Why don't we just cap the amount of the loans per semester? Universities aren't stupid, if the government will guarantee loans for outrageous amounts, they will increase their tuition by outrageous amounts.
@@dylanstump7389 Make private loans dischargeable then. No bank will take the risk of loaning $700,000 even it's for a Yale law student, forcing them to go to Sallie Mae. That or they need to increase interest rates to cover their risks, which would also achieve the goal of steering students towards Sallie Mae (and therefore enforce our hypothetical per-semester caps).
It’s used to be that way back in the 80s… people borrowed a sensible amount, and colleges were forced to keep their costs down. But Congress went and intervened, supposedly to help poorer students but actually to benefit the banks. Hence the current mess.
They should cap the amount PER STUDENT. If they want to stay in college longer than they can afford, then they will have to figure things out the old fashioned way. With work.
Generally speaking, I agree with you. But you know the lobbyist are going to pull the inequality card, about how low income families are now barred from "top" schools. Making the move not PC and in today's political climate, appearing to be PC is valued more than actual practicality. Also, I'm not sure if a cheap option exists for all fields. Say medical, is a cheap M.D. degree even possible? If not, that could be a problem in and of itself. There is a program for discharging the loan for people who work for the good of public after graduating, which I do believe include both medical and legal degrees which are the most expensive. But last I heard that wasn't working so well, with very few actually being discharged.
If student loans were dischargeable in bankruptcy, they would not longer be an option... And that's a good thing. It would force university costs to go down and not be at the insane level they're currently at.
Its not the university paying though, its the tax payer. I agree if loans were not government backed we wouldnt have the insane inflation on the cost of college that we have seen. I went to college in 2006, by the time I graduated tuition had just shy of doubled.
@@joewelch4933 Countries with free education system likely have implemented income tax which increases with the amount of salary. So those who get a college degree will likely repay the cost of their college education to the state by paying higher taxes.
In my Hawaiian high school, you could take a class in scuba diving and a class in native crafts - basket weaving. So you couldn't do it at the same time , but you could have the skill set to do underwater basket weaving.
in my australian high school ( years ago ), woodwork, metalwork and electronics were cancelled due to no interest supposedly, pity most of my year chose those classes, we got sewing, art and a choice of three languages. scuba diving and basket weaving sounds more fun
Basket weaving is often done underwater because it allows the reeds to remain pliable. Which is not at all what people mean when they say underwater basket-weaving.
When I was in a master's program, the department head was teaching on of my classes. He started by asking everyone why they were in this program. People said boring stuff like to further their careers or to better themselves. When he got to me, I said to delay paying on my student loans as long as possible. The other students chuckled but the professor equated my enthusiasm to someone in traffic school.
Steve, when I was a young man you could paint houses for the summer and pay for your next year's tuition, books, labs, room and board and still have $1 to $2 k for incidentals. But in those days colleges and unis adhered to their "tax free org" stipulations per the IRS. That is obviously no longer the case with the prices they've been charging for the last 20 years or so. They are most definately "for profit" orgs today Just look at the Billions of dollars they have in their endowments!
You can still do it. I didn't graduate that long ago and working demolition, manufacturing, tutoring, and work study I graduated with 17k in debt with about 10k in my savings (the only reason I had savings was because the loans were subsidized and I wanted to keep a savings incase I did have an emergency). I applied for a lot of scholarships (had 4 at a time at one point) which also required a lot of effort while my classmates didn't apply for anything our professors/advisors mentioned. So I had my debt paid off within 6 months of graduation. I treated college like a job. I was there at 8AM and didn't leave until all my work was done while also working 45 hours a week (24 hours of that was a Fri-Sun manufacturing job). My wife and I moved into our small apartment together at 18 and 19 and didn't party or pay exorbitant room and board. We drove old cars that we took good care of. She also did work study and worked at KFC 3-4 days a week. It is still possible to work hard, have personal responsibility and live within your means and graduate with little to no debt. We also picked the school that we did because I did the math before picking a college and did the math of how much tuition as and how much I would get in aid/scholarships to figure out which one was actually the cheapest and not just the cheapest sticker price or pick the one that gave the most scholarships even though they were the most expensive. The deck is only stacked against those who are lazy or entitled to thinking they deserve to go to a certain school or have expensive cars and nice things. No one is forced to go to the most expensive schools. At the end of the day an education doesn't give someone a good work ethic. I suspect the woman in this article is still learning this.
@@foxs49er You're the entitled one, Demolition is intense physical labor, work that usually starts from dawn and ends at dusk regardless of how long or short the day is and assuming you're not a crane wrecker operator the kinds of work you perform as a worker with hand-tools takes several weeks at minimum up to a year or two. Every day. Then you layered on top of that a manufacturing job? I assume you mean something like a CNC operator or a factory lineman of some sort, which is usually a 6AM to 4PM (sometimes even longer) AND ON TOP OF THAT you did tutoring AND EVEN ON TOP OF THAT you did your course work and sat in lectures. Who the fuck are you, and where to I get a time-turner? Of course the other option is that you worked those jobs on the black (no documentation and taxes) so your employer was much more happy to let you work limited hours in the shitty parts of the job with pretty much all the cut costs at risk of YOUR health.
Heard an interview with a woman who just became a journeyman electrician, she has two degrees and could not make enough to support herself and her child and pay her student loans. Now she is making over 80 thousand a year and will be making over 100 thousand ongoing. Why do high schools not suggest these non college routes forward to people?
My high school treated you like an idiot for going the tech school route for your final 2 years, half a day of tech school every day. To them if you didnt do algebra 1 you were an idiot. But if you didnt do algebra 1, you took financial applications and if you wanted, tech school. So you learned how to do a budget and weld, for example. Its the whole everyone needs to go to college, illegal immigrants and china will do the dirty work, an economy based on demand instead of supply works, dont think too hard on it idea. The hatred of hard truths drives this crap. My test scores were great, they really were bothered i wasnt interested in their unsustainable system. You cant have a society where everyone provides a nonproductive service to eachother, designers paying teachers paying psychologists paying car dealers paying lawyers and on and on. Someone has to create the base value, actual goods, or you outsource the real value of a nation.
They do.... the choice is up to the student. Not everyone goes to college for an art degree. Why do you think we have blue collar workers? Tech schools are a thing.
Here's the thing: Colleges have decreased value provided and increased costs. So what about Implied Warranty of Suitability? Why are colleges not required to demonstrate that their product (education) is suitable and beneficial? If I bought a lemon car, the car company would have to make good or refund the money. Why not do that with colleges? Secondly, why are colleges permitted to be so opaque about the costs of their products? In any other industry, unclear additional fees and hidden costs would have the FTC crawling up their finances with a microscope. We need a complete revision of our post-secondary education system, and honestly, wouldn't hurt to review secondary education as well. Our process is broken.
You could tie the repayments to the school overseeing or getting them a job. It would be like staffing companies that get you a job, and then get a percentage of your paycheck for a set period of time when you start getting paid.
@@WhereWhatHuh Good question. In my plan, the school would get payments proportional to the ratio of the job they get someone and what the industry pays someone in that field of study. Your senario would technically count, but the college would be getting pennies on the dollar back on the loan. If they want to get at least most of their money they would have to do a lot better since I would have the payments prorated, and limited in how long they can collect, maybe ten years or so. If course, if they got someone a super-sweet really well paying job they might be able to claim a bonus, as that would be prorated also.
Professors canbe really out of touch. I remember attending a faculty meeting as a student, and they were saying Wisconsin was thinking of passing a law requiring all public school librarians to have a degree in -- something, anything. They said "where would you find someone to work for that kind of money with a degree?" I Said "that's easy, pizza places, restaurants, all the people that found out an undergraduate degree in psychology or philosophy means nothing. They'd be happy to take those jobs if they include benefits."
When I went to university in the 90's, the only people getting student loans were doctors and lawyers. I distinctly remember being in the car driving home when the news announced they were opening up the student loan program to, basically, everybody, and thinking to myself what a terrible idea that was. Go check out the increase in tuition rates between 1980 and 2000, then 2000 and 2020. Looking at a graph, you can see when the student loan announcement was made.
I went to university in the late 80s and early 90s, did not major in medicine or law, and yet had federally guaranteed student loans every semester. Your premise is faulty, in that it isn't true that only doctors and lawyers were getting student loans.
There was an acceleration in tuition costs that mirrored Obama's push to get every high school graduate to go to a 4-year university. There are a LOT of incoming freshman that haven't even declared a major and they will end up staying in college for 5+ years because they waste the first year completing introductory classes. High school advisors are pressuring all these teenagers to go to college when many would do just as well in life at a local community college or trade school. Too many kids are convinced by these advisors to go to college and get a bachelors degree in something like "Gender Studies", accumulate 5 years of student loan debt, and can't find a job that pays well enough to pay that debt off. It's the same with undergrads that become convinced they need a graduate degree but they don't do the math on the debt they will accrue vs the income they will make once they begin their career. Way too many worthless graduate programs pumping out people with massive debt competing for a limited number of open positions.
@@dwwolf4636 That's a large part of it. So are reduced subsidies from the government and facilities that aren't necessary for education. Those multi-million dollar gyms are just there for recruitment, but still get charged to the student's fees.
The government needs to get out of the loan backing business; there also needs to be a cost benefit analysis conducted regarding loans vs. possible income. Just as a bank won’t give a loan for $250k on a house assessed at $100k; massive loans shouldn’t be given for a lot of frivolous degrees that have no future potential for monetary returns.
It is in the US Government's best interest to have a well educated workforce. Although I agree that student loans by themselves probably aren't the best way to do that. Instead, I think the Government should focus on subsidizing courses where there's a great need for more educated workers. THEN if students are struggling with living expenses while attending those courses, a government backed loan MIGHT be worth considering. But the focus would be on getting educated people into jobs where there is demand for them (which would in turn require the US Government to think ahead and predict what type of jobs will be in demand). As a side note, the US Government would probably want to keep most of those people working in the USA, so it might require that students who benefit from subsidized courses and student loans work in the USA for a period of time after graduation. Of course, that assumes the Government did their job right and most graduates were able to find work in their chosen field.
