5 ms·

Here, let's make this more concrete so we're not debating over intangibles. How much of your salary are you willing to give for this student loan forgiveness p

Here, let's make this more concrete so we're not debating over intangibles. How much of your salary are you willing to give for this student loan forgiveness program? $10,000? every year? Not that much? Why are you being so selfish?

ryandrake 6y ago
$1.5 trillion is less than what was spent on the Iraq war, and just two years of US military spending. We can make it work without simplistically raising everyone's taxes by $1.5T/everyone. The hardest step is to change people's political priorities so that they actually include making more people better off. Oh, and to answer your actual question, yes, I'd much rather have $300 of my tax bill every paycheck go towards the "making education free for everyone" fund rather than the "blowing up a kid hiding in a hole with an AK47" fund.
- throwmehaweh 6y ago
  > The hardest step is to change people's political priorities so that they actually include making more people better off. That's the problem, who get's to choose what specifically "makes people better off"? Is subsidizing millions of high-schoolers college educations a benefit? What about the millions who will get meaningless degrees in Liberal Arts after being coerced to "just go to college" by their high school counselors? Will we make this perpetual? Wouldn't that just incentivize students to take as many courses and as much time as they want to graduate? Why not give $50,000 to each Millenial age adult? Afterall, they have endured two separate recessions in their adult lives and I can argue it'd be a benefit to help them become financially better off relative to the boomer generation. Student loans are _already_ the most forgiving form of debt there is. They give you low interest rates and 10+ years to pay them off, with generous forbearances, and other options if you can't pay. There is nothing selfish about the above comment at all, it's logical, reasoned, and probably how most people who endured a college education that they paid for will feel. edit: if that doesn't convince you, there's this: https://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2020/11/20/canceling_student_debt_is_not_progressive_110509.html https://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2020/11/20/cance...
- supernova87a 6y ago
  And what if we don't decrease the military spending? Are you happy to pay the extra?
  - ryandrake 6y ago
    Sure, if we're setting aside reality, and pretending that the only possible way to fund this is with a nation-wide, flat, non-progressive federal income tax increase for the full amount, I'd still be fine with it. Not sure what that adds to the discussion, since that's not even remotely how something like this would actually be paid for.

ryandrake 6y ago

$1.5 trillion is less than what was spent on the Iraq war, and just two years of US military spending. We can make it work without simplistically raising everyone's taxes by $1.5T/everyone. The hardest step is to change people's political priorities so that they actually include making more people better off. Oh, and to answer your actual question, yes, I'd much rather have $300 of my tax bill every paycheck go towards the "making education free for everyone" fund rather than the "blowing up a kid hiding in a hole with an AK47" fund.

throwmehaweh 6y ago
> The hardest step is to change people's political priorities so that they actually include making more people better off. That's the problem, who get's to choose what specifically "makes people better off"? Is subsidizing millions of high-schoolers college educations a benefit? What about the millions who will get meaningless degrees in Liberal Arts after being coerced to "just go to college" by their high school counselors? Will we make this perpetual? Wouldn't that just incentivize students to take as many courses and as much time as they want to graduate? Why not give $50,000 to each Millenial age adult? Afterall, they have endured two separate recessions in their adult lives and I can argue it'd be a benefit to help them become financially better off relative to the boomer generation. Student loans are _already_ the most forgiving form of debt there is. They give you low interest rates and 10+ years to pay them off, with generous forbearances, and other options if you can't pay. There is nothing selfish about the above comment at all, it's logical, reasoned, and probably how most people who endured a college education that they paid for will feel. edit: if that doesn't convince you, there's this: https://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2020/11/20/canceling_student_debt_is_not_progressive_110509.html https://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2020/11/20/cance...
supernova87a 6y ago
And what if we don't decrease the military spending? Are you happy to pay the extra?
- ryandrake 6y ago
  Sure, if we're setting aside reality, and pretending that the only possible way to fund this is with a nation-wide, flat, non-progressive federal income tax increase for the full amount, I'd still be fine with it. Not sure what that adds to the discussion, since that's not even remotely how something like this would actually be paid for.