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> cut its tuition by $10,000 for all new students I find it insane tuition is that high. I finished grad school before 2010, and at least with the smaller stat

> cut its tuition by $10,000 for all new students I find it insane tuition is that high. I finished grad school before 2010, and at least with the smaller state schools I went to, total cost of tuition and books was in the $3k~$5k range. Boutique schools like Vanderbilt were like $25k+ (per semester). I had a friend who got a free ride there for graduate school, and he said it wasn't really that different than our state school. You get out of any education what you put into it. All that being said, the Pandemic is not going to be enough to fix the tuition problems across the board. Federally subsidized student loans need to GO AWAY. They've allowed students to enter into debt, the only long term contracts kids under 18 can legally sign, for something they can never declare bankruptcy on. Schools have soaked up that student loan money, increasing costs as the amount kids qualify for goes up. It all gets sucked into administrative costs. Very little of that money even get to professors, many who still depend on grant writing to fund their departments. Schools will scream and moan if the federal government stops backing student loans, but it needs to happen. They've exploited a system to take more public funds without actually contributing significantly a better education for students.

snarf21 6y ago
I think we should start limiting tuition by making it be tied to the first year salary of students graduating from the same school with the same degree. If you want federal money, that is the rule. And room/board must be optional, you can't be forced to live on campus.
- vorpalhex 6y ago
  That might work for Computer Science where grads can be employed quickly and at very solid wages but it won't meaningfully apply for most fields like business, chemistry or physics.
  - anoonmoose 6y ago
    Then those schools will be disincentivized to charge people for degrees that won't pay for themselves, which is good which will result in more people going into degrees where people can be employed quickly at solid wages, which is good which will result in a scarcity of people going into the fields you mentioned, which will increase the wages in those fields which will incentivize people to go into them this, like most things, is a supply and demand problem, and we have created too much supply in certain areas
    - dnadler 6y ago
      They will also be disincentivized to offer those degrees at all. Which, IMO is definitely not good. Obviously these issues are nuanced and complicated...
      - lotsofpulp 6y ago
        They’re not nuanced or complicated. If society (taxpayers) want the benefit of a populace educated in those fields, they need to pay for them by funding schools.
        tesmar2 6y ago
        > they need to pay for them by funding schools I want a populace educated in those fields, and there are much betters way to do it than robbing the citizenry. One way might be to agree to work for a company afterwards who might pay for it, another to join the army in exchange for paying for it. Another might be to stop ensuring loans so that prices fall and become attainable to someone working part-time and going to school. Loans become not such a burden then, if you even want them. Lots of ways.
        lotsofpulp 6y ago
        Such as?
        tesmar2 6y ago
        Edited with examples.
    - theevilsharpie 6y ago
      Even if schools could accurately estimate the "value" of a degree based on expected future earnings, that estimate is going to be affected by a potential student's employability, and the risk that the student may not complete the program. "Tie student loan funding to the value of a degree" is a fantasy. In the real world, what would actually happen is that student loans would become limited to those who could put up some sort of collateral, which for the figures involved involved in a typical college education would largely limit it to the already-wealthy.
- bluGill 6y ago
  Is college a form of jobs training or a way to make yourself better? There is the disconnect, because both are true in different amounts for different people. If it is just jobs training you are correct. We shouldn't have "under water basket weaving" type courses because there is no market for that. There is some need for art, but only in the context of art is useful to make better marketing materials, so the degree should be offered by the business school in context of marketing courses. History is useful to make you a well rounded critical thinker, but if you are going for a history degree it should be sponsored by the school that will eventually give you tenure as a professor. If you just want to make yourself better: art is very interesting as a subject. Have fun learning it. Likewise history is interesting even if there are no job prospects. However because these are no job prospects (this generalization is of course false - but true enough for discussion) you shouldn't be getting such a degree if you cannot self finance it from your current job. Both of the above arguments makes for a worse world in my opinion.
  - daniellarusso 6y ago
    If it is a way to make yourself ‘better’ - why not allow the loans to be used for other types of betterment, like physical and dietary health? Or, is there a way to make oneself better without relying on tens of thousand of dollars of debt, which cannot even be waived via bankruptcy?
  - friedman23 6y ago
    Better by what standard? The current system is definitely better at creating half baked artists.
  - zeku 6y ago
    I think the simple answer is to look at how many Euro countries pull off having good universities for low cost... and copy them. No need to reinvent what has already been done. Just need to "port" it to America.
    - tesmar2 6y ago
      > low cost Not low cost. They tax the hell out of their citizens.
AlexTWithBeard 6y ago
