Should student loans be forgiven?

[ColinC]

Last edited Fri Apr 29, 2022, 04:40 PM - Edit history (1)

64 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Yes, all unpaid student loans should be entirely cancelled.
	39 (61%)
	All student loans should be cancelled, and any portions paid should be completely refunded.
	0 (0%)
	Yes, but no more than $50,000
	6 (9%)
	No student loans should be forgiven.
	4 (6%)
	Something else.
	15 (23%)
	0 (0%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
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[boston bean]

1. I think we should get away from the dollar amount and move to a time frame.

Like after ten years of payments debt is canceled.

[Emile]

2. Why does paid public education stops after high school?

Never did understand that.

[Kaleva]

23. Fight to increase property taxes to also include supporting colleges.

[Emile]

24. Fight for corporations to pay more taxes, after

all they are the ones benefitting hiring educated employees!

[Kaleva]

27. We all benefit from a higher educated citizenry.

[mvd]

3. Ideally cancelled for low income borrowers and reduced for the rest

I don’t know how low income would be determined, however, so voted to just cancel.

[cerebrate2006]

4. Cancel interest

Instead of reducing debt by wiping out money actually borrowed, eliminate interest retroactively. Any interest added to existing loans is wiped out and no interest will be applied point forward. I think it would be a lot more palatable to the general public than reducing money actually given to the student for his or her education. It would also have a similar impact on the overall debt owed if made retroactive.

[COL Mustard]

8. I agree with canceling interest

And I say that as a holder of nearly $200k in student loans. The interest rate is 7%, which in my opinion is ridiculously high. At least I work for the government, so after 120 payments my loans are forgiven. Or they are forgiven when I die.

[Luciferous]

11. I still have student loan debt and would happy with that. It's the interest that's the problem.

[867-5309.]

18. And any penalties n/t

[Demsrule86]

22. That would be my choice. My opinion is that if student debt is wiped out then so is the ability to

borrow for college. The student loan program will be wiped out and since there is no free college this means middle class and poor kids won't be able to go to college.

[Tomconroy]

5. I'm not sure taxpayers should be on the hook for this.

I'll have to think about it some more.
There certainly should be better warnings about what student borrowers are getting themselves into.

[RobinA]

16. I'm With You

about the taxpayers, but I'm not sure why people wouldn't know what they were getting into. I would be in favor of very low cost loans. When I went to grad school the thinking was that you should ALWAYS borrow for grad school because the interest rate was so low. It wasn't long after I graduated in 2006 that they started privatizing or whatever they did that it got so expensive. It got to be chaos and I was getting constant solicitations to refinance the loan with this or that bank or lending institution. I cashed out some retirement savings and paid the thing off while I still had the low interest. It was obvious that they were going to use it as yet another way to relieve middle class people of their hard earned money.

[marie999]

6. Two questions

Should people who paid off their student loans be reimbursed and should all students from now on get free college at all colleges?

[Sick_n_Tired]

7. All debts should be cancelled

All debt incurred by low income people should be cancelled and covered by the oligarchs. The billionaires should have to pay the debts of those less fortunate. They wouldn’t even notice. Maybe they would only be able to have a 100’ yacht and three homes instead.

[Kid Berwyn]

37. Seconded.

Billions made simply by owning billions are taxed at a fraction of what my thousands I sweat over are taxed.

Most importantly: a hearty welcome to DU, Sick_n_Tired! I like the way you put things into words.

[tecelote]

9. We need an educated populace.

Whatever it takes.

[quaker bill]

10. some questions

I generally like the notion of free higher education, or at least very low cost.

I was fortunate enough to be able to pay for my daughter's college education out of my pocket in cash. Now I surely could have taken out loans and had plenty of offers of such each and every term. Over the 4 years I spent roughly 60k. I did not take fancy vacations or buy new cars and that made it possible.

Had I taken out loans these loans, under these proposals I would likely still have that 60k and the gains on it, and my debt would be cancelled.

I have no regrets and am happy with the decision I made, but there seems to be a matter of equity here. Financially, I am fine either way, but had I chosen loans, it seems I might be at least 60k better off than I am. I am sure that some people who are even better off than I chose the loan path to finance their kid's college education, and left their cash invested.

Should there be some limit based on wealth for this debt forgiveness?

Should people who paid out of pocket also be made whole?

[Duppers]

15. Good points.

Like you, we helped pay for our son's post h.s. education. He was awarded two academically based scholarships which lightened our load.
Then, in grad school, he had teaching fellowships which paid for most all of his expenses.

