U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#141

Post by randomacct3847 » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:25 PM UTC

malvosenior wrote: post #126

randomacct3847 wrote: post #121

I don’t regret going to a public college at all. College is more than just a job factory. You make some of your strongest friendships, connections, potentially future partner in school. You learn a lot about yourself. Private edu costs are out of control, but if we can figure out how to cut costs then I don’t think the institution of college/higher ed should go away. You have the rest of your life to work...as a work…

I think this is the strongest argument against student debt relief. I would certainly not pay for someone else to do this: "You make some of your strongest friendships, connections, potentially future partner in school. You learn a lot about yourself."

I agree that taking out $200k+ for an undergrad degree is crazy. But what I paid at a public edu was completely reasonable and worth it in my opinion.

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#142

Post by wutbrodo » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:26 PM UTC

Coding_Cat wrote: post #65

erentz wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right. It’s become a government backed bubble. Somehow we need to pop it softly. I’m sympathetic to all the current student debt holders and providing relief to them but if we do that without putting and end to these guaranteed loans we’re just perpetuating (and making worse) the problem. Doing something like making community college and trade school level degrees free and leaving everything else to private loans sor…

There is a rather simple way of stopping the ever growing tuition bubble, one that is employed in the Netherland, but I feel like it won't be popular in the US: Cap the tuition a college is allowed to charge and restrict them from charging additional fees.

I think part of the reason that the US is hesitant to take approaches that constrain universities' ability to operate based on other countries' actions is that no country has as many universities of as high quality as the US does, to the massive benefit of both the country and the world.

There's undoubtedly tons of waste in universities' functioning, but I don't blame policymakers for treading lightly when it comes to constraining their operations in any significant way for fear of killing the goose that lays the golden eggs, as opposed to simply the baseline ideological skew towards less direct regulation of businesses.

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#143

Post by AngryData » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:26 PM UTC

TrinaryWorksToo wrote: post #84

ashelmire wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, the simplest way to put downward pressure on tuition in the US is to allow the loans to be dischargeable in bankruptcy.

Won't people then plan to go bankrupt? Although perhaps that will allow a better equilibrium.

It works for our president, maybe the government will learn something when not only the wealthy can get away with it.

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#144

Post by troutwine » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:27 PM UTC

rosterface wrote: post #105

goodells wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see two distinct groups of people who would take issue with this, not that they'll necessarily have their way: - people who were realistic about their finances and did not take on debt to "drag for a lifetime" in the first place. Why should the "rich" and/or reckless kids who lived in overpriced dorms with unnecessary amenities get bailed out when "I was smart and didn't screw myself from the start"? - people w…

As a member of the first group, I agree with you. I really don't like the idea of subsidizing what I consider other people's bad decisions. I was able to make financially reasonable decisions, which often involved sacrifice, and chose to focus on a viable career. I don't want to spend my hard earned money supporting people who didn't do that. I did not come from money and came from a pretty awful environment so I kno…

Also a member of the first group and I disagree with the conclusion. I'd be very happy to see all current student debt forgiven and subsidies to university programs improved. Good on you, though, for getting through an education without debt. That's a real accomplishment. There are for sure a good number of people who get an education for a viable career and wind up with loans that spiral out of control, especially in a country with spotty healthcare or perhaps because they exited school during the Great Recession and got stuck in intern-hell. Point being, there's a good number of folks with student loan debt they can't easily manage who made all the right decisions but got a bad break somewhere. Also, this doesn't even consider people who do civically valuable work but having extremely low earning potential.

Are there some people who took out great quantities of loans with no concern for their future? Absolutely. Should such people be hounded by this lack of foresight at the age of 19 into their old age? I'd argue no. Even if you can't find sympathy for the indebted, I'd also argue that very few societies in history have managed to stay cohesive with a large, indebted underclass, let alone prosperous and achieving their potential.