Couldn’t agree more. If the lenders actually bore the risk of the loans instead of the government, she never would have been able to accrue that much debt in the first place. And maybe all the easy money is why tuition has become so outrageous.
I agree with this.. and one of the greatest travesties is that of teachers... in some states, you need to have a masters degree to be a teacher. (NYS, You can start with a BS, but you need the Masters within 5 years), that can add up to some big loans.. but teachers are also not very well paid in their first 20 years or so. Starting wages are actually in the neighborhood of the poverty level and in some cases.. quite a bit below it. Something needs to be corrected here because that's just asking for a breakdown in the future... on top of that, you have some majors where you have less than 1% chance of ever using the damn thing.... on top of that, there are some jobs out there that require a college degree.. the first question I have is what kind of degree.. doesn't matter, you just need a BS/BA in something... wait what? I can understand teachers needing some degrees... we would not want our kids taught by teachers without one (and in some states, they can), or my DR or Lawyer not needing one could be bad.. but a job where you need a degree and even basket weaving works? Something smells in that world... but that's what this world has come to... we used to talk about the glass ceiling... but now there is this paper one that is even harder to break through than that glass one....
It's not counseling that needs an increase, it's government backing that needs to outright cease. Student loans are ONLY a problem because they're guaranteed by the government. If the university or a financial institution had to assume any of the risk, fewer loans would be given out, and those that would be would be for lower amounts of money. If fewer and lower loans were given out, universities would have to lower the price of their product to compensate. If the price was lowered, fewer students would need financial assistance and more could actually work to pay their ways through college without incurring any debt at all.
Actually, make the universities pay for the loans if the student graduates and pays 10% of income for 10 years towards the loan. Then, college will actually provide the value.
I agree, and not knocking someone's degree choice, but schools need to consider how much debt a person can handle, within their career choice, because dishing out all that money. If you're going for an engineering degree, you might can stand more than someone majoring in underwater basket weaving.
Colleges should be required to co-sign any government-backed student loan that is paid to them. Since all of their degrees will lead to a profitable career for their students, so there should minimal risk to them, right…?
Several months ago I spoke to some neighbors and they mentioned their daughter was going to an expensive private university in California for some random degree. I asked what was her potential to earn in that career field. The daughter, mom, and dad gave me a dear in the headlights stair. I mentioned that is something to think about when/if you have over $100,000 in student loans. I also read an article yesterday about a mother in TX that bragged she was going to put her kids through the best college she could. Then she complained how she had almost 100K in student debt on her government salary and she was almost 60yrs old. I get it when someone has unforseen health issues like the lady in this story, but so many people want something for nothing. They also get worthless degrees.
I avoided student loans with the Army's VEAP. It wasn't enough to cover a law degree, but it did cover most of my Bachelor's degree in Structural Engineering.
Good for you. I knew of folks going to law school "part time" and working fulltime. One h*ll of a trip. Seemed easier to attend law school fulltime and not work at all, which is what most law students seem to do. But these folk attending part-time and working fulltime graduated with less law loans and oftentimes where they, already worked, was some law frim or legal entity. So they already had a foot in the door, but they just needed a law degree to move up. The only difference between full and part-time law school was one year. You got an extra year, for a 3-year law degree! You'd think that part-time would mean something like 5 years. You'll still be taking too many hours it seems. But people do it.
I used to be a financial aid officer at a local college. For any student who was awarded a Stafford loan as part of his/her package, we did loan counseling. I cannot tell how bored these students were. Terms like "accrued interest" and "payment schedules" just passed over their heads. I started to make up stories. I used these stories to demonstrate how choices made now, affect a person's future. Sometimes, they got it. More often, not. I feel sad about it now.
@@theincantrix1144 You are being a bit dismissive. As someone who just recently got out of college I have to point out that the idea of getting out of college massively in debt is completely normalized. Like all throughout high school we are told that 1. college is necessary to get a good job (with only a handful of people talking about how trade schools and certification programs are also a viable option) 2. we are told that we want to get into the most prestigious college we can test into which typically means getting into an expensive college and that there is a stigma against community college and to a lesser extent state universities 3. college debt is seen as a fact of life and as a high schooler who at best may have a part time job and thus only the barest idea of the true value of money is asked to make MASSIVE financial choices. The gist of it is a $100,000 schooling debt isn't even that hard to accrue as $25,000+/year tuition costs are not in any way uncommon. I mean I got the highest level of scholarship that my local state university offered and I still left almost $15,000 in debt and that is seen as getting through the system very lightly. The fact is that most people won't truly respect how much a dollar is worth until they have spent at least a few years in the labor market and yet teenagers are being asked to make these decisions without that understanding. Also as someone who has sat through the mandatory loan counselling somewhat recently, there are 2 points I would like to make from that side. First, a lot of these counselling sessions happened yearly so the first couple of times you have them they wouldn't really stick because it was still years away and by the time it started to get closer to when they actually applied to you, you would have already heard the same thing enough times that it is hard to get invested into the counselling. Second, even when it get's closer to the time that you actually start repaying, chances are you have taken some form of economics class and it feels like at best a refresher course and for me at least it still didn't quite fit in as real as there was always that thought in the back of my mind that I'll figure out how to handle it later once I actually got a good paying job. The TLDR of what I am saying is that what we are taught is skewed towards normalizing large college debt to the point where you get a bit desensitized to it and the stuff we are not taught i.e. the real value of money, I don't believe can be reliably taught without a few years working in the job market (or possibly growing up in poverty). And frankly one of the biggest financial decisions of a persons life they often are asked to make before have even finished high school.
@@christianstonecipher1547 Your parents taught you nothing then. They left you to suffer through the rigours of life with no preperation whatsoever. They likely encouraged your whims (anything not a STEM field degree, is a whim - especially in the age of the internet). I had a job delivering newpapers at 9 yrs old (back when such things were common). If I wanted anything extra, I had to both work and save for it. It was normal through the majority of human history that you worked - you worked the farm, or you worked around the house, or you did odd jobs. Modern children are kept in diapers well into their teens, and often even out of college now. Easy to spot, you look for excuse-making or tantrum throwing.
25 -50% of Colleges are predicted to close. When they close they will be „off the hook“. The real question is what is „useless“. Is a humanities degree „useless“. No, but it should never cost $30,000 - $50,000 a year, when what it requires is a room or public meeting place, a teacher, and some used books. You could rent a library room once a month and not even maintain the real estate. Most classes could be online. I do however think in person instruction and interaction is important. What has been happening is the high tuition humanities degree has been subsidizing the high cost engineering or medical degrees.
Economic debt slavery is what we live under. All of us where told by our parents wishing only the best for us to get a degree. So we went and got a degree and tuitions skyrocketed as schools learned how to milk the system with little limitation on what one could take out despite academic performance. And now everyone has a Bachelors degree making it really no better then a High School Diploma was for our parents (or grand parents).
People getting useless degrees is a huge problem. I have seen it in my own family. People have the misconception that any college degree is better than none and that they should pursue their career dreams no matter how expensive. Somehow, there needs to be an honest conversation, a reality check for the students by a trusted adult before they get themselves into such horrible economic difficulty at such a young age.
I heard of the useless degree stuff in the mid 1960's when I was in high school. A year plus after high school graduation I was off to the USAF. They taught me how to fix airplanes, how to manage the people, and allowed me to get an Assoc. degree without any debt. After 20 years I retired, went to a trade school on the VA, and then did 21 years as an industrial electrician with basically no overhead supervision on multi thousand $$$ projects start to finish. Sure am enjoying my full retirement now.
There was a similar case like this that Lawful Masses covered a year or two ago. Basically they can be discharged, but like Qualified Immunity, there's no written standard, rule, or law that says that student loans cant be discharged; just in practice, they're usually not.
Note, this might not be the case in this particular situation, but in general the cost of college and the high amount of student debt, is another case of government involvment making things worse. Lenders making bigger and bigger loans easy to get due to government backing -- > allows colleges to increase tution --> students to take out more and more debt. Rinse and repeat until the whole system comes crashing down and the US tax payer holding the bag.
@@cvr527 : You don't understand how direct it _really_ was- LBJ intended these loans to literally _be how_ "free college for everyone" was implemented. The only reason why he even bothered with the conceit of loans was that Congress wasn't stupid enough to think that it would be cheap.
@@EdDale44135 Data on which? There was an article in the Chicago Tribune a few years ago which charted several decades' worth of increases in Federal Student Aid and average costs to attend US colleges and universities. _Every single time_ Congress allocated more money for grants and (mostly) backing loans "to make college more affordable," colleges and universities cranked up their tuition & fees over the next year or two. And worse, higher education costs were basically flat in between the big increases in Federal spending. While correlation is not causation, it certainly proved that the reverse - that FSA was only going up in response to rising costs (and failing to keep up, at that), as commonly argued - was definitely not true. As for the LBJ stuff, this is the first time I've heard that he meant to provide "free college" via federally guaranteed student loans. But it could be true - it fits in well with other Great Society programs, both in its stated intent and in its real-wotld consequences.
There are a lot more students that qualify for a "fill in the blank" Studies than for STEM. Colleges make most of their money on these Basket Weaving Studies courses. There is no incentive for them to change.
They make most of their money from raising tuition to many times more than it ever should be, and sports teams...definitely the sports teams. There are *far* fewer of those "basket weaving" type courses than you are apparently aware of but I'm guessing you don't actually work for a university/college so you're just babbling about something you actually know very little about. And for the record, basket weaving was an actual time honored course until very recently. I know because my great-grandfather used to teach the course back in the early-ish 1900s through the 1950s, and he's actually considered THE master of the craft. We know because several books have been written about him. Some of his baskets are worth tens of thousands of dollars.
