cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/21841560
this post was submitted on 27 Oct 2024
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Late Stage Capitalism
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I'm curious that it makes me an ass to believe that no matter who your are, you should pay your debts. That goes for banks, industries, farmers, and students.
As I mentioned in another comment. I do believe the law needs to be changed to make student loans dischargeable in a bankruptcy.
The rest of your comment will take a lengthy reply, so I hope you stick around.
You are correct that education has far outpaced the rest of the economy when it comes to inflation. I believe there are two factors at work there.
First, we have glorified education at the expense of the trades. I grew up in the 70s and the roots of that were already beginning to take hold. The adults around me praised and respected (though that's not quite the right word) the "educated". They would say things like "if you want to amount to anything you need a college education!" While at the same time complaining about what the plumber, or electrician, or mechanic charged them.
When I went to high school I went to a school that had been "boys only" (a bad thing) until shortly before I started in 1977. They taught the trades. In fact I had to take eight introductory courses in various trades my Freshman and Sophomore years (a very good thing).
But educators bit on the whole "if you don't go to college, you will suck as a human being" thinking. Parents of course want what's best for their children, so they pushed their kids into colleges. Many of those kids would have been far happier elsewhere.
As an aside, my high school still exists, but I don't think you'll learn the trades there anymore (I may be won't about that as I haven't paid attention in many years, but I think I'm on pretty solid ground with my claim.)
More customers competing for limited resources raises prices. That said, it's not the main culprit.
The main culprit is the fact that there is no means-testing for student loans. Need a loan to go to school? Here's a check.
There was no financial pressure for universities to constrain costs. They knew that lenders would pay for someone's schooling regardless of cost, because those lenders had absolutely no risk!
This created a horrible downward spiral. Too many highly educated individuals competing for too few jobs has created a morass that will take generations at least to resolve.
We have too many highly educated folk, and too few folk willing to do manual labor in the trades. I can't count the number of trades people who have told me that they just can't find good help!
Of course too few people working in the trades has created another sort of inflation. That in turn impacts all of society.
So I personally think that a huge part of there not being anyone available for the trades was the 2008 recession.
I started college in 2002, while working full time in the trades. By 2004, I'd dropped out of school. In 2007 I had a construction company, and 15 full time employees, and another 15ish part timers working for me. By May of 2008, I had to lay everyone off, and I couldn't find any work. Of those 30ish people I had working for me, 1 is still in construction.
We did historic remodeling. These were guys that did everything from custom plaster and woodwork, to electrical and plumbing. There was no work, and we all moved to other shit. By the time work came back, it wasn't worth going back to it.
Holy shit, that's tragic. The loss of so much skilled labor is a huge loss in so many ways. I congratulate you on building something awesome, and I'm sorry you lost it.
What do you do now?
Windows DevOps Engineering. It's way easier on my body, and I never have to stalk a builder to get them to pay.
I was just one tiny company in a tiny city. I'd be willing to bet that there's a 5-10 year gap in the ages of people in the trades. There are a lot of stories like mine. People that were early to mid skill when 2008 happened and had to reskill.
Frequently, student loans were the only way to survive. We went back to school because there was no work. In my area you had to work or volunteer to stay on food stamps. The places that were approved to volunteer at were only allowing people with kids to volunteer.
I took $38,000 in student loans. I've paid $52,000 back on those loans. I still owe $54,000 on those loans. Both in 2002 and 2008 the mantra from the financial aid offices was "take the loans, deffer, consolidate, then deffer again, by then you'll be making enough money to pay them." They didn't explain how compounding all of that interest would mean that every $1 you signed for would actually be $3 in money you have to pay back.
That's another part I don't think people are talking about. Frequently, all that's being forgiven is fees and interest. No actual money is being lost, just potential money. If they retroactively set a 10% cap of profit from student loans, a huge number of people's balances would disappear.
Thanks for taking the time to write all that. It was good to read. I'm sorry you had to deal with all that. Glad you have your feet under you.
I'm a bit appalled by the lean repayments and you've given me something to think about.
Thank you.