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#145

Post by grawprog » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:28 PM UTC

rubyn00bie wrote: post #138

Let it burn down. No one should pay back their student loan debt. Seriously, just stop. This is a scheme in which they've fucked over a large portion of the population with the skyrocketing prices of education. Further, this education is the regularly accepted means of increasing your production. Society says you have to do this, and then continuously increases the price, without reason. The gist of this is; some shi…

Yeah...honestly student loans make the future feel bleak and pointless anyway. The amount of interest that gets put on every month makes paying it back fucking pointless as it is. Unless I like starving and not paying rent so I can do more than just stop the loan from getting bigger while paying it.

Meh...I figure maybe society will just collapse at some point and it won't matter anyway. Either that or a bunch of people are going to start going crazy because of this and things will get interesting.

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#146

Post by randomacct3847 » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:30 PM UTC

tfolbrecht wrote: post #109

temp1928384 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe Lambda School is effective, though something about being alone at home in front of my computer for 12-15 hours/day for 6 months straight, even with remote office hours and chatting with other students, makes me think I'd feel extremely lonely.

It's an 8 hour day with a lunch break. 11am-8pm ET, If you want people, you can always go to the local coffeeshop, library etc. I agree colleges killer feature for a young person is networking, friendship, and dating. You just have to find alternative places to get it.

8 hours of lectures? Then more time on computer for homework/project work?

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#147

Post by gnicholas » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:31 PM UTC

RGamma wrote: post #127

From a European perspective I can only shake my head at this. It doesn't seem like a good idea at all to indebt a significant part of the young population (which I presume creates a lot of avoidable stress) while the rich gain in wealth and power year after year. But I guess longer-term thinking has been thrown overboard in economic decision/policy making anyway, because that would make the numbers not grow fast enou…

I’m curious about the juxtaposition of the indebting of young people and the rich gaining in wealth and power. Is there a causal linkage between student loan debt and the rich getting richer? It’s true that we could levy higher taxes on the rich to pay for college, but as others have pointed out, part of the problem of spiraling costs is the heavy governmental subsidies. Or am I missing the point on how these two things go together?

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#148

Post by why-el » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:32 PM UTC

monting wrote: post #135

RGamma wrote: post #127

From a European perspective I can only shake my head at this. It doesn't seem like a good idea at all to indebt a significant part of the young population (which I presume creates a lot of avoidable stress) while the rich gain in wealth and power year after year. But I guess longer-term thinking has been thrown overboard in economic decision/policy making anyway, because that would make the numbers not grow fast enou…

Don’t mean to sound defensive (I’m not American), and I mostly agree with you. But, from a non-European perspective, Europe doesn’t seem to be doing well? It seems the EU is slowly disintegrating, and the monetary union isn’t working. Also the political landscape seems to be in turmoil as well.

This is a conversation about education. The EU, with all its faults, is leaps and bounds ahead of the US in the democratization of education, even though the US was the nation that pioneered the field in the first place. Goes to show how extreme the whole political spectrum of the US has gotten.

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#149

Post by wpdev_63 » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:32 PM UTC

The problem is that for _many_ of jobs that 'require' a degree is they're not necessary at ALL! A good high school education is good enough for the vast majority of the jobs outside of STEM. Now we have diploma inflation because it makes them 'more productive'.

In an ideal world you world put them in a short boot camp to make sure they up to snuff for the job but atlas you have the gatekeeping going on with universities. I personally can't wait for the education bubble to pop.

Re: U.S. Student Debt in ‘Serious Delinquency’ Tops $166B

#150

Post by pxeboot » Sat, Feb 16, 2019, 7:34 PM UTC

rubyn00bie wrote: post #138

Let it burn down. No one should pay back their student loan debt. Seriously, just stop. This is a scheme in which they've fucked over a large portion of the population with the skyrocketing prices of education. Further, this education is the regularly accepted means of increasing your production. Society says you have to do this, and then continuously increases the price, without reason. The gist of this is; some shi…

This would be beautiful to see. Considering the scope of the population affected, there would be little to no recourse if everybody collectively decided to stop paying at the same time.

If you trash every millennials credit score, the scores would become worthless.