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How America's universities became debt factories

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Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#161

Post by paulcole »

Avicebron wrote: post #147
paulcole wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I took out around $20k in loans to study literature starting in 2001. Graduated in 2005. Rent was $150 a month. Played a lot of poker and disc golf. Studied and learned a bit. Had a 75% scholarship to help with tuition. Had a $300/semester book stipend as part of that and just bought penny books off Amazon (one of the benefits of an English degree) and pocketed the difference. Basically for 5-8% or so of my (estimate…

I'm trying to figure out if you missed a 0 at the end of your rent...

Lol no it was $150. This was Gainesville, Florida and I split a horrible studio apartment with a friend of mine.

It was located in a low lying area and once after a tropical storm we had to wade through hip-deep water to get to class (the apartment itself was miraculously high and dry). Coming home one night I saw a little gator swimming along near me as I trudged through it.

After we graduated my roommate moved to Manhattan for an engineering job. His month’s rent up there was significantly more than he paid for a year in college.

I ended up moving to Portland, Oregon in 2007 and my first rent here was $550. Now in 2024, I’ve finally tacked on that missing 0 and my rent is now around $1500.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#162

Post by esafak »

dachworker wrote: post #25

Meanwhile, I know of German and Dutch peers of mine who upon completing their masters in Europe, enrolled in California to do a second Masters ( at the time I believe they paid in the range of $100k) for the VISA and internship opportunities. And IIRC, the bet paid off because they all found employment in California, with salaries 3x to 4x what they could get here.

That just means they needed the degree to get an opportunity to work in the US. This is really a tax.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#163

Post by sofixa »

ivewonyoung wrote: post #105
ben_w wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If we overdo on it, we get socialism. And we know how it always ends. First, no, we have some high-visibility examples of dictators claiming to be socialists , several of whom had purges of other internal opponents who said socialism was a different thing to what they were doing. We don't point to the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea"* or "The Democratic Republic of Congo" then say of Democracy (or of republi…

There have been a lot of socialist countries that were proper and strong democracies, notably India. The result? Hundreds of millions in abject poverty in India until socialism was given up in the 90s, and is slowly recovering.

Funny you say that, Karnataka is an outlier beating its peers in all quality of life metrics and has been run by communist for decades.

Also, modern day India has a very strong government intervention bias, especially regarding lifting people out of poverty. Be it investments in infrastructure (such as running water), or downright giving food to people. Good luck explaining how that isn't "socialism" to an American.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#164

Post by gfs »

Avicebron wrote: post #147
paulcole wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I took out around $20k in loans to study literature starting in 2001. Graduated in 2005. Rent was $150 a month. Played a lot of poker and disc golf. Studied and learned a bit. Had a 75% scholarship to help with tuition. Had a $300/semester book stipend as part of that and just bought penny books off Amazon (one of the benefits of an English degree) and pocketed the difference. Basically for 5-8% or so of my (estimate…

I'm trying to figure out if you missed a 0 at the end of your rent...

I don't think $150 is out of the question over twenty years ago with roommates and a LCOL region.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#165

Post by grecy »

paulcole wrote: post #139
scoofy wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You forgot the most important part. The people agreeing to these debts, by definition , do not have an education in complex debt instruments that cannot be discharged. Taking our a vast loan to study English literature might seem unwise, but it’s something I could definitely see a starry eyed 17 year old deciding to do.

I took out around $20k in loans to study literature starting in 2001. Graduated in 2005. Rent was $150 a month. Played a lot of poker and disc golf. Studied and learned a bit. Had a 75% scholarship to help with tuition. Had a $300/semester book stipend as part of that and just bought penny books off Amazon (one of the benefits of an English degree) and pocketed the difference. Basically for 5-8% or so of my (estimate…

Woah, you were paying off that debt with interest from 2005 to 2021?