And again, like you, we "did not take fancy vacations or buy new cars and that made it possible."

Perhaps all college education should be free for everyone.

One of my son's girlfriends spent part of her student loan money on a trip to Ireland, she said. The trip was not at all course-work related. So, how do we prevent this kind of spending?

[quaker bill]

43. Just sticking with the strict definition

of college expenses, which we did, I could have left my money in mutual funds where it was, and put more in. This was during the Obama Admin when stock capital gains were quite good. Fairly looked at, that 60k might have turned into 200k, and at the far end, the debts just forgiven? If this is the way it works out, then it would have been far smarter for me to take out the loan, which I could have done easily.

I get that there is a crisis and that this needs to be fixed, but at some level there should be a limit, not all student loans are the same.

I am good with free or very low-cost college. I worked my way through school, it was hard but possible making little more than minimum wage 40 years ago. Then came the Reagan revolution which defunded colleges and shifted moch more of the cost into student debt.

I think there may be some reason for a minimal tuition, some token of commitment, but nothing that would result in the need for debt.

[ariadne0614]

12. FYI

I recently attended a 3+ hour webinar on the student debt crisis. Well over 1000 were in attendance. Chuck Schumer gave a live opening statement, and Elizabeth Warren provided a recorded statement at the end. In between, there were expert panels on different aspects of the issue. Some of these people have been working on this issue for over a decade.

They provided a link to the recording of the entire event, and encouraged us to share it with anyone interested in understanding the rationale for student loan forgiveness.
https://www.youtube.com/c/StudentDebtCrisisCenterSDCC

[USALiberal]

13. And then in 10 years from now we have to do the same thing???

[alphafemale]

14. Just at a loan rate that can be paid.

College professors can't work being fed air.

But if someone got conned into a usury interest loan when they were too young to know better and they have paid far beyond the original loan many times over?

Yes that debt should be cancelled.

Usury interest loans should be illegal.

[XanaDUer2]

17. Zero interest.

It killed me. I ended up paying almost 10k more than the fucking loan

[AntivaxHunters]

19. Cancel all of it

Education is a human right & people shouldn't be saddled with massive debt to better themselves & their future.
It's another great example of how this country is a shit hole compared to other countries. We claim to be the best in the world but in reality we lag far behind other first world countries with any sort of social safety net.

Student loan debt is the largest drag on the economy. I still owe over $130k in student loans & I'll NEVER pay it off due to being disabled and sick, unable to work. How is that fair? It's not. And if I lived in say Germany, this wouldn't be a thing. Germany after all has tuition free 4 year college. If they can do it, so can we. It's time to stop making excuses and it's time to end the mindset of "I had to suffer so everyone else has to! No canceling of student loan debt!".

Student loan debt is responsible for many things, including not being able to find enough healthcare professionals. The intersectionalty runs deep here & until we solve this problem, voter apathy among young people will continue. The top 3 issues among people are student loan debt, the environment, and healthcare. Fix that and you'll never worry about a Republican POTUS again.

[marie999]

20. Should the people who paid off their loans or didn't need loans get a rebate?

[Thtwudbeme]

26. No. Not everything that benefits societies benefit every individual.

I paid mine. I would like to see others get out of debt.

Hope that helps.

[Sympthsical]

30. Should people who don't need food stamps get a free turkey every year?

I paid for my loans. I'm ok with helping others.

That is, in essence, what the Democratic Party is supposed to be about. People who think it's just "free stuff" refuse to acknowledge how out of control and predatory the financial system governing academic institutions and young people are.

We can cut trillions in corporate taxes, but we can't manage this?

[marie999]

31. What about students in college now or will be going to college?

[Sympthsical]

33. What if a meteor hits the earth tomorrow?

We haven't solved every aspect, so let's solve nothing?

[marie999]

35. I'm serious. There are a lot of students in college now who will graduate before the 2024 election.

They will want the government to do the same for them.

[Sympthsical]

38. Of course. I'm currently paying for school now.

Shit ain't cheap. It will take years and a Congress actually willing to bother the financial powers to unravel a system that has created modern indentured servitude. However, if we can do something now, we should.

This is something that can be done now.

[AntivaxHunters]

42. People were able to pay theirs off

I have no problem with that.

[WarGamer]

21. There is no such thing as debt cancellation or forgiveness.

Only a third party PAYING the debt.

