I've posted many times on the for-profit higher education racket and the complicity of student-loan lenders and Congress in the fix we find ourselves. In today's Wall Street Journal you can read even more about this ugly situation. Students may borrow for the traditional tuition and books but also vaguely defined "living expenses." Turns out folks are simply borrowing for the latter purpose with no intention of getting (what passes for) an education.
Bring back the bankruptcy discharge for student loans!
Bring back the bankruptcy discharge for student loans!
I get what you're saying. Students get loans, sometimes as high as the six figure range, only a fraction of which is being used for actual tuition and education-related expenses. Students without jobs or rich families still manage to plan and attend lavish "Spring Break trips" to destinations often requiring a passport. If you could poll such unemployed students found partying out of the country on Spring Break holiday about their major field(s) of study, I suspect you might find many if not most have selected un-challenging degree programs unlikely to end in a career (leaves more time to party). Those same students will often turn around and enroll in a graduate program when they realize their degree won't result in actual earning capacity, which brings about more student loans. Others will drop-out of school altogether before completing.
ReplyDeleteLest I seem like a hypocrite, I admit that I'm all for parties and tropical vacations. I just think we ought not to be borrowing student loans to finance them.
I also don't blame the students. After all, who should be more responsible, a professional lender or students in their teens and early twenties?
(Consequently, that is also why I support a reversion to dischargeability of these loans in bankruptcy - it would encourage lenders to be more responsible with what they lend and to whom they lend it.)