@@ehrichweiss Certainly meant no disrespect towards your grandad. Anything that ends in a Studies is pure crap coast to value wise. I spent nearly 40 years in engineering and barely earned a hs diploma. Most of the very best in my field learned on the job / no degree.
“don’t walk run” has a fantastic channel! That’s a great video. Until schools carry some risk on bad loans this won’t go away. Forcing taxpayers to pay off these worthless loans is the current plan, and already started
I remember working at BK with two people with PhDs while I was in highschool. Work on the job to become a mechanic and made more then most people I knew with PhDs.
student loans are the new form (mechanism) of indentured servitude. I can see the loan principle not being dischargeable, and perhaps interest to a point. Of course, people need to face reality that most college degrees are worthless
Lawyer, CPA, or STEM. Subsidized loans going to a state or community college are OK but not great. They are better than inflation. However they are not able to be discharged. Paid mine way down durring this interest free period.
yep that is the one big problem with student loans, if they would lower the interest on the loans I believe most people could pay them back. My wife and I have our kids loans because that how it works now, kids get some but parents a bulk of them. our interest is so high it is crazy,
In the Netherlands you used to have a system where there was a basic scholarship for 3 years of support that requires you to finish your bachelors degree within 10 years (with some special exceptions). If you failed to get your degree, you did have to pay it back, but otherwise this money was like a present/investment from the government. Of course, if needed, you were also able to loan money (at a very low interest rate), which you did have to pay back eventually. Unfortunately for students right now, the basic scholarship has been replaced with a loan structure 5ish years ago, but the government is actually debating about bringing back this scholarship, which I'm all for.
I finally paid off my student loans at age 41. I can’t even imagine borrowing $ now given the astronomical cost of going to school. I have 2 daughters in college ft and working ft now, and without federal grants and their Native American grants, there is absolutely no way they could do it. I highly cautioned them against utilizing student loans.
Sounds like one of the LAST classes Steve attended should have been one of the first classes for everybody who applies for student loans. But then why should schools educate students about personal finances?
The goal of schools has nothing to do education but to instill a military style indoctrination mind set on all their peasant's children. (ie: mess hall- cafeteria, boot camp - gym, being silent and not having an opinion when the commander/teacher is talking, etc etc etc)
The college didn't want to scare off a potential income stream, students, until after they'd gotten the federally backed money out of them. If students quit the college would have suffered financially. Similarly- My CFI 🛩️said he would only teach most flight students stall/ spin recovery until just before they flew their final FAA test; otherwise they might get scared off and immediately quit flight training. I quite enjoyed spin recovery like a rollercoaster 🎢 The CFI started ALL the stalls leading to spins. he was amazed that I could fly indefinitely with the stall warning ⚠️ horn blowing. CFI said, "You're the only one I know who enjoys this as much as I do. Most pilots I know said they'd need a parachute before trying it."
i been out of school 15 years and never once was i taught about money or finance apart from shit like change from $5. 15 years later and i know about the same when it comes to finance as when i left school. Schools and UNIs have a vested interest in keeping us financially dumb to make more money from us
That's changing in order to take out my student loan, I had to sit through a short course explaining the loans and related bits. I didn't take out that much, just about $3k, and I'll have it paid off before I have to pay any interest thanks to the pandemic relief. But, arguably, they need to do more, and it doesn't account for when the college does things that negatively impact the student and reduces the ability to earn. I was going to be making close to $60k a year teaching, but I'm making roughly half that right now due to the college royally screwing me over and denying me civil rights protections as college officials and partner schools were making decisions based entirely on my sex and skin color. It's blatantly illegal, but tolerated when you're a white man. At the same time, the state was to lower standards to get more people of color into the profession. I'm going to be just fine, and I didn't take out many loans, but the situation is rather ridiculous.
I remember about a year ago Steve talked about a woman who graduated from law school in I believe Ohio who had a similar amount of student debt who was refused a law license because she had no intention of paying it back. She also had filed quite a few frivolous law suits.
"If we are lending money that ostensibly we don't have to kids who have no hope of making it back in order to train them for jobs that clearly don't exist, I might suggest that we've gone around the bend a little bit," ........... Mike Rowe
My wife and i did the dave ramsey plan and paid off all of our student loans in 2 years. My loan was paid off 96 months early. Also i have a fine arts degree in jewelry and now i run the production of jewelry for a online jewelry company. There is nothing wrong with getting a art degree if you have a plan. Now we have a sweet little baby and dont have financial worries and are excited to win with money.
My 4 years of engineering school tuition and books was a whopping total of about $8,000. Yup now I make a 6 figure income. Don't underestimate the value of a community college starter education 😉
Ah, the good ol' days. I remember them, too. But I'm also putting my first of 3 kids through school right now, and times have changed. Still, you are absolutely right: be smart, start at a community college, then go to an in-state university to get a degree that has a good chance of a decent job and the student loans will be manageable.
@@willdejong7763 Yup! People can save at least 50% on tuition by starting out at community college and going to an in state university. It also helps to get a degree that generates decent income 😉
My American friends are astonished when I tell then that not only was my university education completely free of charge but I was given a living allowance grant also. No scholarships - everyone benefitted from this arrangement. Three years at a top flight college, an engineering degree and no debt whatsoever. Didn't know it at the time but now I realize I was very fortunate.
In Canada, student loans can be discharged in Bankruptcy, but only once seven years have passed since you left school. There is also a provision for earlier discharge if repayment would result in undue hardship.
I agree with you Steve 10000000%! Furthermore, not everyone is college material that thinks they are. There are plenty of careers that are in demand that pay a good salary. No one wants to count the cost anymore, even when I was in school. Personal financial education in the country is horrendous.
As a German, these Student Loans are incredible and I'm glad I only have to pay around 200€ per Semester. I can't imagine having such debts after getting my degree
That's how much it cost for tuition here in Canada in the early 2000s, around $250 for a full courseload semester for BA (I knew someone who went to same school and program I did). When I was working on my undergrad in the early 2010s, it was around ten times the cost (~$2500/semester for tuition and books). I'm doing an online program now with a big name Canadian university and it is about $1000/class.
@@wlonsdale1 Yeah, they pay less taxes than the average American does (public and private), and end up with universal healthcare, higher education, less stressful and more efficient work environment, months of paid vacation/child leave, a top economy in the world, etc.. Why do you think education is so expensive in the West? To keep people like you uneducated enough to think you have it good.
Honestly college is a sham nowadays anyway. In the 90s and below it was worth it as you could actually get paid more, but now that $100,000 degree that you went to school for will bankrupt you for 40 years and may get you a dollar more an hour. Not worth it. Unless you’re starting your own business, becoming an engineer, or basically some sort of rich $150,000 job, IF you even make it that far than maybe go for it. I’m just amazed how much these schools charge, and how little you get for all that work, when basically a diploma will do. A waste of time honestly. Well done on the video.
@Steve Lehto : that shirt! Grandma used to make pasties when I was little, they were quite the treat! Then we had a couple of little hole-in-the-wall places that made them, but neither one lasted too long. So where is Lehto's Pasties?
Lots of pearls of wisdom from this story. There is a difference to someone who has experienced employment discrimination, not given a chance to repay and someone who refuses to repay. That is the beauty of our court system. If anyone goes to school with the intent to better themselves and society, that is good. For those who are discriminated or not given the chance then I say ok. Yet there has to be a list of discrimination for example for loan forgiveness. In other words prove your case, prove you have been discriminated against. 🤔❤🇺🇸
I hear tell of seniors who retire, still trying to pay off student loans from college, while they are now barely getting by on Social Security. Something is wrong with an education system built like this.
Yep, I'm one of them! If you have more than $750/month in Social Security, the government takes 15% of your check to pay back government-based student loans. I'm 73 and I'll be paying the loans back until I die. It's mostly compounded interest that's owed, and it just keeps compounding. Thankfully, there's no debtors prisons in this country, or I'd be sitting in a cell.
My soon-to-be ex-wife has student loans from before she and I met, that she will likely never be able to pay off, due to health issues. Perhaps she should study this case. Soon-to-be ex status has nothing to do with student loans.
I worked at a college that can only be described as a student loan racket. There were kids in my classes that could not read or write. But they could sign the student load forms and borrow obscene amounts of money. Most of the people simply would never earn enough money to pay back those loans. The government needs to stop making loans like this so colleges will stop jacking up prices for school. It's a vicious cycle.
12:24 Wouldn't it be more helpful if they made students take that class before the start of all their courses? At least then they'd know about the crippling debt they're gonna be getting into for the next 35+ years. Oh wait. If they did that there might be fewer student loans made and way less interest/fees for t̷h̷e̷ ̷s̷h̷a̷r̷k̷s̷ lenders to collect. Silly me. 🙄
That would have been a dream for me. I did electronic engineering and the course I completed was nothing like what was in the course description. The other interesting thing is that universities can change a course whilst you are doing it. I actually had 3 units that I completed not counting towards my end degree due to course changes and had to do an extra year of study without failing a single unit.
My dad sat down with me in 1999 after I graduated high school and helped me determine how much I could afford to take out in Student loans based on the career I was planning on pursuing. We then chose a college based on what we expected I could likely afford in the future. I didn't graduate due to health issues but because of that conversation being burned into my brain, I didn't have student loans that were so expensive, I couldn't afford the payments. I'm now 40 years old and the loans I took out back then are paid off. The best advice I was ever given as my husband did _not_ have that advice and I married a man with nearly $80k in student loans. We'll be paying _those_ off for the next couple decades, I'm assuming. Amazing what a difference our situations are. The good news (at least), is he's in an industry where he can afford the ridiculous monthly payments.
I started Law School at age 43 as a military retiree with some Vietnam-era Montgomery VA benefits and avoided borrowing money. My peers were mostly not so fortunate. We were told during initial orientation that within five years of graduation, only half of us would be working as lawyers. Why didn't your school give you the dose of reality at the start of school, allowing you to avoid the trap? Answer: they got their money. For public schools, the law school may be a cash cow for the university and law students are subsidizing some of the more expensive graduate schools. I am an admitted cynic but cynics are made, not born.