Current rates for state colleges seem to be not that different [1], still around 5k, with a notable exception of PA and VT. [1] https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/ https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/
swebs 6y ago
>Federally subsidized student loans need to GO AWAY. They've allowed students to enter into debt, the only long term contracts kids under 18 can legally sign, for something they can never declare bankruptcy on. I think that's something that many people would agree with, but how do we go forward with making that happen?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  Running for federal office with that platform, and supporting others that do. Only problem is you will lose to other politicians that are able to promise lower taxes because giving out federal loans to students is cheaper for taxpayers than giving money to schools directly. People will vote for the person “helping” students by lending them money, rather than the person that has to help students by giving schools money, and therefore raising taxes.
- leecb 6y ago
  Introduce a ceiling on the total amount of federally subsidized student loans that a person can get in a year. The ceiling steps down every year, until the loans have completely gone down. Start the first ceiling 2 years from now, so students and institutions have time to plan for the change, and complete the phaseout 8 years from now. That's how I'd do it. As for how you would do it, you'd have to convince your congressional representative that reform is worth doing, and is worth the inevitable political cost to them. Making loans somewhat harder to get will inevitably make universities upset with the politicians (as universities are the ones that actually receive the bulk of the financial benefit from these loans). For this reason, I see this reform as unlikely to happen, at least as I described it. You would have to pair it with more direct funding for universities.
- randomdata 6y ago
  Continue to remind people that incomes have held stagnant with the rise of post secondary education – Meaning that the promise of higher incomes as a result of higher education from decades ago never materialized. The vast majority of students are only taking on these loans because they have been lead to believe that their income will increase, more than offsetting the cost of the loan. But we know very well now that it doesn't play out in practice. As we educate away those flawed ideas from history, those with profit motive will be scared away, leaving those who are there for education's sake. When only they are left, costs will start to align with what education is actually worth. Then again, a diamond remains forever, so perhaps you cannot educate the educated.
dogman144 6y ago
> Federally subsidized student loans need to GO AWAY. The language I'm about to use pains me, but this is an extremely privileged take, or at least naive take, on what these loans do. Removing them will hurt about about a generation of students from the very low to the upper middle class set until the academic<>employment market adjusts. What do I mean? A simple, pragmatic fact is degree from a name-school, vs. a no-name school, is a differentiator to a student who knows what they're doing. This is especially true with grad schools where it's professionally-focused on the outcome. NYU Law vs. CUNY Law. UMass Dartmouth CS vs. BU CS. You're buying a network and a door opener with the latter. One resume gets you an informational interview, a priv'd coop/internship, an alumni network and so on, and the other has an uphill battle. For many underpriv'd students, that network-buy is life changing. I wish it wasn't the case, but pretending that it isn't is damaging. This is just the way of things at the moment. By getting rid of fed-sub'd loans, you: - take away motive-neutral funding route for your cheap but no-name undergrad -> good grad school -> good new career - open only profit-motive funding routes from private loan companies, which.... this never works out well for consumers. - open this priv'd route of good schools to increasingly only the elite. I'd agree with the point that a cheap state school for undergrad, a "known" school for grad school funded by however one can get it funded makes more financial<>career sense, but that nuance didn't exist in your argument.
- pclmulqdq 6y ago
  These loans have destroyed any chance that a generation of underprivileged students will achieve financial prosperity. If they go away, the federally subsidized loan programs will likely be phased out over ~5 years or so. The private sector will replace them for students who are good bets, probably with income-share agreements or something similar and MUCH less predatory than the current federal loan programs.
  - rconti 6y ago
    >The private sector will replace them for students who are good bets, probably with income-share agreements or something similar and MUCH less predatory than the current federal loan programs. [Citation needed] We already know who the "good bets" are. They're the rich kids. And if you think "income sharing" and the private sector will drive rates down from a federally-subsidized ("predatory") rate, well, I don't know what to say. I certainly don't think burying underprivileged students under a mountain of debt at graduation is a good thing. I'd very much like to see costs come way down, and I do agree that doing something about the loan system is a piece of the puzzle. But the reason the underprivileged are taking on this debt is that they're attempting to move up, in a way that avoiding debt by avoiding higher education will never achieve. Unfortunately, higher education has become the only way to hang on to an otherwise-falling standard of living; wage stagnation despite increasing education level.
WaitWaitWha 6y ago
To get a bit nuanced I read, that the subsidy is not the primary problem. It is the guarantee of payment, even on default by the student is the problem. That is what must go away.
- toyg 6y ago
  That would set you back to where you were before the related law was enacted, though: droves of kids going to school with public money, then declaring bankruptcy. Public finances were getting robbed and kids had their future compromised anyway (bankruptcy is no joke).
