While I do not thinks the loans should be forgiven (I'm working on paying back my own right now), we also shouldn't ignore the changing face of the American job market.

Ridiculous majors aside, even the mainstay fields are seeing job markets being inundated with degree holders. There's simply more people earning degrees than there are jobs available. Combine this with a culture that instills throughout junior high and high school that you are only successful if you go to college, and suddenly you have far more people seeking degrees than the job market can bear.

Now combine this with what the universities like to call "retention." They often pass along people who otherwise should have failed out in the interest of keeping them in school and paying tuition (much of which comes from student loans). Again, job market saturation.

And depending on the field, it matters very much if you went to Brown instead of BFE State Uni. For something like an MBA, if you are a newly emerging grad, you WILL be much better served by a degree from one of the more expensive schools. The job market is just that saturated (and competitive).

So to sum up, the issue lies in these areas:

1. High school students are made to believe the only way to become successful is to go to college. Thus, everyone goes.

2. The natural selection that should take place in universities is no longer functioning correctly, because universities are relaxing standards and passing students along so they can keep tuition coming in.

3. Marketplaces are flooded with degree holders, forcing folks to keep climbing higher and higher up the education ladder to stay competitive. What you could have done twenty years ago with a B.A. you now need a master's for.

4. Specialization. Degrees have become so specialized no that it's very hard to compete in crossover job markets. This means, again, that you have too many degree holders with too few jobs available and no real ability to seek jobs in other sectors with that degree.

5. Foreign students. There are so many foreign students who graduate and find American jobs. This shrinks an already diminished job market and leaves people--often Americans--without job prospects.

Do I think student loans should be forgiven? No. Do I think it needs to be recognized that our current system will do nothing but continue to make the situation worse? Yes.

And again, this isn't just about the person who spent $100,000 getting a master's in hip hip history. It's about English majors, engineers, accountants, historians, etc, who face the same issues.

quote:

Originally posted by Scoutmaster:

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
42% of Americans think that Abraham Lincoln fought the Nazis at Valley Forge.

I have to cut back on sigforum, either that or buy a new screen and keyboard. I don't know how many more times I can clean the Mt Dew off.

But forgiving debt does not stimulate the economy. It encourages economic carelessness and irresponsibility.

Pro-tip: Diet Mt Dew is easier to clean up.

People look at the loans the wrong way. They aren't an anchor, they're motivation. The article mentions people with loans would start businesses if they could just get the loans forgiven. I'd argue they should start businesses to pay those loans off. If a person can't figure out how to pay their loan off, I'm not sure they have what it take to start and run a successful business. Adversity and struggle build character.

Very few. But there are 75 million millennials in this country. Heretofore they haven't been voting in larger percentages. That's probably a good part of the reason Trump one. Older people voted, younger people didn't.

But lets say you're an enterprising democratic presidential candidate in 2020 (or even a House or Senate candidate in 2018) and you want to goose the millennials and get them to vote. Proposing a blanket forgiveness for student loan debt may very well do it.

quote:

Originally posted by Sigfest:
What percent of that 42% do you think voted for Trump? Very small I bet. That was the Bernie crowd.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
42% of Americans think that Abraham Lincoln fought the Nazis at Valley Forge.

And 58% of Americans polled did not know...

1 - Who Abraham Lincoln was.
2 - That Donald Trump was not a Nazi.
3 - That Valley Forge was actually a place.



And I'm with the screw 'em crowd when it comes to this issue. I worked all summer every summer from my junior year of high school through my senior year of college working residential construction with my uncle. Try doing roofing work in July In Florida snowflakes! I managed to save up enough money to get through school without racking up debt. My parents helped out where they could too. If I could do it, I'm sure these 'brilliant' young people can figure it out.

quote:

Originally posted by sigcrazy7:
My daughter just graduated from BYU in May. Not only did she manage to get through college with no student debt, she worked in her field which led to post-graduation employment on day one. During her college days, she also served a year and a half in Argentina on a mission, learned Spanish, got married, and saved $10,000 from working.