Hey, good for her. Not quite apropos but there's an old Greek paradox about paying off law school fees, known as the counterdilemma of Euathius. The sophist Protagoras took on Euathius as a law student on the understanding that Protagoras would be paid his fee when Euathius won his first court case. However Euathius after finishing his tuition decided to go into politics instead. So Protagoras sued him for the amount he owed. Protagoras argued that if he won the case, he would be paid his money. If Euathlus won the case, Protagoras would still be paid according to the original contract, because Euathlus would have won his first case. Euathlus, however, claimed that if he won, then by the court's decision he would not have to pay Protagoras. If, on the other hand, Protagoras won, then Euathlus would still not have won a case and would not be obliged to pay. We're not told how that played in court and one wonders how it would play today.
Another problem with trying to declare bankruptcy is that the person is left with no credit. It also takes seven years for that to be removed from your FICO score, so a mortgage and most types of loans aren't going to be available to that person. On top of that, moving into a rental becomes a problems, because they'll want two to three months of rent as a deposit, if not more.
It's the fault of the lenders and the universities for extending that much credit for a long-shot course of study. Universities should be made co-signers on student loans... it would solve sooo many problems in higher education!
I GIVE UP! Why do I work SO HARD and save SO HARD just to have others SCREW THE SYSTEM, and make me PAY FOR THEIR FOOLISHNESS!!! Yes, I have sympathy for my fellow citizen, and yes, I wouldn't wish her problems on an enemy, but MY LORD, she knew she had these ailments early on, but CHOSE to CONTINUE PILING ON FOR YEARS! I am sick of it. Her bad decisions should not be covered by my tax dollar. It just shouldn't. The entire higher educational system has turned into a criminal bad JOKE!
So far I'm the only person I know of who's graduated, in 2014, with no student loan debt. & No, my parents didn't pay anything. First off both of my parents were unemployed, 2008, so I got Maximum Federal Pell Grants every semester. 2nd I had Hope Scholarship via Georgia Lottery, for having above 3.0 average. Lastly and Most Importantly, I applied for EVERY SINGLE FUCKING SCHOLARSHIP that I qualified for. After submitting around 50 or so scholarship applications, every semester, there were always several where I was the ONLY APPLICANT WHO APPLIED. I was able to get lots of free $$$ for school that way. I still don't understand why everyone goes straight for the student loans without ever even TRYING to get scholarships.
@Evey Sweeney That’s exactly what my daughter did! She started applying for scholarships in ninth grade and never stopped!!! Most of the time she was the only applicant!!! She also worked 4 jobs while going to school. Her dad and I paid a little. Then the college she attended chipped in a little. Every little bit helped! She graduated from Vanderbilt University debt free after 4 years!
Exactly! There are plenty of scholarships out there too. You do have to look for them . If you have a high GPA in high school and did very well on your SAT's , You should be able to get all the financing you need without a loan. (Unless you want to live off campus.)
If there is anyone who deserves relief it may well be this gal. But I think the burden of her endeavor should be shared with the schools she was accepted into along with the origin and lenders and not just the taxpayers.
Awww! So she wants a free ride because it's too difficult to repay but she 's going to stick the bill to taxpayers without regard to their ability to bear her burden.
I am more than willing to give her a free ride through my taxes. I'd just like them to be around half the taxes that currently go to into politicians bank accounts. People need to learn where to fight.
I think we see here part of the reason many attorneys make questionable choices in terms of what firm they choose to work for or what kinds of clients they take outside of trial practice. When you're under a mountain of debt and you're in a profession where it's hard to get started (people generally hire an attorney based on their reputation in the particular field of law, and that makes it hard to compete when you've not done anything much as of yet) you can find yourself doing things that may not be what you want to do, but you do need to do. (I'm VERY glad I didn't end up with any student debt.)
Where’s the parents advising their kids? Pretty dumb to get a degree that’s only slightly useful in a couple cities in the world. If you move to a different state…
She likely provided a long history of medical issues. This works with our loan and welfare system. Example: long ago in the housing collapse, I briefly used food stamps, but recovered. The GA drones I met were below-average people who often misunderstood legal stuff. It looks bad to beat up on the sick, and doctor notes are very powerful!
Here's an idea if you don't want student debt. Don't go to college or join the military and use the GI Bill that pays for your school and pays for your housing. Otherwise if you do get a student loan please remember that loan is your responsibility not the tax payer.
Nothing like taking student loans out for a basket weaving degree. I'm glad he said that at the end of the video cuz that's what I was thinking the whole time
settlement, the ultimate silver bullet to ever getting a judgement that might stop horrific practices, fix illegal laws, or give people relief its just like appeals court declaring that qi needs a previous case to determine qi doesnt apply and never allowing that 'previous case' to happen
I recently filed for Chapter 7 and hired a bankruptcy attorney. She advised that all debts should be listed on the petition, even those that can't be discharged (like student loans and some tax debts, both of which I had) for informational purposes, because the court will consider your potential post bankruptcy situation when making it's decision. It's possible that my attorney did some wizardry behind the scenes, but I was never told about it... The court discharged my $40k in loans completely! I was a University of Phoenix student. They require you to watch a video of Suze Ormann talking down to you like you're a bad dog, telling you about how it is literally impossible to get student debt discharged. It feels good to have gotten this virtual also on her smug little face. Maybe she's a great person with a brilliant financial mind, but watching that video created visceral anger and hatred that I'm not proud of, and I'm glad it's gone.
Stories like this piss me off. I repaid every cent of my student loan. I owed no one anything. 6 years of surviving on Ramen noodles and peanut butter sandwiches to make the $1000/month payment. I remember making that last payment and having a little party to celebrate. Like getting a $1000 a month raise.
Well done! Definitely something to be proud of! I understand that feeling due to paying off my home mortgage. There was a time when that was the biggest investment anyone would ever make. Now it is education and health insurance followed closely by vehicles.
I paid mine off, too. However, this lady will likely die before she would repay that big amount. Also, she's not getting into the industry to studied for. So, the lower amount sounds just.
My wife and I, middle class earners, $20k to $70k combined income over our marriage, were frugal enough that we could pay for our child's medical education that cost over $300,000. Can you imagine how pissed I will be if the administration eliminates student debt.
I remember Lennard covered a case a few years back where a judge gave the opinion that the undue hardship standard doesn't match the language of the law. Curious why that opinion hasn't been brought elsewhere.
When I started college in 1995 we had a manditory seminar about what we were getting into with student loans. They described the difference between subsidised and unsubsidised loans and how all of that worked. I would have freaked out if I had gotten to the end of the road and they had laid it out on me like Steve went through. It still took me forever to pay them off, but at least I was in a good field.
I've heard many arguments for and against "student loan forgiveness." Often, not always, the arguments only look at one aspect and don't take into consideration the second and third order effects of what would happen if that particular argument was implemented. Having student loans myself, I can empathize with those who feel the weight of them hanging around their neck. I also find it ridiculous to take out 300k+ in loans in pursuit of a degree in things that have no reasonable chance of making enough to pay back the loans. That said, I did hear a couple incredibly well thought out arguments. One was to eliminate the interest rates on all fed backed loans. Another, though an interesting idea I somewhat disagree with it, was to only offer fed backed loans to STEM degrees. Another was to make these educational institutions co-sign the loans, making them just as liable for the debt as the individual.
I don't think much of forgiveness. On the other hand, I don't believe that student loans should be protected from bankruptcy. Let the banks make the poor loans and let the students with a basket weaving degree discharge them in bankruptcy. I see no reasons schools need a defacto subsidy which is what government backed student loans effectively are. The whole reason higher education costs increases vastly exceed inflation is that they know desperate students will be able to borrow money to cover the costs.
this person exemplifies "how to make consistently poor financial decisions" There are plenty of people that graduated reasonable majors that are still buried under crippling debt with no end in sight (other than death)
Realistic is a word that is foriegn to most young people today, many of whom have never been told "no". The "guaranteed " part needs to go away. This would have a "trickle up " effect. Eliminating a lot of the worthless degrees as well as the nonsensical classes that are required for your degree, that have nothing to do with your degree.
People who file for personal bankruptcy disgust those of us who live within our means and pay our bills. Actually, we're paying their bills too, because all of the losses forced on lending institutions and credit card companies then trickle down for us to pay. They live the good life and walk away, leaving us holding the bag. You have ads on TV for people looking to get out of paying their credit card balances, negotiating "pennies on the dollar". It's typical for the times."You're not responsible", " it's not my fault", "they induced me", all typical of today's lifestyle of shirking responsibility. The penalty for bankruptcy should be far more strict, like it is in most countries. All your assets siezed, houses and their contents, vehicles, jewelry, everything. Then there should be an inability to obtain any kind of credit for ten years. Walking away with most of your assets intact is no punishment for financially screwing over the people and businesses that you owed.
When you see people keeping their houses in a personal bankruptcy, they are either in a 7 and re-affirming the debt, or they are in a 13 meaning that they are not only paying the debt but making up back payments. With automobiles they have to pay off the value if they are to keep it. It's never been an option to just wipe away secured debt and keep the collateral. Also, you're not paying a dime more for anything because of what someone else did with a bankruptcy. Anyone that understands money and how it works can see through that argument. If you're ready for the red pill, listen to (or read) The Creature From Jekyll Island. Only after understanding the true nature of money and how it works will you understand how and why bankruptcy is a necessary part of the equation.
And if you think the banks and credit cards companies are eating that debt, you're nuts. They pass it on to the consumers in one way or another. I'm 70, buster, been around the block a hell of a lot more than you, and I know about how the monetary system works.