  - WaitWaitWha 6y ago
    Maybe the schools should have to be partially on the hook, at best financially in some way, or indirectly by a score of failed/drop out/bankrupt students? Student selection & preparation would get better. Maybe it would trickle down to High Schools.
- ishjoh 6y ago
  Can you send me that study/article, would love to read it. What I did come across a while back was a study done by the NY FED. On the effect of the amount of available credit and tuition rates, they found that increased loan availability did increase tuition costs, but they looked at subsidized and unsubsidized loans and how much they increased the tuition cost. They found: "We estimate tuition effects of changes in institution-specific program maximums of about 60 cents on the dollar for subsidized loans and 15 cents on the dollar for unsubsidized loans" https://www.newyorkfed.org/medialibrary/media/research/staff_reports/sr733.pdf https://www.newyorkfed.org/medialibrary/media/research/staff...
  - WaitWaitWha 6y ago
    Misunderstanding - "I read..." as in, I interpreted the post I am responding to. (I have an excuse, as English not my first language, but not excusable. Sorry.)
ntsplnkv2 6y ago
The federal loan influence is not large enough to cause the problem we're in. The real problem is the demand for college is enormous because it's the only way to a semi-decent living these days. If you get rid of federal loans all it will mean is private loans fill in to take its place - people still want good paying jobs, so they'll still pay to go to school.
- foolmeonce 6y ago
  I think the new no-one-is-responsible approach is to let it all fail so interest groups like the low quality private schools won't exist to have an influence then revive state school funding.. A less drastic approach might be to give schools qualifications for seats in a department as graduates take jobs in their field with the overall lost capacity being redistributed evenly over participating schools. In such a system, the bad schools could finally drop out.
- emidln 6y ago
  > The real problem is the demand for college is enormous because it's the only way to a semi-decent living these days. There are well-paying jobs that don't require a university degree. Skilled trade jobs exist and are in high demand. Tech careers with IT, networking, software, and hardware exist for those that put in the time, whether that time is on school grounds or at home. I've known (and currently work with) professional programmers, sysadmins, network engineers, designers, and hardware engineers who don't have formal credentials. All of these people are making six figures in US dollars outside the bay area. They've all put in the time in their domain and in speaking with any of them their expertise is evident. A major factor in learning these skills is available dedicated time. Middle/Upper-Middle/Upper class kids who are interested in tech can often find available free time to read books, tinker, and acquire hardware/resources (whether through their parents buying it or by tracking down cheap/free hardware (more of a time cost)). The less financially stable a family is, the higher the likelihood that there won't be free time available for academic endeavors and will instead be filled with finding a job to help pay for food/shelter/clothes for themselves and their family. Going to college provides a structured place where dedicated study is expected (and paid for via scholarship or loans). This is an escape hatch for students who didn't have the same opportunities.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> Federally subsidized student loans need to GO AWAY. There's a good argument that its the wrong method to acheive democratization/affordability (I personally prefer a very different approach), but… > They’ve allowed students to enter into debt, Nope, students could enter debt before (and still can outside of) federally subsidized student loans. > the only long term contracts kids under 18 can legally sign, Again, no. Its true that federally subsidized student loans are not voidable under federal law even where due to the age of the borrower contracts generally might be under state law, but similar exclusions from the “defense of infancy” apply to student loan contracts, whether public or private, generally under many state laws, as well as sometimes for other contracts. So its not the only kind of contract which minors can enter into and not subsequently avoid. (And even without the exclusions minors can legally enter into the contracts and they are valid until and unless the defense is asserted, but counterparties will be unlikely to enter into the contracts because they know the defense is available to the minor.) And even if this were a particular problem, it would be easily fixed without abandoning federally subsidized student loans, either by shifting eligibility for minor students from student loans to parent loans, or by simply limiting them to students 18+, which might force some younger students to delay college entry. > for something they can never declare bankruptcy on. That’s also not true; there is a fairly high threshold for discharge of student loans, but it is not impossible. Again, the problem suggested with this is easily curable (and arguably doesn’t even require removing the limitations on discharge) within the context of federal student loans. If the income contingent repayment plan with discharge of the balance after a set period were the only one available, discharge in bankruptcy would be largely a non-issue. Now, since the discharge restrictions also apply to private student loans, you might still want to remove them to address that problem.
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  > Nope, students could enter debt before (and still can outside of) federally subsidized student loans. Source? I’m not aware of any non government lender that would or has underwritten an 18 year old with no collateral and no co-signer. At least not at any single digit interest rate, and definitely not for tens of thousands and maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars.
- 6y ago

