3 ms·
Relevant quote that applies to most of the stories in this article: "but, he said, his difficultly finding a college-level job in the U.S. has made that debt op
by mdorazio 7y ago
Relevant quote that applies to most of the stories in this article: "but, he said, his difficultly finding a college-level job in the U.S. has made that debt oppressive nonetheless." The problem isn't just that students are graduating with debt, it's that they are graduating with debt and degrees that don't translate into actual good job prospects anymore.
I think it's also worth mentioning that the "leave the US for a cheaper/easier lifestyle elsewhere" choice isn't new. I met dozens of expats when I lived in China 15 years ago who were there because they could make ends meet and still have fun doing little more than teaching English. The only difference now is that if you ever come back to the US you're pretty much screwed.
- USNetizen 7y agoAbsolutely agree. We as a society have put so much emphasis on earning a college degree that people are attaining worthless ones at too high of a rate and finding themselves buried in debt with no way to pay it off. It doesn't help that basic financial literacy isn't taught in grade school anymore, either. Too many times, a graduate's first lesson in managing finances and debt comes in the form of a default notice from a lender. The other problem I see here is that the whole mentality of being able to run away from your problems is, well, problematic. These things will only get worse if you don't address them. What they don't apparently realize is, one day, they're going to want to come back to the U.S. for one reason or another just to find out that their mound of student debt has grown into a mountain of defaults which prevents them from even holding certain jobs, getting credit, finding housing, and basically functioning comfortably in society.
- bluGill 7y agoI do think you should be able to declare bankruptcy on worthless degrees. Banks (note that I have a problem with government loan subsidies) should face the risk and not loan to a student getting a worthless degree. What I can't figure out is how to stop someone who gets a useful degree from declaring bankruptcy right after graduating and then getting a job using that degree. This is fraud.
- Consultant32452 7y agoIn this way college loans are unsecured debt, like credit cards, and should be priced accordingly.
- PretzelFisch 7y agoYou never really know when the market would be saturated with degree x since it takes 4 years to earn. On the other end banks may decline a degree that if taken now will start to be high demand when the candidate graduates.
- bluGill 7y agoIf you have a electrical engineering degree in generators right before someone discovers a cheap over unity solar panel (coming up with a way to violate the laws of physics is left as an exercise to the reader) thus making all generator specialists valueless - most of your EE course work still applies so you just need pivot a little. Maybe you need an additional year of school to get in demand skills, but the odds that you can't find something that it is a low risk to get you into is low. If you have a degree in music - we already know that field is saturated. If you studied only music you have a few years left to get a course of study that is useful.
- PretzelFisch 7y agoIs the value of some college degree really the problem or does our system and culture just do a horrible job of matching candidates with open positions?
- briandear 7y agoThe fun part about expat life is that the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion often puts your adjusted gross income at below zero, which means income based repayment plans have a zero payment while your income is that “low.”
- joshuaheard 7y agoI worked summers during college to help pay the cost. One of those jobs led to a full time job at a commercial bank after I graduated.