Good afternoon, unlike almost every other form of debt student loans are not able to be discharged through bankruptcy, you could be releived of all your other obligations but still be on the hook for the student loans. So if you're businessman fails you declare bankruptcy and don't pay, if you lose your job and you don't pay your mortgage you lose the house in foreclosure or sell it and away. If you're big enough, Uncle Sam will bail you out with tax dollars, credits and special rules$/deals that only apply for the very wealthy.
Good point. We have two systems, one for the wealthy to file bankruptcy and they lose nothing, in fact they’ll come out ahead like Donald Trump did, dumping all of his losses on his workers, we call that wealth incumbency.
When your average middle-class Americans files bankruptcy they don’t come out ahead, and it’s the Republicans that insisted that student debt not be affected by bankruptcy, the same people who keep running up deficits deficits and putting the cost on our children.
A lot of them believe that if they themselves can’t benefit from something, nobody else should either. Shortsighted and ignorant. They are incapable of seeing how this would benefit the entire country.
George from Colorado is not a bright man. How about instead of forgiving student debt we write them checks to pay it off? Do you think that would’ve made him understand?
Every Republican president has exploded the national debt, putting that cost on our kids. That is in fact, making our kids pay for their debt.
The bigger picture is, education is infrastructure, the more educated our workforce has the more wealth our nation creates. There’s a reason why, of all the counties that voted for Donald Trump, they only produced 30% of our economy while at the same time want to live as well as the rest of us. They’re the ones that complain about students not paying their loans.
Really student loan people made a bad decision? WTF about business that made bad decisions that trillions have been given to? This guy is a right wing clown that just doesn't get it. He has his house and lazy boy and cold beer. What about the rest of us. I'm sure he feels the same way about texas people getting thousands of dollar bills now because of the republican de regulation failure there. Well they signed the paper to get power now pay up. I bet he calls himself a christian as well.
Forgive me, off topic, but I just listened to Friday's episode via On Demand and it really was a fantastic show, Michelangelo. Elie Mystal was on fire, as usual; Richard Parker (NY Times) was excellent; and, your conversation with Eleanor Clift was probably the very best of the year so far — you guys covered so much and so comprehensively, you actually had sort of a rhythm going on there!
Back to Richard Parker: such an intelligent, insightful and thoughtful guy — never heard him before that I can remember — please have him back on again, Michelangelo, really, really great guest.
Also, I SO enjoyed your "Biden's Speech at G7" segment — very insightful commentary on your part.
Don't get me wrong, your show is always good, but the mix of guests and your commentary on Friday made it all the more more exciting and enjoyable. Thank you. (FYI, I listen to your show solely via On Demand so am always a day or two behind — but, so happy Sirius XM makes that possible.)
Merrick, sorry I'm just getting back to you on this, but thanks for the wonderful comments! Elie is pure tonic, gets me revved up -- smart and doesn't pull punches. I've really wanted to give people an idea of what's happening in TX, in a way that you can on radio with longer segments, and Richard Parker helped to do that. Very well-informed and passionate about the state.
Very interesting about listening via streaming a day or two later. So many people are doing that now --- and some are streaming an hour later, calling up during the show about something we discussed an hour ago. I think it's great that people have so many opportunities to listen and am glad SiriusXM is keeping more than 10 shows online for people who want to go back and listen again. Thanks again for the comments!
While I only see one facet of this issue, it is the facet I see, so I will share.
Americans got greedy.
Yes, I know that the housing prices shot up due to cheap loans, but they also shot up when Americans felt the need to buy homes and land – multiple homes. Americans got rich by buying and selling houses to each other.
Then the cost of education went up because faculty needed more money to buy houses.
Now we have an workable system.
First, we must realize that many (not all, but many) of these students attended colleges they should never have attended, earning useless degrees. Many schools put in swimming pools, movie theaters and entertainment rooms in dorms. School life became like an MTV reality show.
Now the system has crashed.
First, we must lower faculty salaries. I offered twice (Yes, I did. I live within my means), but if my salary lowered, it opens the door to more and the union won’t let me succeed with my offer.
Second, let the students pay off their loans when they inherit one of their parents’ second or third homes, because they will.
Furthermore, schools should cut back on needless services – there are too many, and many are useless.