snarf21 6y ago

I think we should start limiting tuition by making it be tied to the first year salary of students graduating from the same school with the same degree. If you want federal money, that is the rule. And room/board must be optional, you can't be forced to live on campus.

vorpalhex 6y ago
That might work for Computer Science where grads can be employed quickly and at very solid wages but it won't meaningfully apply for most fields like business, chemistry or physics.
- anoonmoose 6y ago
  Then those schools will be disincentivized to charge people for degrees that won't pay for themselves, which is good which will result in more people going into degrees where people can be employed quickly at solid wages, which is good which will result in a scarcity of people going into the fields you mentioned, which will increase the wages in those fields which will incentivize people to go into them this, like most things, is a supply and demand problem, and we have created too much supply in certain areas
  - dnadler 6y ago
    They will also be disincentivized to offer those degrees at all. Which, IMO is definitely not good. Obviously these issues are nuanced and complicated...
    - lotsofpulp 6y ago
      They’re not nuanced or complicated. If society (taxpayers) want the benefit of a populace educated in those fields, they need to pay for them by funding schools.
      - tesmar2 6y ago
        > they need to pay for them by funding schools I want a populace educated in those fields, and there are much betters way to do it than robbing the citizenry. One way might be to agree to work for a company afterwards who might pay for it, another to join the army in exchange for paying for it. Another might be to stop ensuring loans so that prices fall and become attainable to someone working part-time and going to school. Loans become not such a burden then, if you even want them. Lots of ways.
        lotsofpulp 6y ago
        Such as?
        tesmar2 6y ago
        Edited with examples.
  - theevilsharpie 6y ago
    Even if schools could accurately estimate the "value" of a degree based on expected future earnings, that estimate is going to be affected by a potential student's employability, and the risk that the student may not complete the program. "Tie student loan funding to the value of a degree" is a fantasy. In the real world, what would actually happen is that student loans would become limited to those who could put up some sort of collateral, which for the figures involved involved in a typical college education would largely limit it to the already-wealthy.
bluGill 6y ago
Is college a form of jobs training or a way to make yourself better? There is the disconnect, because both are true in different amounts for different people. If it is just jobs training you are correct. We shouldn't have "under water basket weaving" type courses because there is no market for that. There is some need for art, but only in the context of art is useful to make better marketing materials, so the degree should be offered by the business school in context of marketing courses. History is useful to make you a well rounded critical thinker, but if you are going for a history degree it should be sponsored by the school that will eventually give you tenure as a professor. If you just want to make yourself better: art is very interesting as a subject. Have fun learning it. Likewise history is interesting even if there are no job prospects. However because these are no job prospects (this generalization is of course false - but true enough for discussion) you shouldn't be getting such a degree if you cannot self finance it from your current job. Both of the above arguments makes for a worse world in my opinion.
- daniellarusso 6y ago
  If it is a way to make yourself ‘better’ - why not allow the loans to be used for other types of betterment, like physical and dietary health? Or, is there a way to make oneself better without relying on tens of thousand of dollars of debt, which cannot even be waived via bankruptcy?
- friedman23 6y ago
  Better by what standard? The current system is definitely better at creating half baked artists.
- zeku 6y ago
  I think the simple answer is to look at how many Euro countries pull off having good universities for low cost... and copy them. No need to reinvent what has already been done. Just need to "port" it to America.
  - tesmar2 6y ago
    > low cost Not low cost. They tax the hell out of their citizens.