You don't need to go to Brown and spend $50,000 a year for an education. That is just a racket perpetuated by easy government money. A person who chooses his/her major well, is motived, and doesn't spend her college days hugging a beer keg can be really successful and graduate with no student debt.

You are crazy, teaching your daughter to be responsible and productive. How would the political/bureaucratic gravy machine continue to function if everyone was like your family.

quote:

And depending on the field, it matters very much if you went to Brown instead of BFE State Uni. For something like an MBA, if you are a newly emerging grad, you WILL be much better served by a degree from one of the more expensive schools. The job market is just that saturated (and competitive).

Doesn't this just raise the question why a student would be seeking a degree in a saturated marketplace? If you need to spend a quarter million to get an undergraduate degree on gilded sheepskin, just to be competitive, then you probably should reconsider the value of the degree.

Outside of snob circles in the big markets, flyover America really doesn't seem to care so much. When I worked for a big software company, five years out of college nobody cared where you went to school. The people who graduated from Stanford were viewed the same as those who graduated from Utah Valley University. The company really valued what you could do and your work ethic much more than your degree.

Software/coding is one of the few industries that care more about actual work output than your degree.

A degree from a "good" school doesn't do anything other than get your foot in the door. If you want to work in banking/consulting/energy/automotive etc a degree from a relevant school is critical. You won't even get an interview 95% of the time.

My daughter is getting her college degree for free. She works her butt off in a program that enrolled her in college at the start of high school. She will have her degree before graduating high school - by a few days. In fact she just switched from biology to mechanical Engineering because the employment options are broader/better.

She will get a BS from Florida Atlantic at 18, then go on to graduate school. Not Harvard, but as mentioned does not need to be. Our goal is no debt for our kids and cash in pocket to start their new lives - but they will work to earn it.

Sad thing is, at 15 she and the other high school kids end up being the best students and best grades while their college age classmates shoot for a C, skip class, barely speak up and make work for my daughter on group projects.

Education and opportunity are there for those that work and reach for it, but overall our college system seems pretty broken. No way to forgive - they made those choices. They owe.

Since college has become a necessity for anything above a menial level job, many more people are going to college than really should. That's a big part of the problem.

quote:

Since college has become a necessity for anything above a menial level job, many more people are going to college than really should. That's a big part of the problem.

A friend posted on Facebook earlier. Oscar Meyer is hiring Weiner Mobile drivers.

They are seeking "applicants with a bachelor of arts or sciences, preferably in public relations, journalism, communications, advertising, or marketing."

To drive a truck and cook hot dogs.

Re: graduating college while still in high school, the average starting salary of someone with a high school education in 1959 was around $54k... (in 2017 dollars) which is higher than the average starting salary of someone with a bachelor's degree today.

Not taking into account the differences in employment, pensions, unemployment rate, difficulty in switching jobs nowadays, etc.

It's a different world.

Our institutions of higher learning damn well understand who has the ability to benefit from their offerings, thus who should pass. Pursuit of a dream, desire for insight, determination, blessed with requisite cognitive ability, all play a part in who should take up valuable classroom slots.

That they accept unqualified people, those rich enough to pay any tuition, for political reasons, for pure profit, etc. robs those striving to learn by lowering the progress and level of discourse in the classroom even.

That they offer degrees that have no known or reasonable promise of return on ones time and funds spent... telling of their ethics.

If wishes were horses,
beggars would ride.

Our institutions of higher learning damn well understand who has the ability to benefit from their offerings, thus who would be better served elsewhere. Pursuit of a dream, desire for insight, determination, blessed with requisite cognitive ability, all play a part in who should take up valuable classroom slots.

That they accept unqualified people, those rich enough to pay any tuition, for political reasons, for pure profit, etc. robs those striving to learn by lowering the progress and level of discourse in the classroom even.

That they offer degrees that have no known or reasonable promise of return on ones time and funds spent... telling of their ethics.