It is predicted that in the next 10 years, one third of American universities will go bankrupt. Yet we continue with policies to keep them running.
Finally, there are two problems with college education with regard to gender:
The entry point for men.
The exit point for women.
We should be spending more money on high schools and finding ways to get men into college. Right now, they are only one third of those entering. When this gender ratio was reversed, we opened Woman’s Centers. Today, we do nothing. Well, not nothing. We focus on women and the exit point.
Instead, we seek to find ways to help women exit. So let me be clear: this is not a student loan crisis. It is a women’s student loan crisis as they own 2/3 of the debt and men, only one third.
It is infuriating that as a society, we continue to ignore the needs of men and favor women (don’t get me started on the list regarding criminal sentencing, health care or homelessness).
The significant force behind these programs are faculty who want to keep cushy jobs, and women’s organization that want to give money to women because of a fictitious wage gap.
Yes, I know that some very good people are slipping through the cracks. But that is facing everyone, even those with first time home loans or joblessness.
If the government pays for their college loans, the students should sign over the house they will inherit from their parents.
Yes, there are excesses in what I have written and there are some truly terrible cases. And I find it infuriating that we are discussing how to help women exit college while ignoring how to help men enter it.
Mr x, what exactly are you a professor at, physical education?
Pay off the loans with one of their parents houses when they die? Those people don’t have to take out student loans you idiot, their parents pay for them.
Making up a scenarios, with no data or sources to suits your argument, is not somebody who has an education I question your entire premise, including your claim to be an educator. chances are higher you are a typical right winger who doesn’t have an education and lives off the rest of those that do.
I agree the arguments against student loan forgiveness are callously cruel. I spent most of high school homeless and living a cave, but I would never demand that everyone younger than I am should endure that too.
Thank your for your comment Sabra, and I hope someone helped you get a leg up and showed an example of what we can do if we reach out. Too many people fall through the cracks.
My question about the plan is...what’s next? What is being done to address future affordability in higher education? Will this become a permanent or ongoing debt forgiveness program? What about the kids in highschool— how should this influence their decisions about college choices? They may have many better options if they can take out more loans with the hope they wont have to pay them back. Clearly I’m on the fence about this program, I think we need to help this generation of 20-30-somethings who have inherited an economy based on greed and yes that involves student loan debt, but a one-time debt forgiveness is a band aid when what we need is restructuring of systems.
One last thing if americans want capitalism to survive this they need to be putting insane amounts of money in our hands. People going forward are going to be holding on to money for the next few years. Which means tech items and big purchases will slump.
The very lest they can do now is at least allow people to file Bankruptcy on student loans. But paying them off helps the economy more than putting 7 trillion dollars in the stock market.
This is a very complicated issue. While there are some who consider this letting people off the hook and encouraging people to irresponsible, how do you justify people sacrificing buying a home or starting a family to pay the loan back, let’s say for 10 years and still have not even reduced the principal? I paid my undergrad back after 10 years of a whopping $5,000. But I did go back to grad school and now I owe nearly 200,000, but here’s the thing I did not borrow $200,000 but since the interest is calculated as a compounding interest just like a mortgage you it is a vicious cycle. You end up paying the interest upfront but you still have a principal. Now, let’s look at this realistically if these loans could be restructured to a fixed 5 or 10 years at at let’s say 1 or 2% then people are not being let off the hook and you are freeing them up. Note, if people extra money to spend the economy would grow exponentially and everyone would benefit!! My last point, the government should not be making a profit off of people! We need an educated society to provide opportunity and growth! This will have other tangible benefits of reducing crime and providing people a leg up! We all will do better when everyone has opportunities not just the privileged.
We need to help get this economy stimulated, allowing entire generations to get a decent shot, and that means putting behind us of these arguments. Then we need to overhaul the system so people get an education and are not in debt.
Definitely Michelangelo!! I am totally on board and I support loan forgiveness in its entirety! Who cares what people like George think!! He will benefit from strong economy as will everyone rich or poor and we can then call ourselves “The land of opportunity “
Ha, the Spartacus line made laugh! And you are so right re: the past. A lot of people don't realize that before the '80s most states had minimal or free tuition for state schools, good schools.
