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I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

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Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#141

Post by SCdF »

NamTaf wrote: post #101

The US university loan system is fucked. We have a government-run loan scheme called HECS. You defer your university fees throughout the duration of your studies, apparently no matter how long they last. The programme is not means tested at all, so it is available for every single domestic student studying uni here, no matter what. That loan is then paid back only once you start earning more than a threshold amount o…

New Zealand has a similar system.

All kiwis can get a student loan, which you can put class fees, some living costs and a few other expenses under. You can also apply for a student allowance which you don't have to pay back, but you have to qualify (e.g. you and your family are poor).

With the student loan, it's a no interest loan as long as you're in the country. If you leave it defaults to a normal loan (not sure the % is).

While you're working and make over a certain minimal amount the govt takes 10% of your income to pay it off.

I'm not sure how much it is now, but I graduated in 2006 with a BSc in CS and my loan was somewhere around 21k.

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#142

Post by originofspecie »

kyro wrote: post #70

Hey, at least you're not $250k in the hole with an incredibly low 7% interest rate, at the age of 26! What do you all think about a Kickstarter for student loans? I'm looking for $300k in investment or to validate my idea by raising $300k through the service.

looks like someone beat you to the punch https://www.upstart.com/

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#143

Post by fixxer »

rayiner wrote: post #14

I agree with the ultimate sentiment, which is that it's generally inadvisable to try and pay your way through school these days. The federal government will let you and your parents borrow as much as you need to pay for school, and you'll make more money after you finish your degree, so your efforts are better spent trying to finish in as few semesters as possible to minimize the amount of money you need to borrow in…

It gets stranger with graduate school.

I'm currently a PhD student. I quit a fairly lucrative trading career in 2010 and went back to school without any intention of doing a GRA (I was fine with self-funding; to be honest, I wanted to not have a boss for a while)... that lasted one semester.

My adviser realized she liked the idea of paying 1/10 my old salary and getting an actual software engineer on her staff. I'm not one to complain or turn down money, so I took the gig and I'm near finished with the degree.

Moral of the story #1: Go back to school for a PhD with a boat load of cash in your pocket, legitimate skills and solid work experience. You won't have to pay tuition.

My wife and also decided to start a family during this time. We paid for her insurance out of pocket. Once the little guy came into the world, we started getting pamphlets in the mail from the state (aka the broke state of Illinois) regarding free programs (health insurance, food and formula vouchers) that we qualified for due to my lowly GRA salary (my wife is a stay-at-home mom). They don't care about or penalize high savings; these program managers just want to get as many qualified participants on the dole as possible to justify their existence. "Need" is not important; quotas are.

Moral of the story #2: Quit producing taxable income, go back to school, breed like a rabbit. The state will provide.

I realize this may sound harsh to those students currently getting by thanks to federal grants, but if you want to fix the problem, we need to get rid of these fucking programs. Prices will drop. All these loans accomplish is artificially inflating demand and putting graduates deep in debt. It'll be messy, sure, but the system is not sustainable in current form.

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#144

Post by ohazi »

muzz wrote: post #124
ohazi wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This annoys the hell out of me. "Retirement account" here is a tax deferred account like a 401k or an IRA, right? There are limits to how much you can put into accounts like these, and in today's world it can be difficult to adequately fund a comfortable retirement on these savings alone. If you make a modest income but are careful about your spending, it's not unreasonable to have leftover after-tax money that you c…

Yes, 401k, IRA, etc. But your concern of their limitations applies to so few people. Roughly 30% of people have less than $1000 saved for retirement, in any kind of account [1] Roughly 55% of people have less than $25K saved, in any kind of account The 401k personal contribution limit is $17,500 this year, and if someone had a 50% match form their company, they could top that in just ONE single year. [1] page 18, 19:…

Yes, I know that the vast majority of people don't/can't/won't plan for retirement at all. But we're already talking about "parents with modest incomes but a lot of savings from planning their own retirement." Many of these people could fall into this category.

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#145

Post by AlexDanger »

NamTaf wrote: post #139
AlexDanger wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The major criticism of the system is that students can just incur this debt then flee the country. Do you have any stats on how much HECS is lost in this manner? I've not heard of this being a big problem. One of my friends is in this category - he got a PHD scholarship at a top institution in the UK and isnt likely to return to Australia anytime soon. But I'd have thought the overall impact of brain drain (Austral…

I don't, but I'd love to see some if anyone has any. The problem is that because the only interest on the loan is CPI, the HECS system is essentially a fixed pool of money that is temporary loaned to students then paid back, real-dollar for real-dollar. By not paying it back, it's essentially 1 student's volume of study that is lost out of that pool. I don't know how significant that 'leak rate' is though, so I can't…

The only reason I suspect its not a big problem is neither political party seem to be whining about it.

