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Median student loan debt is about $25,000 dollars. That's a lot, but not so much that it wouldn't be covered by a very modest increase in lifetime earnings. T
by maxerickson 1y ago
Median student loan debt is about $25,000 dollars.
That's a lot, but not so much that it wouldn't be covered by a very modest increase in lifetime earnings.
The mean is closer to $40,000, which is still going to be covered by a modest improvement in earnings.
I think we should be working on changing things so that students graduate with less debt, and working on ensuring that time spent studying is worthwhile to the individual, but it's weird to treat extreme cases as if they are universal.
- disambiguation 1y agoYour math is incomplete. The whole formula includes interest rates and total amortized cost as well as the average / median income, cost of living, time to employment, and employment rates of new graduates. Additional exercises for the reader: find the average TTL of full loan repayment (~20 years) and the percent of graduates where debt exceeds earnings (~20%). This isn't to say that degree attainment isn't statistically better on average, much like paying off ransomware. The price of tuition seems to reflect the lack of reasonable alternatives more than the intrinsic value of the education.