AlexTWithBeard 6y ago

Current rates for state colleges seem to be not that different [1], still around 5k, with a notable exception of PA and VT. [1] https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/ https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/

swebs 6y ago

>Federally subsidized student loans need to GO AWAY. They've allowed students to enter into debt, the only long term contracts kids under 18 can legally sign, for something they can never declare bankruptcy on. I think that's something that many people would agree with, but how do we go forward with making that happen?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
lotsofpulp 6y ago
Running for federal office with that platform, and supporting others that do. Only problem is you will lose to other politicians that are able to promise lower taxes because giving out federal loans to students is cheaper for taxpayers than giving money to schools directly. People will vote for the person “helping” students by lending them money, rather than the person that has to help students by giving schools money, and therefore raising taxes.
leecb 6y ago
Introduce a ceiling on the total amount of federally subsidized student loans that a person can get in a year. The ceiling steps down every year, until the loans have completely gone down. Start the first ceiling 2 years from now, so students and institutions have time to plan for the change, and complete the phaseout 8 years from now. That's how I'd do it. As for how you would do it, you'd have to convince your congressional representative that reform is worth doing, and is worth the inevitable political cost to them. Making loans somewhat harder to get will inevitably make universities upset with the politicians (as universities are the ones that actually receive the bulk of the financial benefit from these loans). For this reason, I see this reform as unlikely to happen, at least as I described it. You would have to pair it with more direct funding for universities.
randomdata 6y ago
Continue to remind people that incomes have held stagnant with the rise of post secondary education – Meaning that the promise of higher incomes as a result of higher education from decades ago never materialized. The vast majority of students are only taking on these loans because they have been lead to believe that their income will increase, more than offsetting the cost of the loan. But we know very well now that it doesn't play out in practice. As we educate away those flawed ideas from history, those with profit motive will be scared away, leaving those who are there for education's sake. When only they are left, costs will start to align with what education is actually worth. Then again, a diamond remains forever, so perhaps you cannot educate the educated.

dogman144 6y ago

> Federally subsidized student loans need to GO AWAY. The language I'm about to use pains me, but this is an extremely privileged take, or at least naive take, on what these loans do. Removing them will hurt about about a generation of students from the very low to the upper middle class set until the academic<>employment market adjusts. What do I mean? A simple, pragmatic fact is degree from a name-school, vs. a no-name school, is a differentiator to a student who knows what they're doing. This is especially true with grad schools where it's professionally-focused on the outcome. NYU Law vs. CUNY Law. UMass Dartmouth CS vs. BU CS. You're buying a network and a door opener with the latter. One resume gets you an informational interview, a priv'd coop/internship, an alumni network and so on, and the other has an uphill battle. For many underpriv'd students, that network-buy is life changing. I wish it wasn't the case, but pretending that it isn't is damaging. This is just the way of things at the moment. By getting rid of fed-sub'd loans, you: - take away motive-neutral funding route for your cheap but no-name undergrad -> good grad school -> good new career - open only profit-motive funding routes from private loan companies, which.... this never works out well for consumers. - open this priv'd route of good schools to increasingly only the elite. I'd agree with the point that a cheap state school for undergrad, a "known" school for grad school funded by however one can get it funded makes more financial<>career sense, but that nuance didn't exist in your argument.

pclmulqdq 6y ago
These loans have destroyed any chance that a generation of underprivileged students will achieve financial prosperity. If they go away, the federally subsidized loan programs will likely be phased out over ~5 years or so. The private sector will replace them for students who are good bets, probably with income-share agreements or something similar and MUCH less predatory than the current federal loan programs.
- rconti 6y ago
  >The private sector will replace them for students who are good bets, probably with income-share agreements or something similar and MUCH less predatory than the current federal loan programs. [Citation needed] We already know who the "good bets" are. They're the rich kids. And if you think "income sharing" and the private sector will drive rates down from a federally-subsidized ("predatory") rate, well, I don't know what to say. I certainly don't think burying underprivileged students under a mountain of debt at graduation is a good thing. I'd very much like to see costs come way down, and I do agree that doing something about the loan system is a piece of the puzzle. But the reason the underprivileged are taking on this debt is that they're attempting to move up, in a way that avoiding debt by avoiding higher education will never achieve. Unfortunately, higher education has become the only way to hang on to an otherwise-falling standard of living; wage stagnation despite increasing education level.

