4 ms·

Student loans would evaporate. Good! Let education be paid for by grants and the student own income, most grants. Plus force the universities to make their tu

Student loans would evaporate. Good! Let education be paid for by grants and the student own income, most grants. Plus force the universities to make their tuition cost effective. Edit: However many years ago, public universities charged a fairly nominal tuition and survived for many doing that (financed by their respective US states). These public universities today have massively expanded their costs, primarily based on capital spending and follow the model of private universities.

bpodgursky 5y ago
Every student would with good cause declare bankruptcy immediately upon graduation, because they have debt and no assets and no job. I get where you're coming from, but this is not a workable solution.
- lazide 5y ago
  It didn’t happen that way until many, many years after student loans started to be a thing. Some enterprising law students figuring out they could get a loan to learn how to get out of the loan - and end up with a very valuable degree out of it that could not be repossessed - and by the time they needed good credit, it would be off their records. It took awhile for word to get out, and then they banned getting out of student loans. So blame the lawyer (students) I guess?
- threwawasy1228 5y ago
  As someone with a relative currently going through bankruptcy, I can assure you that every student would not go through this process. It is incredibly difficult, intensive, and horrible process that takes years. It is not pleasant and I think that the idea that it would be utilized in this way by students is totally coming from a place of ignorance of what modern bankruptcy actually entails.
  - bpodgursky 5y ago
    I totally understand that this is an unpleasant and long process, but I think you in turn come from a place of ignorance about what it means to live the best years of your life under hundreds of thousands of dollars of student debt. It eats at you, every time you spend money, for decades. It's soul-crushing. I know people who would GLADLY throw away two years of their life in bankruptcy proceedings if it means they could be free of their crushing student debt.
xmprt 5y ago
The issue is that then you gatekeep higher education to the wealthy. What's more likely? Harvard reducing tuition because underprivileged kids aren't able to attend and can't get loans. Or Harvard keeping the same tuition and only admitting the wealthy people that are able to pay it (of which there are plenty).
- joe_the_user 5y ago
  Harvard reducing tuition because underprivileged kids aren't able to attend and can't get loans. Harvard in particular is so wealthy it always charges tuition based on ability to pay. The poor who go to Harvard pay nothing. But, of course, the poor seldom go to Harvard because they aren't admitted. Just saying. There are mid-range school where, all else being equal, your scenario might be true. But those school depend on those same lower income students and, well, I'd be in favor of them buckling and charging less.
- Notanothertoo 5y ago
  Good thing there is a whole market of ranging degrees of education quality and price distributed a cross the US... Also there are lots and lots of programs state and private to fund low income higher Ed. It is not a dichotomy.
- ashtonkem 5y ago
  Driving education policy based off anything Harvard is doing is a mistake. Pay attention to state schools only, that’s what policy should be tailored for.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- steveBK123 5y ago
  Ivys are basically majority privileged kids already anyway. There was a stat that 1% of Americans go to Private High School but 40% of Ivy admittance is from Private High Schools. Add to that: the % who go to elite selective public HS in systems like NY, the large number of full-freight paying foreign students who represent their local elite and legacy admissions.. If underprivileged kids represent anything above about 5% at Ivy's I would be shocked. One stat from Boston Globe was that only 3% of Harvard comes from the US bottom 20% economically. The Ivys do more to perpetuate the existing power dynamic than they do to raise anyone up. They are far too small and far too nepotistic to do otherwise. If you want to raise the middle/bottom up, you need to look at the large state university systems which are orders of magnitude larger.
spamizbad 5y ago
Here's an article in Fortune from 1957 arguing college is too cheap. Seems like it was really taken to heart: https://fortune.com/2013/05/05/colleges-are-too-cheap-fortune-1957/ https://fortune.com/2013/05/05/colleges-are-too-cheap-fortun...
coryrc 5y ago
> massively expanded their costs While I attended college, tuition costs almost doubled, but since haven't increased much per year. It wasn't massive increased spending, it was the state cutting off basically all finding. There's certainly fat to be cut, but the admin costs are mostly imposed on high.

bpodgursky 5y ago

Every student would with good cause declare bankruptcy immediately upon graduation, because they have debt and no assets and no job. I get where you're coming from, but this is not a workable solution.

lazide 5y ago
It didn’t happen that way until many, many years after student loans started to be a thing. Some enterprising law students figuring out they could get a loan to learn how to get out of the loan - and end up with a very valuable degree out of it that could not be repossessed - and by the time they needed good credit, it would be off their records. It took awhile for word to get out, and then they banned getting out of student loans. So blame the lawyer (students) I guess?
threwawasy1228 5y ago
As someone with a relative currently going through bankruptcy, I can assure you that every student would not go through this process. It is incredibly difficult, intensive, and horrible process that takes years. It is not pleasant and I think that the idea that it would be utilized in this way by students is totally coming from a place of ignorance of what modern bankruptcy actually entails.
- bpodgursky 5y ago
  I totally understand that this is an unpleasant and long process, but I think you in turn come from a place of ignorance about what it means to live the best years of your life under hundreds of thousands of dollars of student debt. It eats at you, every time you spend money, for decades. It's soul-crushing. I know people who would GLADLY throw away two years of their life in bankruptcy proceedings if it means they could be free of their crushing student debt.

xmprt 5y ago

The issue is that then you gatekeep higher education to the wealthy. What's more likely? Harvard reducing tuition because underprivileged kids aren't able to attend and can't get loans. Or Harvard keeping the same tuition and only admitting the wealthy people that are able to pay it (of which there are plenty).

joe_the_user 5y ago
Harvard reducing tuition because underprivileged kids aren't able to attend and can't get loans. Harvard in particular is so wealthy it always charges tuition based on ability to pay. The poor who go to Harvard pay nothing. But, of course, the poor seldom go to Harvard because they aren't admitted. Just saying. There are mid-range school where, all else being equal, your scenario might be true. But those school depend on those same lower income students and, well, I'd be in favor of them buckling and charging less.
Notanothertoo 5y ago
Good thing there is a whole market of ranging degrees of education quality and price distributed a cross the US... Also there are lots and lots of programs state and private to fund low income higher Ed. It is not a dichotomy.
ashtonkem 5y ago
Driving education policy based off anything Harvard is doing is a mistake. Pay attention to state schools only, that’s what policy should be tailored for.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
steveBK123 5y ago
Ivys are basically majority privileged kids already anyway. There was a stat that 1% of Americans go to Private High School but 40% of Ivy admittance is from Private High Schools. Add to that: the % who go to elite selective public HS in systems like NY, the large number of full-freight paying foreign students who represent their local elite and legacy admissions.. If underprivileged kids represent anything above about 5% at Ivy's I would be shocked. One stat from Boston Globe was that only 3% of Harvard comes from the US bottom 20% economically. The Ivys do more to perpetuate the existing power dynamic than they do to raise anyone up. They are far too small and far too nepotistic to do otherwise. If you want to raise the middle/bottom up, you need to look at the large state university systems which are orders of magnitude larger.

spamizbad 5y ago

Here's an article in Fortune from 1957 arguing college is too cheap. Seems like it was really taken to heart: https://fortune.com/2013/05/05/colleges-are-too-cheap-fortune-1957/ https://fortune.com/2013/05/05/colleges-are-too-cheap-fortun...

coryrc 5y ago

> massively expanded their costs While I attended college, tuition costs almost doubled, but since haven't increased much per year. It wasn't massive increased spending, it was the state cutting off basically all finding. There's certainly fat to be cut, but the admin costs are mostly imposed on high.