@@jpharleyd9325 Perhaps you can answer a question for me then.... 1) The Feds print money and loan it to us (the national debt) 2) Said money is loaned with interest (interest on the national debt) So how is all this money supposed to be paid back when all money in existence is merely the principal? Mathematically the system is setup so that NOT ALL MONEY CAN BE PAID BACK. But maybe you in all your infinite wisdom can figure it out.
@@Conkythedumy The feds don't loan us money. Paper money is no more than a promisory note that the money represents it's value backed up by prescious metal. Politicians put together a budget. That budget far exceeds whst it takes in every year and that's why we're in the situation we are. Lending institutions and credit card companies are private businesses owned by shareholders who exist because they lend money and charge interest on it. These institutions have a fiduciary duty to their stockholders to make money. When people default on loans and on their credit cards, their defaults are passed on to those of us who pay our bills. They're no better than people who steal from stores. The cost of those losses are passed on to the consumer.
@@jpharleyd9325 Wrong. All money is debt based. It hasn't been backed by precious metal for years. It started with the Federal Reserve Act of 1913. Again, "The Creature From Jekyll Island" required reading here, but that something you wouldn't be able to handle after spending 70 years thinking you know how the monetary system works. What really makes me sick are those, who through their own ignorance, believe that all of this debt can be paid back with interest. It is simply a mathematical fact that some will be able to pay it back and others wont. The ones like me, and presumably you, will pay our debts because we are in the right circumstances to do so. "There but by the grace of God go I". It's not in my character to look down on the inevitably less fortunate in a system that mathematically creates winners and losers, and advocate for harsher conditions that they are already experiencing.
One of the best deals out there are the state maritime colleges. They always rank very high on the Money value based rankings. They are not that expensive and the job placement numbers are some of the highest around. Best of all you don't have to be an MIT genius to get in, just be willing to work hard. The deepwater hiring market is not great but the workboat business is doing great and getting better as the offshore wind business picks up. In addition, the logistics, shipbuilding, power and military hire a lot of graduates as well. Maine, Massachusetts, New York, Texas, California and Michigan all have colleges.
OMG, By the time I graduated I had a wife and two children. We were barely getting by and ate lunch every day at the soup kitchen because we were so broke. Just buying baby formula was unbelievably expensive. We declared bankruptcy but the court said we could not discharge our federal student loans. We paid $99 a month for 21 years to pay them off. We wanted to claim that we had been paying for too long but they said every time we renegotiated the loans we started the clock over again so it was like a brand new loan. I did get an upper management job after I got my MBA so I guess the loans were worth it. It took us that long to pay back a little under $25,000 in loans. There is no way you're going to pay off $350,000 in debt. Thank God we don't have debtors prisons anymore.
My understanding is that she filed for bankruptcy and lodged a second proceeding regarding the student loans. Regardless if she gets a Tax debt she can just go bankrupt again.
I once lived near the KU Med Center in Kansas City. Lots of people training to become doctors. Neighbor of mine was a resident Anestisologist. Told me one night that he was probably going to have $500k in student loans when he got out. Which makes sense, when you know that he had to borrow to pay all his living expenses. So they have to make tons of money right off the bat, to keep their heads above water. Which partially explains why health care costs are out of control in this country. Too many people are making too much money the way it is for it to change. I plan on beating the system, by dying early and suddenly. Call it taking one for the Wretched Refuse team. Better that, than be pennyless after paying off the doctors and hospitals.
Grad school and borrowing up to cost of attendance, plus they accrue interest while you're there. The mistake is thinking you're ever supposed to pay them back. Just file for IBR and if you end up making at least ten% more post tax than before you went, then you're fine. The structural issue is really with people leaving college no better than when they started.
You can still find overhead projectors for sale on eBay. I created a large binder full of the transparencies to be projected, while instructing for the Air Training Command, back in the 70's. These tools had some advantages over power point. You could (e.g.), quickly use a grease pencil to change, correct or add clarifications to a transparency, during your instruction.
Steve I had 3 older cousin that all started college 1980 and 1981 or so.. They took out student loans which were at a subsidized interest rate 5.5 percent. They were able to buy zero coupons bond that were at interest rate as high as 12.9 percent. So their invested money was doubling ever 5.5 years while their loans where doubling ever 13.4 years. Their scheme last about 15 years and I remember them figuring out that they had paid about 5k for both a bachelor and masters degree this included room and board. It was just a strange time between 81 and early 85 when interest rate here that high.
It’s one of those things, until you’ve felt a bit of the pain behind compound interest working against you it’s hard to wrap your head around it at 17. Even if you are smart enough to make an amortization table, and plan out paying it back it’s also hard to really understand how much life costs in your 20s/30s starting a family, etc, when your 17. They make it just TOO easy to get the money, I mean the federal loans basically are just line items on your bill that automatically get deducted unless you go out of your way to decline them. Private is obviously a little more traditional like a bank or car loan. I don’t know what they do now but for me it was literally a 15 min meeting the 1st week of freshman year where they hand a room full of people the terms of federal loans.
I read every line of the loan paperwork when I signed it. Nothing in there taught me about how capitalizing interest could snowball loans. Because you only learn about that AFTER you get the loan and are unable to repay it right away. I was a kid, my parents didnt have to deal with student loans so they had no clue either. Now a day kids dont have quite as an excuse as its clear the predatory nature/how student loans can get out of control. But that is only a more recent revelation. In 2005 when I signed my first loan in my home town these issues were not known. Student loans started off with good intentions. But now lenders see it as a good source of high return very low to no risk income source.
You should not be able to take out a student loan amount where the repayments are near or higher then the potential income of the learned profession. Mike Roe has it right, we need to be pushing more trade schools and less colleges.
I took some classes one semester Went to the finance dept to pay They handed me a folder full of crap to fill out for lones and such I laughed and handed it back said no I pulled 4 grand out of my pocket And the most amazing thing happened No one knew what to do with it There so used to the grift they could not comprehend cash I did that a few times And that is how I got my degree
People need more education on paying for education. If you have a serious health condition and financial difficulties why are you taking out a loan to get 2 film degrees to try to break into the film industry? Not only is it a competitive industry but unlike tech, it’s declining. Nobody cares about your degree on a film set. This is an utter disaster and is the reason government thinks citizens can’t make their own intelligent decisions.
With FASFA loans you do it to stop the interest and payments on subsidized loans. Ever move this lady made was calculated. Dreams of being big in hollywood. This is malignant narcisism embodied.
Why don't we just cap the amount of the loans per semester? Universities aren't stupid, if the government will guarantee loans for outrageous amounts, they will increase their tuition by outrageous amounts.
the problem with this is you would just require people to then get private and government loans
@@dylanstump7389 Make private loans dischargeable then. No bank will take the risk of loaning $700,000 even it's for a Yale law student, forcing them to go to Sallie Mae. That or they need to increase interest rates to cover their risks, which would also achieve the goal of steering students towards Sallie Mae (and therefore enforce our hypothetical per-semester caps).
It’s used to be that way back in the 80s… people borrowed a sensible amount, and colleges were forced to keep their costs down. But Congress went and intervened, supposedly to help poorer students but actually to benefit the banks. Hence the current mess.
They should cap the amount PER STUDENT. If they want to stay in college longer than they can afford, then they will have to figure things out the old fashioned way. With work.
Generally speaking, I agree with you. But you know the lobbyist are going to pull the inequality card, about how low income families are now barred from "top" schools. Making the move not PC and in today's political climate, appearing to be PC is valued more than actual practicality.
Also, I'm not sure if a cheap option exists for all fields. Say medical, is a cheap M.D. degree even possible? If not, that could be a problem in and of itself. There is a program for discharging the loan for people who work for the good of public after graduating, which I do believe include both medical and legal degrees which are the most expensive. But last I heard that wasn't working so well, with very few actually being discharged.
What a great story of unrelenting perseverance! Bravo to her for never giving up! Thank you for this story!
If student loans were dischargeable in bankruptcy, they would not longer be an option... And that's a good thing. It would force university costs to go down and not be at the insane level they're currently at.
management always needs a 30% raise every year, and bonus' right?
Exactly
Its not the university paying though, its the tax payer. I agree if loans were not government backed we wouldnt have the insane inflation on the cost of college that we have seen. I went to college in 2006, by the time I graduated tuition had just shy of doubled.
@@joewelch4933 Countries with free education system likely have implemented income tax which increases with the amount of salary.
So those who get a college degree will likely repay the cost of their college education to the state by paying higher taxes.
Except that many people with degrees do not have high salaries. And many people without degrees have very high salaries.
In my Hawaiian high school, you could take a class in scuba diving and a class in native crafts - basket weaving. So you couldn't do it at the same time , but you could have the skill set to do underwater basket weaving.
in my australian high school ( years ago ), woodwork, metalwork and electronics were cancelled due to no interest supposedly, pity most of my year chose those classes, we got sewing, art and a choice of three languages. scuba diving and basket weaving sounds more fun
@@draconightwalker4964 Hey, _sewing_ is practical. Not marketable, but practical.
Basket weaving is often done underwater because it allows the reeds to remain pliable. Which is not at all what people mean when they say underwater basket-weaving.
sounds like it would have been a more solid career path for her
When I was in a master's program, the department head was teaching on of my classes. He started by asking everyone why they were in this program. People said boring stuff like to further their careers or to better themselves. When he got to me, I said to delay paying on my student loans as long as possible.
The other students chuckled but the professor equated my enthusiasm to someone in traffic school.
Steve, when I was a young man you could paint houses for the summer and pay for your next year's tuition, books, labs, room and board and still have $1 to $2 k for incidentals. But in those days colleges and unis adhered to their "tax free org" stipulations per the IRS. That is obviously no longer the case with the prices they've been charging for the last 20 years or so. They are most definately "for profit" orgs today Just look at the Billions of dollars they have in their endowments!