[ColinC]

28. Not third party, but everybody including the third party

The loan takers are also tax payers. They would also pay for their own debt forgiveness. And those who are successful like dentists doctors and lawyers have likely already (or will) pay back their loans in full through taxes even if they did not repay their official loans.

[Johnny2X2X]

25. I voted something else

First, interest free, you pay back what you borrowed, but not a dime in interest. No one should be making money off interest on student loans.

Second, the PAYE (Pay As You Earn) options are being updated, here's what's proposed. Taking it from 10% of your income to 5%. Taking the adjustment for living expenses from 1.5 times poverty income to 2 times poverty income. Total forgiveness after 20 years of making payments for undergrad loans, 25 years for grad loans. These are already rules that are about to be implemented. And they'll make enrollment in PAYE automatic.

If they can't get those things done, then maybe just full forgiveness should happen, the debt is not tenable for people, adding it to the US debt is a better option.

[helpisontheway]

29. He should cancel the $10,000 that he campaigned about during the election. Nt

[davsand]

32. This is not a single step fix.

At a minimum, interest and fees on any student loan need to be removed from the debt. Interest on any existing student loan needs to be prohibited. Doing that will most likely result in private lenders getting out of the market completely because that removes their profits. ALL lending for student loans needs to be made a governmental program set up to protect against any more predatory lending like we have had for the last couple decades.

Debt repayment on new loans needs to be based on the realities not on some bean counters opinion of what somebody should pay.

Degrees in needed fields like teaching, medicine, and mental health fields (just to name a few) need to be canceled completely after X number of years/months/days (insert your chosen time unit here) working in that field. Any payments on those loans need to be suspended as long as they work in that field. Add bonuses to people for going into under served areas if there is any real desire to make it attractive. Maybe offer a form of Single payer health care coverage to the deal too!

Yes, Biden does need to do something to live up to statements made on the campaign trail. A failure to do anything is an absolute betrayal of voters. How much actual political will is actually there, I don't honestly know. From a personal perspective, I believe all existing debt should be wiped out, but I doubt it will be. We can hope.


Laura

[H2O Man]

34. Yes.

[meadowlander]

36. Calculate in today's dollars the difference between what someone would have spent

for public college tuition in 1960 and the amount they spent in 2019 and forgive that from everyone who still has outstanding loans. So about $14,000 per year of college.

That's the difference failed public policies and university administration have meant for young people going to college post-Reagan.

[gulliver]

39. Promise now to work on further student loan forgiveness if we keep Congress in 2022...

...and if the demographics most interested in student loan forgiveness help us win.

Otherwise, fair's fair. If we lose, we can't do anything, and Republicans will start writing laws to prevent student loan forgiveness in the future. They'll go to court to take back any student loan forgiveness Biden has already provided. We won't be able to stop them, and we shouldn't try (if student loan forgiveness supporters contributed to the loss by not showing up). If we win, but it is other demographic groups that help us, then those groups get their issues worked on first.

I believe we call that democracy. It's about as fair as you can get.

[DFW]

40. Good question, and one I hadn't really gven much thought to

I was in college when it wasn't an immense burden to my parents, relative to their income ($6,000 a semester or so). By the time my daughters went to college in the USA, it has gone up to $50,000 a year for the younger one and about half that for the older one. The younger one went on to Law School, but got a break, as she was given a "diversity grant" as a "foreigner." She enrolled as a German. Her tuition was still about $32,000 a year. On top of that came air fare to the USA, room and board, books, etc.

Now, I was lucky enough to inherit (after taxes) some money from my parents, and after taxes and dividing it up evenly with my siblings, I had almost exactly enough to cover the education costs for my two daughters, both of whom wanted to study in the USA. I saved every cent in anticipation, and was able to swing it, and four years of GW in Washington, DC is a chunk of change, let me tell you, let alone two years of boarding school in Hawaii prior, and three years of law school after undergrad.

But how many families are able to do THAT? Maybe one in a hundred? Less? So there have to be a LOT of people out there who are paying off huge loans. To forgive what is now owed--OK, that part is easy enough. But what does that mean for those who have already sacrificed and dampened down their lives' expectations in order to pay off their loans? Do they ask for a refund? Are they out of luck? "Sorry sucker, you paid it off ten years too soon?"

The mechanics are easy enough, but the moral implications involving those who have already compromised their lives to pay off their loans seem a lot more complicated to tackle. i wouldn't want to enter that debate.

[madville]

41. Only if they make it illegal to issue new ones

The only way cancelling current debt makes sense to is to prohibit any future debt from being taken out or we’re right back in the same mess a few years from now.