Good afternoon, unlike almost every other form of debt student loans are not able to be discharged through bankruptcy, you could be releived of all your other obligations but still be on the hook for the student loans. So if you're businessman fails you declare bankruptcy and don't pay, if you lose your job and you don't pay your mortgage you lose the house in foreclosure or sell it and away. If you're big enough, Uncle Sam will bail you out with tax dollars, credits and special rules$/deals that only apply for the very wealthy.
Good point. We have two systems, one for the wealthy to file bankruptcy and they lose nothing, in fact they’ll come out ahead like Donald Trump did, dumping all of his losses on his workers, we call that wealth incumbency.
When your average middle-class Americans files bankruptcy they don’t come out ahead, and it’s the Republicans that insisted that student debt not be affected by bankruptcy, the same people who keep running up deficits deficits and putting the cost on our children.
Exactly Mike.
A lot of them believe that if they themselves can’t benefit from something, nobody else should either. Shortsighted and ignorant. They are incapable of seeing how this would benefit the entire country.
And that explained George! i think his call was instructive if callous.
George from Colorado is not a bright man. How about instead of forgiving student debt we write them checks to pay it off? Do you think that would’ve made him understand?
Every Republican president has exploded the national debt, putting that cost on our kids. That is in fact, making our kids pay for their debt.
The bigger picture is, education is infrastructure, the more educated our workforce has the more wealth our nation creates. There’s a reason why, of all the counties that voted for Donald Trump, they only produced 30% of our economy while at the same time want to live as well as the rest of us. They’re the ones that complain about students not paying their loans.
Really student loan people made a bad decision? WTF about business that made bad decisions that trillions have been given to? This guy is a right wing clown that just doesn't get it. He has his house and lazy boy and cold beer. What about the rest of us. I'm sure he feels the same way about texas people getting thousands of dollar bills now because of the republican de regulation failure there. Well they signed the paper to get power now pay up. I bet he calls himself a christian as well.
Forgive me, off topic, but I just listened to Friday's episode via On Demand and it really was a fantastic show, Michelangelo. Elie Mystal was on fire, as usual; Richard Parker (NY Times) was excellent; and, your conversation with Eleanor Clift was probably the very best of the year so far — you guys covered so much and so comprehensively, you actually had sort of a rhythm going on there!
Back to Richard Parker: such an intelligent, insightful and thoughtful guy — never heard him before that I can remember — please have him back on again, Michelangelo, really, really great guest.
Also, I SO enjoyed your "Biden's Speech at G7" segment — very insightful commentary on your part.
Don't get me wrong, your show is always good, but the mix of guests and your commentary on Friday made it all the more more exciting and enjoyable. Thank you. (FYI, I listen to your show solely via On Demand so am always a day or two behind — but, so happy Sirius XM makes that possible.)
Merrick, sorry I'm just getting back to you on this, but thanks for the wonderful comments! Elie is pure tonic, gets me revved up -- smart and doesn't pull punches. I've really wanted to give people an idea of what's happening in TX, in a way that you can on radio with longer segments, and Richard Parker helped to do that. Very well-informed and passionate about the state.
Very interesting about listening via streaming a day or two later. So many people are doing that now --- and some are streaming an hour later, calling up during the show about something we discussed an hour ago. I think it's great that people have so many opportunities to listen and am glad SiriusXM is keeping more than 10 shows online for people who want to go back and listen again. Thanks again for the comments!
I am a tenured professor and I get paid too much.
While I only see one facet of this issue, it is the facet I see, so I will share.
Americans got greedy.
Yes, I know that the housing prices shot up due to cheap loans, but they also shot up when Americans felt the need to buy homes and land – multiple homes. Americans got rich by buying and selling houses to each other.
Then the cost of education went up because faculty needed more money to buy houses.
Now we have an workable system.
First, we must realize that many (not all, but many) of these students attended colleges they should never have attended, earning useless degrees. Many schools put in swimming pools, movie theaters and entertainment rooms in dorms. School life became like an MTV reality show.
Now the system has crashed.
First, we must lower faculty salaries. I offered twice (Yes, I did. I live within my means), but if my salary lowered, it opens the door to more and the union won’t let me succeed with my offer.
Second, let the students pay off their loans when they inherit one of their parents’ second or third homes, because they will.
Furthermore, schools should cut back on needless services – there are too many, and many are useless.