Perhaps the boom economy over the last few years has hidden the problem. Graduates from IT/Engineering/Geology had a very good chance of skyrocketing into a top income bracket after only 1-2 years on the job. In terms of NPV this accelerated repayment makes the pool of money larger. And vice versa in a slow economy. I'm quite certain the previous generation didn't see their income climb so fast relative to their years of experience.

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#146

Post by mchannon »

charliepinglass wrote: post #82
mchannon wrote: post #15

Across this country, this very month, legions of rubes will be getting low-interest student loans to enroll in psychology, general studies, and undecided major degree programs, paying $40k per year, only to drop out shortly thereafter with a huge financial hangover and little ability to pay for it. In contrast, an electrical engineering degree will easily pay for itself, particularly if you've managed to bootstrap yo…

You can't borrow enough to pay for tuition at many schools using federal loans as an undergraduate student. Stafford loans have a maximum borrowing limit of $12,500 per year, and 4% of that goes to origination fees, leaving $12,000 for tuition, less if you're a freshman or sophomore: http://studentaid.ed.gov/types/loans/subsidized-unsubsidized... That's not enough for many state schools, and definitely not enough for…

There are also dozens of scholarship programs that, when I was in college, I didn't qualify for because I didn't look like the OP. A lot of them are only for upperclassmen, and a lot of them are only for STEM disciplines.

It may be too late to apply and get such things but I didn't read of any effort to track those down. Finding scholarships, even qty 10 of $500 apiece requiring 3 hours' work each, should be easier with this backstory than any other I've ever read.

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#147

Post by originofspecie »

hga wrote: post #140
originofspecie wrote: post #134

I feel terrible for Ingrid, but I think the end of her article requires a caveat. The financial aid system is a game, and learning the rules can save a lot of money. Lets assume that your taxable income was 27k.(36 weeks x 40 hours a week x $26 an hour) You will be in the 15% tax bracket, so the total tax liability on your income would be approximately(i'm assuming only federal income tax) 23k (27000*.85). This is th…

It's very much not my impression that most people can deduct health expenses. Here from the horse's mouth ( http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/2013-changes-to-itemized-dedu... ): " Beginning Jan. 1, 2013, you can claim deductions for medical expenses not covered by your health insurance that exceed 10 percent of your adjusted gross income. " Previously it was 7.5%, but it's nothing if you can't file a Schedule A to itemi…

I may be reading this wrong, but from what I understand anyone can file a Schedule A (which allows you to itemize your deductions), but in doing so you give up the standard deductions for your tax bracket, which for a single filer is 5350. So at 7.5% of her adjusted gross of ~25k which is $1875. So if her medical expenses are less than 5350 it would most likely make the most sense for her to take the standard deduction. Otherwise according to this info she should be able to write off the full amount.

I could be entirely wrong about this. I am not a tax professional, but I do think that a little bit of financial planning could go a long way in these types of situatons.

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#148

Post by zw123456 »

I entered Engineering school at a state University in 1974 and graduated in 1978 with a BSEE and NO loans. I was able to do so by working and going to school, tuition was $216 per semester, which even then was very affordable. It is a crime that today, this would be impossible. It is one of the greatest injustices today.

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#149

Post by LanceH »

It was my experience that every dollar I made came out of any potential financial assistance package I could get. So making $15k in an entire year, they expected that I could apply all $15k toward the school, which wouldn't have covered tuition. There was zero incentive to work as far as paying for school went, unless I could make substantially more than required for school.

I ended up just paying for school out of savings (I had worked 4 years before my junior year). Another thing about savings is that they expected I could spend 100% of my savings immediately. They don't even pro rate savings across the multiple years required for a degree. Financial aid is for them, not for the student.

Re: I cannot afford to go back to engineering school

#150

Post by vacri »

NamTaf wrote: post #101

The US university loan system is fucked. We have a government-run loan scheme called HECS. You defer your university fees throughout the duration of your studies, apparently no matter how long they last. The programme is not means tested at all, so it is available for every single domestic student studying uni here, no matter what. That loan is then paid back only once you start earning more than a threshold amount o…

There was even a golden period, '84 - '88, where it was entirely free to get a degree in Australia.

Australia needs something like HECS to encourage skills. Even with the loss of those going overseas, to support a service-based economy, it's still necessary to maintain domestic skills. The US is less in need - it is where the brain-drain of the world goes - which may be why their government feels less of the pinch.

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