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The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

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Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#51

It's really too bad that the laws surrounding student loans make them artificially cheap. You can't get rid of college debt through bankruptcy so you're basically saddled for life. Normally the interest you pay is the combination of three things: 1. The (inherent) time value of money 2. Expenses the lender incurs to keep up with the debt 3. The average default risk of those taking the loans Student loans only price i…

Playing devil's advocate, isn't it fair to remove the ability to discharge student loan debt and in term the default risk due to the fact that there is no collateral? Unlike a car loan or a mortgage, a bank can't repossess your education.

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#52
post #32
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that most money in circulation was manufactured by creating debt. When you destroy that debt through default, you destroy that money. The fiction of student loans is tricky because under Bush they changed bankruptcy rules to exclude student debt. But fundamentally when banks are forced to write down bad student debt, their rosy asset picture becomes non-rosy. When that happens they are required by regu…

As to the last part of your comment- it's all imaginary anyway.

The sharecropper economy that results from these profit guarantees to financial institutions won't be.

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#53
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This one is going to be messy. As someone who really hasn't thought about it very much, I'd love for someone to expand on this. What's the expected fallout? In the housing bubble, many people lost the places where they lived. But it's not like someone can "take back" your education if you default on the loan, so what happens instead?

This article was from about 3 weeks ago: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/ripping-off-young-... Short version: The government makes money off student loans, and there is no defaulting on them (unless you die of course). There are no incentives to keep tuition costs in check because the lenders (government) are happy to put more money into the asset class. We're getting to the point where the price of educati…

If the government is making money off student loans, then how are they a subsidy?

If profitable, that would imply that commenters calling loans a subsidy are simply incorrect.

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#54

It's really too bad that the laws surrounding student loans make them artificially cheap. You can't get rid of college debt through bankruptcy so you're basically saddled for life. Normally the interest you pay is the combination of three things: 1. The (inherent) time value of money 2. Expenses the lender incurs to keep up with the debt 3. The average default risk of those taking the loans Student loans only price i…

A large part of the problem is all the shitty for profit schools. They get students to take out large government backed loans, then are defaulting, since they can't actually get a job. I knew several people I grew up with who went to these schools. They took out huge loans, 10k plus, and they never landed any kind of job with their "certificates" / degrees. [1] Half of all defaults are from these kind of schools. [1]…

>[1] Half of all defaults are from these kind of schools.

That means half of all defaults are from the "other" kind of school. And the loans from the "other" kind of school are much, much more than 10k +, and many of those students are "never landing any kind of job", too.

Sounds like a LARGER part of the problem is "conventional" higher education.

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#55
post #51

It's really too bad that the laws surrounding student loans make them artificially cheap. You can't get rid of college debt through bankruptcy so you're basically saddled for life. Normally the interest you pay is the combination of three things: 1. The (inherent) time value of money 2. Expenses the lender incurs to keep up with the debt 3. The average default risk of those taking the loans Student loans only price i…

Playing devil's advocate, isn't it fair to remove the ability to discharge student loan debt and in term the default risk due to the fact that there is no collateral? Unlike a car loan or a mortgage, a bank can't repossess your education.

Not really when other types of unsecured debt are wiped out by bankruptcy. Your credit card debt can be erased by chapter 7 bankruptcy even if you used it to fund an awesome vacation that no one can take back.

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#56
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think calling it a "bubble" is a way to put it into immediately recognizable terms for people. And according to your definition of what a bubble is, it could be an apt description. From wikipedia: "It could also be described as a situation in which asset prices appear to be based on implausible or inconsistent views about the future," which to me sounds a lot like the current student loan situation. The tuition cos…

Not sure you apply that definition at all. Education is not an asset-- it can't be transferred ie sold like a house can. Along the same lines, there is no incentive or ability to buy an extra degree in Vegas, Phoenix, or Miami, just because prices are going up there.

who says assets have to be transferrable. Is life insurance not an asset, even though, obviously, it's not transferrable?

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#57
Perfect opportunity for hackers.

Employers pay big money to find employees. Students pay big money to get educated to get a job.

Hackers roll in with apps that allow students to do courses for free on the smartphone/tablet, sell the info of the students to employers, who then hire the students. Everyone wins. Hackers are proclaimed heros.

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#58
post #55
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Playing devil's advocate, isn't it fair to remove the ability to discharge student loan debt and in term the default risk due to the fact that there is no collateral? Unlike a car loan or a mortgage, a bank can't repossess your education.

Not really when other types of unsecured debt are wiped out by bankruptcy. Your credit card debt can be erased by chapter 7 bankruptcy even if you used it to fund an awesome vacation that no one can take back.

Yes, but a credit card requires credit. Student loans are specifically crafted to be obtainable by people with no income and no credit.

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#59
post #51

It's really too bad that the laws surrounding student loans make them artificially cheap. You can't get rid of college debt through bankruptcy so you're basically saddled for life. Normally the interest you pay is the combination of three things: 1. The (inherent) time value of money 2. Expenses the lender incurs to keep up with the debt 3. The average default risk of those taking the loans Student loans only price i…

Playing devil's advocate, isn't it fair to remove the ability to discharge student loan debt and in term the default risk due to the fact that there is no collateral? Unlike a car loan or a mortgage, a bank can't repossess your education.

I assume a bank cannot reposes my liver either. What happens if I go into debt from medical expenses? Is there an exemption for medical debt as well?

Re: The Student Loan Bubble is Starting To Burst

#60

It's really too bad that the laws surrounding student loans make them artificially cheap. You can't get rid of college debt through bankruptcy so you're basically saddled for life. Normally the interest you pay is the combination of three things: 1. The (inherent) time value of money 2. Expenses the lender incurs to keep up with the debt 3. The average default risk of those taking the loans Student loans only price i…

>This excess demand and fixed supply means that colleges can raise prices. If colleges raise prices, won't this make it more attractive/affordable for new colleges to open, thus increasing supply?

Potentially yes. But those colleges won't have the prestige and long history that a college needs to serve as some kind of credential, neither will the inherent network-building happen there either. What I mean is that because Harvard is such an elite school, many of the people you meet there WILL be involved in society at the highest levels and you'll already know them. That gives you a powerful advantage. University of Phoenix doesn't have that yet and may not for several decades. And the University of Phoenix doesn't carry much prestige or brand recognition with it.

Furthermore the job market doesn't necessarily support the need for additional college grads. In a "normally functioning" (total bullshit I know but go with it for a second) job market high wages and high employment does two things:

1. Increases people's ability to pay for loans post-graduation

2. Reduces the average default risk

When that happens, interest rates for college loans go down and more people are able to go to college based on fundamentals: the job market will (with some lag factor) still be good when they graduate and thus loaning to them is a good idea. This is a "natural market function" which, though imperfect, tends to balance out the supply of college with ability to demand. I would estimate that college loans would tend to lag the job market by somewhere between 2 and 10 years depending on how agile a bank was to react to the job market. So you would have a period of heightened wages for at least 4 years as people worked their way through school and then potentially a period of lowered wages for a few years as people slowly figure out that the crazy high wages are gone.

But with these subsidies you get all the downside of the glut with none of the upside of the scarcity. It's not awesome.

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