You can still do it. I didn't graduate that long ago and working demolition, manufacturing, tutoring, and work study I graduated with 17k in debt with about 10k in my savings (the only reason I had savings was because the loans were subsidized and I wanted to keep a savings incase I did have an emergency). I applied for a lot of scholarships (had 4 at a time at one point) which also required a lot of effort while my classmates didn't apply for anything our professors/advisors mentioned. So I had my debt paid off within 6 months of graduation. I treated college like a job. I was there at 8AM and didn't leave until all my work was done while also working 45 hours a week (24 hours of that was a Fri-Sun manufacturing job). My wife and I moved into our small apartment together at 18 and 19 and didn't party or pay exorbitant room and board. We drove old cars that we took good care of. She also did work study and worked at KFC 3-4 days a week. It is still possible to work hard, have personal responsibility and live within your means and graduate with little to no debt. We also picked the school that we did because I did the math before picking a college and did the math of how much tuition as and how much I would get in aid/scholarships to figure out which one was actually the cheapest and not just the cheapest sticker price or pick the one that gave the most scholarships even though they were the most expensive.
The deck is only stacked against those who are lazy or entitled to thinking they deserve to go to a certain school or have expensive cars and nice things. No one is forced to go to the most expensive schools. At the end of the day an education doesn't give someone a good work ethic. I suspect the woman in this article is still learning this.
@@foxs49er You're the entitled one, Demolition is intense physical labor, work that usually starts from dawn and ends at dusk regardless of how long or short the day is and assuming you're not a crane wrecker operator the kinds of work you perform as a worker with hand-tools takes several weeks at minimum up to a year or two. Every day. Then you layered on top of that a manufacturing job? I assume you mean something like a CNC operator or a factory lineman of some sort, which is usually a 6AM to 4PM (sometimes even longer) AND ON TOP OF THAT you did tutoring AND EVEN ON TOP OF THAT you did your course work and sat in lectures.
Who the fuck are you, and where to I get a time-turner?
Of course the other option is that you worked those jobs on the black (no documentation and taxes) so your employer was much more happy to let you work limited hours in the shitty parts of the job with pretty much all the cut costs at risk of YOUR health.
Heard an interview with a woman who just became a journeyman electrician, she has two degrees and could not make enough to support herself and her child and pay her student loans. Now she is making over 80 thousand a year and will be making over 100 thousand ongoing. Why do high schools not suggest these non college routes forward to people?
My high school treated you like an idiot for going the tech school route for your final 2 years, half a day of tech school every day. To them if you didnt do algebra 1 you were an idiot. But if you didnt do algebra 1, you took financial applications and if you wanted, tech school. So you learned how to do a budget and weld, for example. Its the whole everyone needs to go to college, illegal immigrants and china will do the dirty work, an economy based on demand instead of supply works, dont think too hard on it idea. The hatred of hard truths drives this crap. My test scores were great, they really were bothered i wasnt interested in their unsustainable system. You cant have a society where everyone provides a nonproductive service to eachother, designers paying teachers paying psychologists paying car dealers paying lawyers and on and on. Someone has to create the base value, actual goods, or you outsource the real value of a nation.
Because becoming an electrician doesn’t allow for 4 years of partying, and they look down on people who do real work as dumb and uneducated.
They do.... the choice is up to the student. Not everyone goes to college for an art degree. Why do you think we have blue collar workers? Tech schools are a thing.
Idk. I made 130k last year with my tech school certificate. My student loan debt ridden friends still look down on me.
Here's the thing: Colleges have decreased value provided and increased costs. So what about Implied Warranty of Suitability?
Why are colleges not required to demonstrate that their product (education) is suitable and beneficial? If I bought a lemon car, the car company would have to make good or refund the money. Why not do that with colleges?
Secondly, why are colleges permitted to be so opaque about the costs of their products? In any other industry, unclear additional fees and hidden costs would have the FTC crawling up their finances with a microscope.
We need a complete revision of our post-secondary education system, and honestly, wouldn't hurt to review secondary education as well. Our process is broken.
You could tie the repayments to the school overseeing or getting them a job. It would be like staffing companies that get you a job, and then get a percentage of your paycheck for a set period of time when you start getting paid.
@@frankwalder3608 Nice thought, but if they get you a job at McDonalds after selling you a $50,000 music major education, does that count?
@@WhereWhatHuh Good question. In my plan, the school would get payments proportional to the ratio of the job they get someone and what the industry pays someone in that field of study. Your senario would technically count, but the college would be getting pennies on the dollar back on the loan. If they want to get at least most of their money they would have to do a lot better since I would have the payments prorated, and limited in how long they can collect, maybe ten years or so. If course, if they got someone a super-sweet really well paying job they might be able to claim a bonus, as that would be prorated also.
@@frankwalder3608 It's a workable plan. Now we just need to get about 200 million people onboard with it.
Rhetorical question, eh?
Professors canbe really out of touch. I remember attending a faculty meeting as a student, and they were saying Wisconsin was thinking of passing a law requiring all public school librarians to have a degree in -- something, anything. They said "where would you find someone to work for that kind of money with a degree?" I Said "that's easy, pizza places, restaurants, all the people that found out an undergraduate degree in psychology or philosophy means nothing. They'd be happy to take those jobs if they include benefits."
When I was in school (many years ago--I'm old) the librarian in every school I went to had a degree in library science.
When I went to university in the 90's, the only people getting student loans were doctors and lawyers. I distinctly remember being in the car driving home when the news announced they were opening up the student loan program to, basically, everybody, and thinking to myself what a terrible idea that was. Go check out the increase in tuition rates between 1980 and 2000, then 2000 and 2020. Looking at a graph, you can see when the student loan announcement was made.
Also check out the amount of non-teaching staff over the same period.
@@dwwolf4636 symptom of bureaucracy in general. it all must go.
I went to university in the late 80s and early 90s, did not major in medicine or law, and yet had federally guaranteed student loans every semester. Your premise is faulty, in that it isn't true that only doctors and lawyers were getting student loans.
There was an acceleration in tuition costs that mirrored Obama's push to get every high school graduate to go to a 4-year university. There are a LOT of incoming freshman that haven't even declared a major and they will end up staying in college for 5+ years because they waste the first year completing introductory classes. High school advisors are pressuring all these teenagers to go to college when many would do just as well in life at a local community college or trade school. Too many kids are convinced by these advisors to go to college and get a bachelors degree in something like "Gender Studies", accumulate 5 years of student loan debt, and can't find a job that pays well enough to pay that debt off. It's the same with undergrads that become convinced they need a graduate degree but they don't do the math on the debt they will accrue vs the income they will make once they begin their career. Way too many worthless graduate programs pumping out people with massive debt competing for a limited number of open positions.
@@dwwolf4636 That's a large part of it. So are reduced subsidies from the government and facilities that aren't necessary for education. Those multi-million dollar gyms are just there for recruitment, but still get charged to the student's fees.
The government needs to get out of the loan backing business; there also needs to be a cost benefit analysis conducted regarding loans vs. possible income. Just as a bank won’t give a loan for $250k on a house assessed at $100k; massive loans shouldn’t be given for a lot of frivolous degrees that have no future potential for monetary returns.
The problem is all the liberal arts schools can afford lobbyists to fight that legislation.
It is in the US Government's best interest to have a well educated workforce. Although I agree that student loans by themselves probably aren't the best way to do that. Instead, I think the Government should focus on subsidizing courses where there's a great need for more educated workers. THEN if students are struggling with living expenses while attending those courses, a government backed loan MIGHT be worth considering. But the focus would be on getting educated people into jobs where there is demand for them (which would in turn require the US Government to think ahead and predict what type of jobs will be in demand).
As a side note, the US Government would probably want to keep most of those people working in the USA, so it might require that students who benefit from subsidized courses and student loans work in the USA for a period of time after graduation. Of course, that assumes the Government did their job right and most graduates were able to find work in their chosen field.
Couldn’t agree more. If the lenders actually bore the risk of the loans instead of the government, she never would have been able to accrue that much debt in the first place. And maybe all the easy money is why tuition has become so outrageous.
@@rodh1404 No it's not, what are you talking about? Since when is a degree in "Cinema studies" education anyways? Lol.
I agree with this.. and one of the greatest travesties is that of teachers... in some states, you need to have a masters degree to be a teacher. (NYS, You can start with a BS, but you need the Masters within 5 years), that can add up to some big loans.. but teachers are also not very well paid in their first 20 years or so. Starting wages are actually in the neighborhood of the poverty level and in some cases.. quite a bit below it. Something needs to be corrected here because that's just asking for a breakdown in the future... on top of that, you have some majors where you have less than 1% chance of ever using the damn thing.... on top of that, there are some jobs out there that require a college degree.. the first question I have is what kind of degree.. doesn't matter, you just need a BS/BA in something... wait what? I can understand teachers needing some degrees... we would not want our kids taught by teachers without one (and in some states, they can), or my DR or Lawyer not needing one could be bad.. but a job where you need a degree and even basket weaving works? Something smells in that world... but that's what this world has come to... we used to talk about the glass ceiling... but now there is this paper one that is even harder to break through than that glass one....
It's not counseling that needs an increase, it's government backing that needs to outright cease.
Student loans are ONLY a problem because they're guaranteed by the government. If the university or a financial institution had to assume any of the risk, fewer loans would be given out, and those that would be would be for lower amounts of money. If fewer and lower loans were given out, universities would have to lower the price of their product to compensate. If the price was lowered, fewer students would need financial assistance and more could actually work to pay their ways through college without incurring any debt at all.
Yup. Education prices are another failure of Keynesian economics.
I commented the same before reading your reply. You are exactly correct.
Actually, make the universities pay for the loans if the student graduates and pays 10% of income for 10 years towards the loan. Then, college will actually provide the value.
I agree, and not knocking someone's degree choice, but schools need to consider how much debt a person can handle, within their career choice, because dishing out all that money. If you're going for an engineering degree, you might can stand more than someone majoring in underwater basket weaving.
Colleges should be required to co-sign any government-backed student loan that is paid to them. Since all of their degrees will lead to a profitable career for their students, so there should minimal risk to them, right…?