Damn I’m happy to live in a country with free university.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#166

Post by sofixa »

anovikov wrote: post #64
ben_w wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If we overdo on it, we get socialism. And we know how it always ends. First, no, we have some high-visibility examples of dictators claiming to be socialists , several of whom had purges of other internal opponents who said socialism was a different thing to what they were doing. We don't point to the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea"* or "The Democratic Republic of Congo" then say of Democracy (or of republi…

No, i mean EU socialist countries. To the tune of Sweden, Netherlands, etc. That are little but sleepy retirement community with no ways to make money. Why would anyone with any ambition want to live there? So they don't. They go to America in spite of all it's horrors and sins. Live there once they made they money? Also no, because taxes, they go to the likes of Cyprus or Malta, or since recently, Spain [1]. These c…

Sweden? The country with one of the highest amounts of startups per capita? The Netherlands???

Are you sure you know what you're talking about?

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#167

Post by sevensor »

Avicebron wrote: post #147
paulcole wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I took out around $20k in loans to study literature starting in 2001. Graduated in 2005. Rent was $150 a month. Played a lot of poker and disc golf. Studied and learned a bit. Had a 75% scholarship to help with tuition. Had a $300/semester book stipend as part of that and just bought penny books off Amazon (one of the benefits of an English degree) and pocketed the difference. Basically for 5-8% or so of my (estimate…

I'm trying to figure out if you missed a 0 at the end of your rent...

Big state U is in the middle of nowhere, and in those years I was paying closer to $250, but I could see if you were willing to compromise on quality or quantity of personal space, getting that down to $150 without even hitting bottom.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#168

Post by dukeyukey »

sofixa wrote: post #154
vondur wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would imagine in Europe they select more carefully the students whom will go to College. Here in the US we've told students that everyone must go to College. We now have too many people in College and many of them aren't going to be successful once they are in. It's not sustainable. In many of our public universities, the graduation rate is well below 50%

> I would imagine in Europe they select more carefully the students whom will go to College. Here in the US we've told students that everyone must go to College You imagine wrong. Pretty much everyone goes to university in most and European countries. Even in wildly tourist dependent places, a degree in tourism is a normal thing for a young person to pursue before going to work at hotels/restaurants.

It's actually less than half for the EU as a whole - https://erudera.com/news/statistics-show-41-of-eu-youngsters...

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#169

Post by JoBrad »

brigadier132 wrote: post #151
lenerdenator wrote: post #89

1) Move most good careers that do not require a college degree out of the country for the benefit of shareholders 2) Tell everyone born between 1980 and 1995 that they'll be unable to compete in the global marketplace if they don't get at least some post-high school education, and imply that the mere presence of a degree will help instead of having a specific type of degree 3) Have next-to-zero standards for public f…

In your 4 step process where do you blame the not for profit schools for raising tuition by completely absurd and unsustainable amounts? If we are going to forgive student loans, tax payers should not be on the hook. The loan originators and most importantly the schools should pay since they are both the primary beneficiaries of this disastrous policy.

The cost of student loans is nothing compared to the value that those degree holders will provide. In my opinion, your first degree at a public university or community college should be paid for by the Federal government as long as you keep a certain grade average, and stick to a reasonable timeline.

If it matters to anyone, I paid off my loans entirely, but also received Pell grants.

Re: How America's universities became debt factories

#170

Post by d0mine »

chii wrote: post #68
pj808 wrote: post #21

Human capital contracts are another partial solution that flips the incentives: instead of using loans to pay tuition up front, institutions are paid a % of your income for a fixed period of time, after which any remaining amount is forgiven. Typically this only applies to income over a base amount (such as 10% of income above a 40,000 base). Naturally this works great in fields with strong employment outcomes and te…

> a % of your income for a fixed period of time why not a % until the cost of the degree is paid back? Why does there have to be a forgiveness component?

So there would be an incentive for a university to actually teach marketable skills.

Of cause it is all wishful thinking: big corrupt institutions exist not as if nobody can come up with better solutions

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