U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#431

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 11:16 PM UTC

formula1 wrote: post #409

tptacek wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a self-educated (1 semester at UIC and nothing else) programmer with $0 in debt. I just sold a company a few years back. I do not have "anger and resentment towards successful people". I do not think we should spend large amounts of money to help refinance the debts of some of the best-off people in our society. I think that's a bad use of funds. I also do not believe that college selects for "ambition". The over…

Its clear you wish to end this discussion so I will give you the final word after this. Luck only goes so far. You need grades or sports to get in cheaply. The inflation of college prices isnt related to only the "1%" going to college. Nearly everyone goes [0], 68% in 2014. And if you dont, you either couldnt get in or smarter than the system could handle. To graduate you need to study, pass exams, write essays. Coll…

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#432

Post by formula1 » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 11:17 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #428

formula1 wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for the information! So you believe that the homeless problem is greater if not equal problem to tge student debt problem? What do you believe is a good solution to a large group of young able minds and bodies wasted from lack of employment and an oversaturation of low income workers due to the inability for college students to find middle class work?

This response is not only incoherent but also attacks a straw man. "So you believe ${uncharitable reframing}" is almost never going to fly on HN.

Its a question. They changed the focus from student debt to homelessness. I want to understand their perspective so I ask it.

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#433

Post by tptacek » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 11:17 PM UTC

formula1 wrote: post #409

tptacek wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a self-educated (1 semester at UIC and nothing else) programmer with $0 in debt. I just sold a company a few years back. I do not have "anger and resentment towards successful people". I do not think we should spend large amounts of money to help refinance the debts of some of the best-off people in our society. I think that's a bad use of funds. I also do not believe that college selects for "ambition". The over…

Its clear you wish to end this discussion so I will give you the final word after this. Luck only goes so far. You need grades or sports to get in cheaply. The inflation of college prices isnt related to only the "1%" going to college. Nearly everyone goes [0], 68% in 2014. And if you dont, you either couldnt get in or smarter than the system could handle. To graduate you need to study, pass exams, write essays. Coll…

I'm comfortable with the words I've already had here. As with my previous comment: there's no response I have to this that I didn't already write in my first response to you.

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#434

Post by Mz » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 11:23 PM UTC

formula1 wrote: post #432

tptacek wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This response is not only incoherent but also attacks a straw man. "So you believe ${uncharitable reframing}" is almost never going to fly on HN.

Its a question. They changed the focus from student debt to homelessness. I want to understand their perspective so I ask it.

I did no such thing. That's disingenuous. I merely rebutted your offensive characterization of poor people, not all of whom are homeless. Like many people do, YOU chose to make it about homelessness because you, personally, are incapable of getting past this detail about my life in order to hear anything else I am actually saying.

Your behavior towards me here is akin to calling someone of color by the N word and then pretending they have emotional baggage about their skin color when the only thing they have is a feeling of being offended by offensive behavior -- which gets yet more offensive with every additional remark by you. Because you are making zero effort whatsoever to understand what you are doing wrong here.

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#435

Post by rayiner » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 11:28 PM UTC

formula1 wrote: post #409

tptacek wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a self-educated (1 semester at UIC and nothing else) programmer with $0 in debt. I just sold a company a few years back. I do not have "anger and resentment towards successful people". I do not think we should spend large amounts of money to help refinance the debts of some of the best-off people in our society. I think that's a bad use of funds. I also do not believe that college selects for "ambition". The over…

Its clear you wish to end this discussion so I will give you the final word after this. Luck only goes so far. You need grades or sports to get in cheaply. The inflation of college prices isnt related to only the "1%" going to college. Nearly everyone goes [0], 68% in 2014. And if you dont, you either couldnt get in or smarter than the system could handle. To graduate you need to study, pass exams, write essays. Coll…

Only 35% of millenials have student loan debt: http://www.gallup.com/businessjournal/188984/americans-big-d.... As you concede, if you are part of the one-third that doesn't go, it's probably because you couldn't get in. But to the extent the government should be spending public funds to help people, those are the people who it should help first. Moreover, on a dollar basis, it's the people who have the most education that will likely have the most debt. E.g. interest free student loans will help those who do a couple of semesters of community college a little bit, but will really help out the doctors, lawyers, etc. who take on six-figure debt.

This is part of a larger phenomenon of the American welfare system helping people who are already relatively better off. Own a million dollar house? You can deduct tens of thousands of dollars a year in mortgage interest! Have $200,000 in debt after going to a private college and getting a masters degree? The government will forgive it! Did you make a six figure income during your working years? Great, the government will not only give you the disproportionate share of social security benefits, it will pay out more than you put in!