It is predicted that in the next 10 years, one third of American universities will go bankrupt. Yet we continue with policies to keep them running.
Finally, there are two problems with college education with regard to gender:
The entry point for men.
The exit point for women.
We should be spending more money on high schools and finding ways to get men into college. Right now, they are only one third of those entering. When this gender ratio was reversed, we opened Woman’s Centers. Today, we do nothing. Well, not nothing. We focus on women and the exit point.
Instead, we seek to find ways to help women exit. So let me be clear: this is not a student loan crisis. It is a women’s student loan crisis as they own 2/3 of the debt and men, only one third.
It is infuriating that as a society, we continue to ignore the needs of men and favor women (don’t get me started on the list regarding criminal sentencing, health care or homelessness).
The significant force behind these programs are faculty who want to keep cushy jobs, and women’s organization that want to give money to women because of a fictitious wage gap.
Yes, I know that some very good people are slipping through the cracks. But that is facing everyone, even those with first time home loans or joblessness.
If the government pays for their college loans, the students should sign over the house they will inherit from their parents.
Yes, there are excesses in what I have written and there are some truly terrible cases. And I find it infuriating that we are discussing how to help women exit college while ignoring how to help men enter it.
Mr x, what exactly are you a professor at, physical education?
Pay off the loans with one of their parents houses when they die? Those people don’t have to take out student loans you idiot, their parents pay for them.
Making up a scenarios, with no data or sources to suits your argument, is not somebody who has an education I question your entire premise, including your claim to be an educator. chances are higher you are a typical right winger who doesn’t have an education and lives off the rest of those that do.
I couldn't agree more. They always have arguments with no facts. But to them it just doesn't matter. Their friends are like yeah man word.
I agree the arguments against student loan forgiveness are callously cruel. I spent most of high school homeless and living a cave, but I would never demand that everyone younger than I am should endure that too.
Thank your for your comment Sabra, and I hope someone helped you get a leg up and showed an example of what we can do if we reach out. Too many people fall through the cracks.
My question about the plan is...what’s next? What is being done to address future affordability in higher education? Will this become a permanent or ongoing debt forgiveness program? What about the kids in highschool— how should this influence their decisions about college choices? They may have many better options if they can take out more loans with the hope they wont have to pay them back. Clearly I’m on the fence about this program, I think we need to help this generation of 20-30-somethings who have inherited an economy based on greed and yes that involves student loan debt, but a one-time debt forgiveness is a band aid when what we need is restructuring of systems.
One last thing if americans want capitalism to survive this they need to be putting insane amounts of money in our hands. People going forward are going to be holding on to money for the next few years. Which means tech items and big purchases will slump.
The very lest they can do now is at least allow people to file Bankruptcy on student loans. But paying them off helps the economy more than putting 7 trillion dollars in the stock market.
This is a very complicated issue. While there are some who consider this letting people off the hook and encouraging people to irresponsible, how do you justify people sacrificing buying a home or starting a family to pay the loan back, let’s say for 10 years and still have not even reduced the principal? I paid my undergrad back after 10 years of a whopping $5,000. But I did go back to grad school and now I owe nearly 200,000, but here’s the thing I did not borrow $200,000 but since the interest is calculated as a compounding interest just like a mortgage you it is a vicious cycle. You end up paying the interest upfront but you still have a principal. Now, let’s look at this realistically if these loans could be restructured to a fixed 5 or 10 years at at let’s say 1 or 2% then people are not being let off the hook and you are freeing them up. Note, if people extra money to spend the economy would grow exponentially and everyone would benefit!! My last point, the government should not be making a profit off of people! We need an educated society to provide opportunity and growth! This will have other tangible benefits of reducing crime and providing people a leg up! We all will do better when everyone has opportunities not just the privileged.
We need to help get this economy stimulated, allowing entire generations to get a decent shot, and that means putting behind us of these arguments. Then we need to overhaul the system so people get an education and are not in debt.
Definitely Michelangelo!! I am totally on board and I support loan forgiveness in its entirety! Who cares what people like George think!! He will benefit from strong economy as will everyone rich or poor and we can then call ourselves “The land of opportunity “
Ha, the Spartacus line made laugh! And you are so right re: the past. A lot of people don't realize that before the '80s most states had minimal or free tuition for state schools, good schools.