Warren unveils details in plan to cancel $640B in student loan debt

[brooklynite]

Politico

Democratic 2020 candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Tuesday disclosed the details of her promise to cancel approximately $640 billion of student loan debt, targeted at lower and middle-income earners.

Warren's measure follows a competing bill released earlier this year by her presidential campaign opponent, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). His plan would go further in eliminating all outstanding student loan debt, regardless of a borrower’s income.

Warren (Mass.) is introducing the bill — dubbed The Student Loan Debt Relief Act — along with Rep. Jim Clyburn, (S.C.), the No. 3 House Democrat, who will sponsor a companion measure in that chamber.

The legislation calls for automatically canceling most student loans without requiring borrowers to submit applications. The government would use existing income and debt information to determine who qualifies.

And the person who applies to college the day after this takes effect: do they assume that the loans they take out will also be vacated?

[BeyondGeography]

1. That's why she would spend another $60 billion/year of weath tax money on public colleges

If you want a loan for a private institution your call.

Under Warren, we could also expect better terms for those students who still need a loan.

[customerserviceguy]

2. Of course they do

So, go ahead and get that art history or Slavic literature degree, you can sit around and think deep thoughts all day in your extended adolescence without worrying about making enough to live on as a Starbucks barista.

[Politicub]

3. We need more historians in our society. There has been an anti-intellectualism push for too long

I think the point gets lost that liberal arts educations teach people how to think versus only one thing to think about. Writing is also emphasized in liberal arts disciplines, and writing is something that is more important than ever in our content-centric, connected world.

[customerserviceguy]

4. And just how

do you get a job to pay back a student loan with a degree in history? There are only so many teaching jobs out there.

If your Daddy's not willing to back your useless degree, and you're not willing to work at a scut job to pay off the debt, then maybe you shouldn't sign on the dotted line to buy this luxury.

As for writing, major websites won't even hire English majors to be proofreaders, I see spelling, grammar, and punctuation mistakes every single day on major-name news sites, like ABCNews.com. Writing seems to be less valued by our society than you think.

[Politicub]

5. You are wrong and coming from this from a point of anti-intellectualism

I’m not going to waste my time trying to convince you of the importance of higher education. And you have a very limited understanding of the importance of good writers and opportunities for them.

[customerserviceguy]

6. I'm not anti-intellectual

I'm anti-shirking-responsibility. Nobody held a gun to anyone's head who ever signed an agreement promising to pay back money for an extended adolescence.

The opportunities for writers are shrinking, and not just in print media. There are only a few thousand great writers at any time, and their works can be distributed widely and inexpensively by modern technology. The dead-tree book will be an anachronism in another ten to twenty years.

I'm not against people studying whatever suits their fancy, I'm just against a strapped society paying for it. If we're going to raise taxes on the rich, there are a lot bigger priorities to spend that money on than educations that nobody is willing to pay for the product of.

Sens. Warren and Sanders student debt forgiveness and free tuition plans are nothing but welfare for college employees.

[Politicub]

7. I have worked in creative services and corporate marketing for

most of my working life. I can assure you that good writers are hard to find and are in high demand.

Finding someone who is a quick learner is also difficult. A liberal arts education teaches you to research and use information to make an argument. These are essential skills in the modern economy. It also helps to be comfortable with change and understand some of the factors that lead to it. Exposure to global affairs can be an asset.

It was the exception to work with someone who had a marketing or business degree. I’ve had on my team a philosophy major, someone with a classics degree, and a biology major, to name a few I remember.

So please expand your thinking beyond what disciplines are important to society. The idea that college is only an “extended adolescence” is an opinion. An educated society makes a country more competitive and drives higher earning potential. Education is more of an investment in the future rather than an expense.

[customerserviceguy]

8. Two rebuttals

If it's that hard to find good writers, then maybe our institutions of higher education are doing a poor job. There are millions of people with liberal arts degrees in the US who are working at jobs that have diddly squat to do with what their formal education is, and would much rather have a job sitting on their butts writing clever things than standing up all day making glorified coffee. Would giving away free tuition make those institutions any better? Would forgiving student debt make the degree holders any smarter?

When I went to work full time in 1976, I only had two years of university under my belt. I found that when I worked in the title insurance industry that indeed, there were ecomomics majors, art history majors, etc. working alongside of me, doing the same job, making the same money, and were on the same career path. The one advantage I had over them was a really small student loan debt of only $1K, which I managed to pay off even as the economy went into recession in 1980. I refuse to believe that extra two years of education they had made them any better people than me, it certainly didn't get them any extra money to pay back their loans.

And that was when companies fawned over people who had a four year degree in anything. When I got dumped on my ass by a title company right after 9/11, the state of Washington paid thousands of dollars in tuition, books, and extended unemployment compensation for me to get an associate's degree in computer network administration. But, those hiring for those positions wanted someone with four years of experience working with software that had only been out for three years (you had to have been a beta tester, of course) and really would rather hire someone from a foreign country who would work for peanuts, with the real prize of being able to bring their family over someday.

And as for being a better society with brighter thinkers, this is the country that elected Trump, remember?