Several months ago I spoke to some neighbors and they mentioned their daughter was going to an expensive private university in California for some random degree. I asked what was her potential to earn in that career field. The daughter, mom, and dad gave me a dear in the headlights stair. I mentioned that is something to think about when/if you have over $100,000 in student loans.
I also read an article yesterday about a mother in TX that bragged she was going to put her kids through the best college she could. Then she complained how she had almost 100K in student debt on her government salary and she was almost 60yrs old.
I get it when someone has unforseen health issues like the lady in this story, but so many people want something for nothing. They also get worthless degrees.
In my opinion more than half the degrees today are worthless degrees. As in, you'll be flipping hamburgers after you graduate.
I avoided student loans with the Army's VEAP. It wasn't enough to cover a law degree, but it did cover most of my Bachelor's degree in Structural Engineering.
Structural engineering follow by law? Why the first seemed so productive and the latter a rather less so?
Good for you. I knew of folks going to law school "part time" and working fulltime. One h*ll of a trip. Seemed easier to attend law school fulltime and not work at all, which is what most law students seem to do. But these folk attending part-time and working fulltime graduated with less law loans and oftentimes where they, already worked, was some law frim or legal entity. So they already had a foot in the door, but they just needed a law degree to move up.
The only difference between full and part-time law school was one year. You got an extra year, for a 3-year law degree! You'd think that part-time would mean something like 5 years. You'll still be taking too many hours it seems. But people do it.
The elephant in the room is the obscene cost of tuition and text books.
I used to be a financial aid officer at a local college. For any student who was awarded a Stafford loan as part of his/her package, we did loan counseling. I cannot tell how bored these students were. Terms like "accrued interest" and "payment schedules" just passed over their heads. I started to make up stories. I used these stories to demonstrate how choices made now, affect a person's future. Sometimes, they got it. More often, not. I feel sad about it now.
I got a business degree and that did nothing to teach me the ways of loans. I received my education dealing with the loan holders AFTER graduation.
Blame new age parenting. Whole lot of buddy system friendship, and very little (if any) actual teaching.
And at the end of the day we have more educated Idiots/morons/democRAT voters @ large...!
@@theincantrix1144 You are being a bit dismissive. As someone who just recently got out of college I have to point out that the idea of getting out of college massively in debt is completely normalized. Like all throughout high school we are told that 1. college is necessary to get a good job (with only a handful of people talking about how trade schools and certification programs are also a viable option) 2. we are told that we want to get into the most prestigious college we can test into which typically means getting into an expensive college and that there is a stigma against community college and to a lesser extent state universities 3. college debt is seen as a fact of life and as a high schooler who at best may have a part time job and thus only the barest idea of the true value of money is asked to make MASSIVE financial choices. The gist of it is a $100,000 schooling debt isn't even that hard to accrue as $25,000+/year tuition costs are not in any way uncommon. I mean I got the highest level of scholarship that my local state university offered and I still left almost $15,000 in debt and that is seen as getting through the system very lightly. The fact is that most people won't truly respect how much a dollar is worth until they have spent at least a few years in the labor market and yet teenagers are being asked to make these decisions without that understanding.
Also as someone who has sat through the mandatory loan counselling somewhat recently, there are 2 points I would like to make from that side. First, a lot of these counselling sessions happened yearly so the first couple of times you have them they wouldn't really stick because it was still years away and by the time it started to get closer to when they actually applied to you, you would have already heard the same thing enough times that it is hard to get invested into the counselling. Second, even when it get's closer to the time that you actually start repaying, chances are you have taken some form of economics class and it feels like at best a refresher course and for me at least it still didn't quite fit in as real as there was always that thought in the back of my mind that I'll figure out how to handle it later once I actually got a good paying job.
The TLDR of what I am saying is that what we are taught is skewed towards normalizing large college debt to the point where you get a bit desensitized to it and the stuff we are not taught i.e. the real value of money, I don't believe can be reliably taught without a few years working in the job market (or possibly growing up in poverty). And frankly one of the biggest financial decisions of a persons life they often are asked to make before have even finished high school.
@@christianstonecipher1547 Your parents taught you nothing then. They left you to suffer through the rigours of life with no preperation whatsoever. They likely encouraged your whims (anything not a STEM field degree, is a whim - especially in the age of the internet). I had a job delivering newpapers at 9 yrs old (back when such things were common). If I wanted anything extra, I had to both work and save for it. It was normal through the majority of human history that you worked - you worked the farm, or you worked around the house, or you did odd jobs. Modern children are kept in diapers well into their teens, and often even out of college now. Easy to spot, you look for excuse-making or tantrum throwing.
The schools that charge that much for a useless degree should be on the hook, not the tax payers.
25 -50% of Colleges are predicted to close. When they close they will be „off the hook“. The real question is what is „useless“. Is a humanities degree „useless“. No, but it should never cost $30,000 - $50,000 a year, when what it requires is a room or public meeting place, a teacher, and some used books. You could rent a library room once a month and not even maintain the real estate. Most classes could be online. I do however think in person instruction and interaction is important.
What has been happening is the high tuition humanities degree has been subsidizing the high cost engineering or medical degrees.
School loans need to be capped. Over $300k is absolutely ridiculous.
Government is primarily lender since 2009.
Economic debt slavery is what we live under. All of us where told by our parents wishing only the best for us to get a degree. So we went and got a degree and tuitions skyrocketed as schools learned how to milk the system with little limitation on what one could take out despite academic performance. And now everyone has a Bachelors degree making it really no better then a High School Diploma was for our parents (or grand parents).
@@Cragified Yep. Rental / subscription based economy isn't helping.
The only reason to incur that kind of is for high end jobs like doctors and lawyers and high end stem careers
Long before that
They are capped. Do you often speak on things u don’t know about or understand?
People getting useless degrees is a huge problem. I have seen it in my own family. People have the misconception that any college degree is better than none and that they should pursue their career dreams no matter how expensive. Somehow, there needs to be an honest conversation, a reality check for the students by a trusted adult before they get themselves into such horrible economic difficulty at such a young age.
I heard of the useless degree stuff in the mid 1960's when I was in high school. A year plus after high school graduation I was off to the USAF. They taught me how to fix airplanes, how to manage the people, and allowed me to get an Assoc. degree without any debt. After 20 years I retired, went to a trade school on the VA, and then did 21 years as an industrial electrician with basically no overhead supervision on multi thousand $$$ projects start to finish. Sure am enjoying my full retirement now.
There was a similar case like this that Lawful Masses covered a year or two ago. Basically they can be discharged, but like Qualified Immunity, there's no written standard, rule, or law that says that student loans cant be discharged; just in practice, they're usually not.
Note, this might not be the case in this particular situation, but in general the cost of college and the high amount of student debt, is another case of government involvment making things worse. Lenders making bigger and bigger loans easy to get due to government backing -- > allows colleges to increase tution --> students to take out more and more debt. Rinse and repeat until the whole system comes crashing down and the US tax payer holding the bag.
It is all intentional with the purpose of forcing society to accept free college for everyone. Whether the degrees are useful or not.
@@cvr527 : You don't understand how direct it _really_ was- LBJ intended these loans to literally _be how_ "free college for everyone" was implemented. The only reason why he even bothered with the conceit of loans was that Congress wasn't stupid enough to think that it would be cheap.
Data?
@@EdDale44135 Data on which?
There was an article in the Chicago Tribune a few years ago which charted several decades' worth of increases in Federal Student Aid and average costs to attend US colleges and universities. _Every single time_ Congress allocated more money for grants and (mostly) backing loans "to make college more affordable," colleges and universities cranked up their tuition & fees over the next year or two. And worse, higher education costs were basically flat in between the big increases in Federal spending. While correlation is not causation, it certainly proved that the reverse - that FSA was only going up in response to rising costs (and failing to keep up, at that), as commonly argued - was definitely not true.
As for the LBJ stuff, this is the first time I've heard that he meant to provide "free college" via federally guaranteed student loans. But it could be true - it fits in well with other Great Society programs, both in its stated intent and in its real-wotld consequences.
Don't forget most States reduced their support for universities causing prices to rise to be paid for with the Government backed loans
There are a lot more students that qualify for a "fill in the blank" Studies than for STEM. Colleges make most of their money on these Basket Weaving Studies courses. There is no incentive for them to change.
They make most of their money from raising tuition to many times more than it ever should be, and sports teams...definitely the sports teams. There are *far* fewer of those "basket weaving" type courses than you are apparently aware of but I'm guessing you don't actually work for a university/college so you're just babbling about something you actually know very little about.
And for the record, basket weaving was an actual time honored course until very recently. I know because my great-grandfather used to teach the course back in the early-ish 1900s through the 1950s, and he's actually considered THE master of the craft. We know because several books have been written about him. Some of his baskets are worth tens of thousands of dollars.
@@ehrichweiss Certainly meant no disrespect towards your grandad. Anything that ends in a Studies is pure crap coast to value wise. I spent nearly 40 years in engineering and barely earned a hs diploma. Most of the very best in my field learned on the job / no degree.
"Don't walk run" did a great video about people getting loans for degrees that will never get them a job that could allow them to pay it back
The real culprits are the education institutes who run this scam. It should be illegal.
@@dorbie One went to be an attorney, dropped out to pursue a much lower paying job a few years into law school. That one was 100% on her.
@@michaellemons7213 did you watch *this* video?
“don’t walk run” has a fantastic channel! That’s a great video.
Until schools carry some risk on bad loans this won’t go away. Forcing taxpayers to pay off these worthless loans is the current plan, and already started
I remember working at BK with two people with PhDs while I was in highschool. Work on the job to become a mechanic and made more then most people I knew with PhDs.
@skutch Blobaum do you wish to make out a hurt feelings report?
student loans are the new form (mechanism) of indentured servitude. I can see the loan principle not being dischargeable, and perhaps interest to a point. Of course, people need to face reality that most college degrees are worthless
Lawyer, CPA, or STEM.