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#436

Post by formula1 » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 11:29 PM UTC

Mz wrote: post #434

formula1 wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a question. They changed the focus from student debt to homelessness. I want to understand their perspective so I ask it.

I did no such thing. That's disingenuous. I merely rebutted your offensive characterization of poor people, not all of whom are homeless. Like many people do, YOU chose to make it about homelessness because you, personally, are incapable of getting past this detail about my life in order to hear anything else I am actually saying. Your behavior towards me here is akin to calling someone of color by the N word and the…

That was a very caustic remark. If your looking for sympathy, you will not find it with me like that. If you are looking for conversation, this is not how you keep it with me. Thank you for your time.

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#437

Post by throwaway729 » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 11:46 PM UTC

School-Cotton wrote: post #58

brobinson wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>the act of renouncing U.S. citizenship does not allow persons to avoid possible prosecution for crimes which they may have committed in the United States, or escape the repayment of financial obligations, including child support payments, previously incurred in the United States or incurred as United States citizens abroad. https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/legal-considerati... I guess if you successfully r…

You can't be arrested for not paying debts. You could probably still visit the US as long as you didn't intend to work there.

In principle. In practice, renouncing US citizenship is the sort of thing that gets you put on a "make their life hell if they want to come here" list.

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#438

Post by caseysoftware » Tue, Nov 22, 2016, 12:43 AM UTC

skuhn wrote: post #108

caseysoftware wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a 7 week old and a 22 month old and am convinced that - outside of certain fields - college will be entirely optional to them. Even now, there are many things that can/should be learned through apprenticeship or online or via other means and that is only going to increase in the next 15+ years. Please note: I said "college" not education. I believe education will always be vital, no matter what. A piece of pap…

Education (or teaching people how to think) will always be important. Curriculums which attempt to teach and certify specific things will always be of varying degrees of usefulness, but in order for them to become optional their importance to your career will need to be greatly reduced. That means that entire industries need to learn how to hire people based on what they know and what they can do rather than what som…

For close to 10 years, I've been encouraging developers to build portfolios instead of just resumes. Whether that is on Github or sharable project details (don't break NDAs!) or whatever, I don't care.

But we have to be able to talk about our work and show its results whenever possible.

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#439

Post by ekianjo » Tue, Nov 22, 2016, 12:51 AM UTC

aianus wrote: post #259

ekianjo wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> student loans are provided by the government and are interest free as long as we reside in New Zealand. If you give interest free loans there is a strong incentive from the universities to increase their fees. How do you fix that issue?

At least in Ontario, Canada the schools cannot raise tuition without asking the government for permission.

Does that work?

Re: U.S. Citizens Now Hold About $1.3 Trillion in Student Loan Debt

#440

Post by rahimnathwani » Tue, Nov 22, 2016, 1:29 AM UTC

stale2002 wrote: post #396

rahimnathwani wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you've described here is the value of an asset (student loan paper) declining due to a change in the underlying cash flows generated by that asset. This is how asset prices are supposed to work. It's not the busting of a bubble.

OK, how about this. Imagine that employers stop caring about degrees, and evaluate potential hires based on other qualities. This is already happening in tech. If employers no longer cared about degrees, then workers who don't have them would now suddenly be on equal footing. The non degree holders would get much higher paying jobs, and conversely the degree holders would get worse jobs. This causes the "value of edu…

Then we're back to my earlier point. There is no 'value of education' bubble analogous to a housing bubble. An individual's degree isn't tradable in the same way as a house is, so the value of that individual's degree isn't being bid up by people competing to buy it. So what would it mean for the bubble to burst?

If you're talking about a mechanism by which the price of newly-issued degrees were to fall (i.e. college tuition sticker prices fall by 50% within a year or two) then, even if it were to happen, that's just a fall in the price of a consumer good. If the price of laptop computers falls because people realise they can do their work with tablets and chromebooks, we don't think of that as a laptop bubble. Not a perfect analogy but I hope you get my general point: if you're calling something a bubble, then you've got to be able to point to the stock of existing assets whose price is out of whack with fundamental value (e.g. based on future cash flows) due to irrational investors bidding up the price.

I'm not claiming tuition fees are in line with fundamental value to the recipient. If they're not, then it's just people buying stuff they shouldn't. If they are in line, but it's for signalling reasons rather than the education received, then there's economic inefficiency due to market failure, but it' seems still not a bubble.