WaitWaitWha 6y ago

To get a bit nuanced I read, that the subsidy is not the primary problem. It is the guarantee of payment, even on default by the student is the problem. That is what must go away.

toyg 6y ago
That would set you back to where you were before the related law was enacted, though: droves of kids going to school with public money, then declaring bankruptcy. Public finances were getting robbed and kids had their future compromised anyway (bankruptcy is no joke).
- WaitWaitWha 6y ago
  Maybe the schools should have to be partially on the hook, at best financially in some way, or indirectly by a score of failed/drop out/bankrupt students? Student selection & preparation would get better. Maybe it would trickle down to High Schools.
ishjoh 6y ago
Can you send me that study/article, would love to read it. What I did come across a while back was a study done by the NY FED. On the effect of the amount of available credit and tuition rates, they found that increased loan availability did increase tuition costs, but they looked at subsidized and unsubsidized loans and how much they increased the tuition cost. They found: "We estimate tuition effects of changes in institution-specific program maximums of about 60 cents on the dollar for subsidized loans and 15 cents on the dollar for unsubsidized loans" https://www.newyorkfed.org/medialibrary/media/research/staff_reports/sr733.pdf https://www.newyorkfed.org/medialibrary/media/research/staff...
- WaitWaitWha 6y ago
  Misunderstanding - "I read..." as in, I interpreted the post I am responding to. (I have an excuse, as English not my first language, but not excusable. Sorry.)

ntsplnkv2 6y ago

The federal loan influence is not large enough to cause the problem we're in. The real problem is the demand for college is enormous because it's the only way to a semi-decent living these days. If you get rid of federal loans all it will mean is private loans fill in to take its place - people still want good paying jobs, so they'll still pay to go to school.

foolmeonce 6y ago
I think the new no-one-is-responsible approach is to let it all fail so interest groups like the low quality private schools won't exist to have an influence then revive state school funding.. A less drastic approach might be to give schools qualifications for seats in a department as graduates take jobs in their field with the overall lost capacity being redistributed evenly over participating schools. In such a system, the bad schools could finally drop out.
emidln 6y ago
> The real problem is the demand for college is enormous because it's the only way to a semi-decent living these days. There are well-paying jobs that don't require a university degree. Skilled trade jobs exist and are in high demand. Tech careers with IT, networking, software, and hardware exist for those that put in the time, whether that time is on school grounds or at home. I've known (and currently work with) professional programmers, sysadmins, network engineers, designers, and hardware engineers who don't have formal credentials. All of these people are making six figures in US dollars outside the bay area. They've all put in the time in their domain and in speaking with any of them their expertise is evident. A major factor in learning these skills is available dedicated time. Middle/Upper-Middle/Upper class kids who are interested in tech can often find available free time to read books, tinker, and acquire hardware/resources (whether through their parents buying it or by tracking down cheap/free hardware (more of a time cost)). The less financially stable a family is, the higher the likelihood that there won't be free time available for academic endeavors and will instead be filled with finding a job to help pay for food/shelter/clothes for themselves and their family. Going to college provides a structured place where dedicated study is expected (and paid for via scholarship or loans). This is an escape hatch for students who didn't have the same opportunities.

dragonwriter 6y ago

> Federally subsidized student loans need to GO AWAY. There's a good argument that its the wrong method to acheive democratization/affordability (I personally prefer a very different approach), but… > They’ve allowed students to enter into debt, Nope, students could enter debt before (and still can outside of) federally subsidized student loans. > the only long term contracts kids under 18 can legally sign, Again, no. Its true that federally subsidized student loans are not voidable under federal law even where due to the age of the borrower contracts generally might be under state law, but similar exclusions from the “defense of infancy” apply to student loan contracts, whether public or private, generally under many state laws, as well as sometimes for other contracts. So its not the only kind of contract which minors can enter into and not subsequently avoid. (And even without the exclusions minors can legally enter into the contracts and they are valid until and unless the defense is asserted, but counterparties will be unlikely to enter into the contracts because they know the defense is available to the minor.) And even if this were a particular problem, it would be easily fixed without abandoning federally subsidized student loans, either by shifting eligibility for minor students from student loans to parent loans, or by simply limiting them to students 18+, which might force some younger students to delay college entry. > for something they can never declare bankruptcy on. That’s also not true; there is a fairly high threshold for discharge of student loans, but it is not impossible. Again, the problem suggested with this is easily curable (and arguably doesn’t even require removing the limitations on discharge) within the context of federal student loans. If the income contingent repayment plan with discharge of the balance after a set period were the only one available, discharge in bankruptcy would be largely a non-issue. Now, since the discharge restrictions also apply to private student loans, you might still want to remove them to address that problem.

lotsofpulp 6y ago
> Nope, students could enter debt before (and still can outside of) federally subsidized student loans. Source? I’m not aware of any non government lender that would or has underwritten an 18 year old with no collateral and no co-signer. At least not at any single digit interest rate, and definitely not for tens of thousands and maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars.
6y ago