trying to help non-tech people?

Because the truth is that the technical work is not the barrier, but rather the grit to grind through the hundreds of little problems that you'll encounter on the way to getting a working piece of code. So "do a coding bootcamp" functions as a rapid weeding process where someone can find out quickly if they're up to the career or not. Then if they're not, they didn't waste a ton of time finding out that it doesn't work out for them, and if they are, then the bootcamp will provide further vectors to progress.

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#97

Post by michaelbrave » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:52 PM UTC

war1025 wrote: post #58

ikeyany wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For starters, H1Bs are cheaper to hire. Also, they're more desperate to stay in the US, so they won't demand too much and won't walk away from poor conditions. That also fixes with the population issue since middle class Americans can't really afford to have kids.

Middle class Americans can absolutely afford to have kids. People in certain metros maybe can't afford it, but living there is often a choice they explicitly make, or at the very least talk themselves into. Sure you make half as much working somewhere else, but the cost of living is also a quarter as much.

A lot of American's grew up middle class but aren't anymore, they still think of themselves as such but truly aren't. This is how most Millenials live, they are too broke to have kids, think of themselves as middle class because they grew up that way, even if in reality they aren't.

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#98

Post by drak0n1c » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:57 PM UTC

luisaguimaraes wrote: post #83

It's such a shame that the state can't support the education system financially, so that 20-year old people wouldn't have to take loans to study. It works in other countries, so why not in the US?

Federally guaranteed student loans exceed $120 billion every year. That is a massive subsidy, and it may be increasing costs for more people than it helps. The glut of admissions being able to pay artificially high tuitions is emboldening administrators to add more dormitories every year, expand the administrative class, and build rec centers -- raising tuition even further.

> Last year, FSA provided more than $120 billion in federal grants, loans, and work-study funds to approximately 13 million students at nearly 6,000 participating schools.

https://www2.ed.gov/about/reports/annual/2017report/fsa-repo...

The damage from existing poorly designed government subsidies should be fixed before we issue any more blank checks - otherwise we'll all be stuck paying for artificially inflated university budgets.

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#99

Post by throwaway2048 » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:57 PM UTC

zaroth wrote: post #93

I’m looking at the Underemployment vs Unemployment of Recent College Grads graph, and then the following graph of Unemployment of Young Workers vs Recent Grads and they seem like they should share one of the curves in common, but the graphs are different? Underemployment rates for non-farm jobs in the US, 2005–2018 — Unemployment of Recent Grads Vs Unemployment rates for non-farm jobs in the US, 2005–2018 — Recent Gr…

Why should the principle not be discharged? Why is lending a virtually risk free position (which induces a massive moral hazard)

Re: The student loan crisis is really an underemployment catastrophe

#100

Post by war1025 » Mon, Jun 17, 2019, 7:58 PM UTC

sdfsaf wrote: post #91

war1025 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Middle class Americans can absolutely afford to have kids. People in certain metros maybe can't afford it, but living there is often a choice they explicitly make, or at the very least talk themselves into. Sure you make half as much working somewhere else, but the cost of living is also a quarter as much.

A quarter? Dream on. We're living in the Midwest with an East coast salary (remote). I have no idea how other ppl here afford kids and manage to save. We spend $30k on day care and another $12k on health premiums alone.

Living in the Midwest on a Midwest salary ($85k/yr), currently 30 years old, have 3 kids, a stay at home wife, and a net worth that just peeked over $250k.

Also, our work health insurance is shit, so $200 gets taken out of my paycheck each week for that, which puts it right around the $12k you mentioned.

Daycare is stupid expensive. Healthcare is stupid expensive. We handle the former by having my wife stay home. The latter is just an unfortunate fact of life.

I really don't know how much it costs to live on the coasts, but on a developer salary you can live very comfortably in the Midwest (Ames, Iowa here).