Subsidized loans going to a state or community college are OK but not great. They are better than inflation. However they are not able to be discharged. Paid mine way down durring this interest free period.
Who needs a college degree, when you can make $15 an hour, flipping burgers?
@@robertheinkel6225 some people like their latte made by a cultured and educated barista? Still min wage though
@@robertheinkel6225 You say that like it's a decent hourly wage 😆
@@scarling9367 $15 hr is quite decent for a Cinema Studies graduate.
Half of my student loan debt consists of interest accrued when my loan was in forbearance. I will probably be dead before I can pay it all.
yep that is the one big problem with student loans, if they would lower the interest on the loans I believe most people could pay them back. My wife and I have our kids loans because that how it works now, kids get some but parents a bulk of them. our interest is so high it is crazy,
@@detcat312 My nurse-practitioner medical care provider is paying 18% interest.
In the Netherlands you used to have a system where there was a basic scholarship for 3 years of support that requires you to finish your bachelors degree within 10 years (with some special exceptions). If you failed to get your degree, you did have to pay it back, but otherwise this money was like a present/investment from the government. Of course, if needed, you were also able to loan money (at a very low interest rate), which you did have to pay back eventually.
Unfortunately for students right now, the basic scholarship has been replaced with a loan structure 5ish years ago, but the government is actually debating about bringing back this scholarship, which I'm all for.
I finally paid off my student loans at age 41. I can’t even imagine borrowing $ now given the astronomical cost of going to school. I have 2 daughters in college ft and working ft now, and without federal grants and their Native American grants, there is absolutely no way they could do it. I highly cautioned them against utilizing student loans.
Sounds like one of the LAST classes Steve attended should have been one of the first classes for everybody who applies for student loans.
But then why should schools educate students about personal finances?
The goal of schools has nothing to do education but to instill a military style indoctrination mind set on all their peasant's children. (ie: mess hall- cafeteria, boot camp - gym, being silent and not having an opinion when the commander/teacher is talking, etc etc etc)
The college didn't want to scare off a potential income stream, students, until after they'd gotten the federally backed money out of them. If students quit the college would have suffered financially.
Similarly-
My CFI 🛩️said he would only teach most flight students stall/ spin recovery until just before they flew their final FAA test; otherwise they might get scared off and immediately quit flight training.
I quite enjoyed spin recovery like a rollercoaster 🎢
The CFI started ALL the stalls leading to spins. he was amazed that I could fly indefinitely with the stall warning ⚠️ horn blowing.
CFI said, "You're the only one I know who enjoys this as much as I do.
Most pilots I know said they'd need a parachute before trying it."
“Why should schools educate?” Hmmm … Let me ponder that …
i been out of school 15 years and never once was i taught about money or finance apart from shit like change from $5. 15 years later and i know about the same when it comes to finance as when i left school. Schools and UNIs have a vested interest in keeping us financially dumb to make more money from us
That's changing in order to take out my student loan, I had to sit through a short course explaining the loans and related bits. I didn't take out that much, just about $3k, and I'll have it paid off before I have to pay any interest thanks to the pandemic relief.
But, arguably, they need to do more, and it doesn't account for when the college does things that negatively impact the student and reduces the ability to earn. I was going to be making close to $60k a year teaching, but I'm making roughly half that right now due to the college royally screwing me over and denying me civil rights protections as college officials and partner schools were making decisions based entirely on my sex and skin color. It's blatantly illegal, but tolerated when you're a white man. At the same time, the state was to lower standards to get more people of color into the profession.
I'm going to be just fine, and I didn't take out many loans, but the situation is rather ridiculous.
I remember about a year ago Steve talked about a woman who graduated from law school in I believe Ohio who had a similar amount of student debt who was refused a law license because she had no intention of paying it back. She also had filed quite a few frivolous law suits.
"If we are lending money that ostensibly we don't have to kids who have no hope of making it back in order to train them for jobs that clearly don't exist, I might suggest that we've gone around the bend a little bit," ........... Mike Rowe
Love the dude, he's a straight shooter.
My wife and i did the dave ramsey plan and paid off all of our student loans in 2 years. My loan was paid off 96 months early. Also i have a fine arts degree in jewelry and now i run the production of jewelry for a online jewelry company. There is nothing wrong with getting a art degree if you have a plan. Now we have a sweet little baby and dont have financial worries and are excited to win with money.
My 4 years of engineering school tuition and books was a whopping total of about $8,000.
Yup now I make a 6 figure income. Don't underestimate the value of a community college starter education 😉
Ah, the good ol' days. I remember them, too. But I'm also putting my first of 3 kids through school right now, and times have changed. Still, you are absolutely right: be smart, start at a community college, then go to an in-state university to get a degree that has a good chance of a decent job and the student loans will be manageable.
@@willdejong7763 Yup! People can save at least 50% on tuition by starting out at community college and going to an in state university. It also helps to get a degree that generates decent income 😉
My American friends are astonished when I tell then that not only was my university education completely free of charge but I was given a living allowance grant also. No scholarships - everyone benefitted from this arrangement. Three years at a top flight college, an engineering degree and no debt whatsoever. Didn't know it at the time but now I realize I was very fortunate.
Student loan amounts should be limited to the 1-year average (median) salary of the degree-holder after 5 years.
In Canada, student loans can be discharged in Bankruptcy, but only once seven years have passed since you left school. There is also a provision for earlier discharge if repayment would result in undue hardship.
In the UK you don’t start paying them back until you earn above a salary threshold and the courses aren’t quite so eye wateringly expensive.
I agree with you Steve 10000000%! Furthermore, not everyone is college material that thinks they are. There are plenty of careers that are in demand that pay a good salary. No one wants to count the cost anymore, even when I was in school. Personal financial education in the country is horrendous.
As a German, these Student Loans are incredible and I'm glad I only have to pay around 200€ per Semester. I can't imagine having such debts after getting my degree
That's how much it cost for tuition here in Canada in the early 2000s, around $250 for a full courseload semester for BA (I knew someone who went to same school and program I did).
When I was working on my undergrad in the early 2010s, it was around ten times the cost (~$2500/semester for tuition and books).
I'm doing an online program now with a big name Canadian university and it is about $1000/class.
DOn't worry! YOu pay for it in taxes.
@@wlonsdale1 Yeah, they pay less taxes than the average American does (public and private), and end up with universal healthcare, higher education, less stressful and more efficient work environment, months of paid vacation/child leave, a top economy in the world, etc..
Why do you think education is so expensive in the West? To keep people like you uneducated enough to think you have it good.
Honestly college is a sham nowadays anyway. In the 90s and below it was worth it as you could actually get paid more, but now that $100,000 degree that you went to school for will bankrupt you for 40 years and may get you a dollar more an hour. Not worth it. Unless you’re starting your own business, becoming an engineer, or basically some sort of rich $150,000 job, IF you even make it that far than maybe go for it.
I’m just amazed how much these schools charge, and how little you get for all that work, when basically a diploma will do. A waste of time honestly.
Well done on the video.
@Steve Lehto : that shirt! Grandma used to make pasties when I was little, they were quite the treat! Then we had a couple of little hole-in-the-wall places that made them, but neither one lasted too long. So where is Lehto's Pasties?
@Java Beanz Great observation!!!🤣
Poor lady. Glad it worked for her. This is how the system should work.
She obviously ought to take out some more student laws and get a law degree with them.
of take some medical classes
Lots of pearls of wisdom from this story. There is a difference to someone who has experienced employment discrimination, not given a chance to repay and someone who refuses to repay. That is the beauty of our court system. If anyone goes to school with the intent to better themselves and society, that is good. For those who are discriminated or not given the chance then I say ok. Yet there has to be a list of discrimination for example for loan forgiveness. In other words prove your case, prove you have been discriminated against. 🤔❤🇺🇸
I hear tell of seniors who retire, still trying to pay off student loans from college, while they are now barely getting by on Social Security. Something is wrong with an education system built like this.
Yep, I'm one of them! If you have more than $750/month in Social Security, the government takes 15% of your check to pay back government-based student loans. I'm 73 and I'll be paying the loans back until I die. It's mostly compounded interest that's owed, and it just keeps compounding. Thankfully, there's no debtors prisons in this country, or I'd be sitting in a cell.
Congratulations to her, she has overcome a lot, she did her best not to be there, poor woman, literally.
My soon-to-be ex-wife has student loans from before she and I met, that she will likely never be able to pay off, due to health issues. Perhaps she should study this case.
Soon-to-be ex status has nothing to do with student loans.
I worked at a college that can only be described as a student loan racket. There were kids in my classes that could not read or write. But they could sign the student load forms and borrow obscene amounts of money. Most of the people simply would never earn enough money to pay back those loans. The government needs to stop making loans like this so colleges will stop jacking up prices for school. It's a vicious cycle.
12:24 Wouldn't it be more helpful if they made students take that class before the start of all their courses? At least then they'd know about the crippling debt they're gonna be getting into for the next 35+ years. Oh wait. If they did that there might be fewer student loans made and way less interest/fees for t̷h̷e̷ ̷s̷h̷a̷r̷k̷s̷ lenders to collect. Silly me. 🙄
That would have been a dream for me. I did electronic engineering and the course I completed was nothing like what was in the course description. The other interesting thing is that universities can change a course whilst you are doing it. I actually had 3 units that I completed not counting towards my end degree due to course changes and had to do an extra year of study without failing a single unit.
Interesting that the school, who presumably knew about this issue, let the students get almost to the end before tipping them off.
Yeah, but if they did it at the start no one would take out the loan and pay the college. I blame it on the colleges and not the lenders
@@cheeto4493 The colleges certainly share in the blame.
@@cheeto4493 They are in it together. Loan officers have offices at most, if not all, universities.
Best of luck to this lady. This lady should be a lawyer.
My dad sat down with me in 1999 after I graduated high school and helped me determine how much I could afford to take out in Student loans based on the career I was planning on pursuing. We then chose a college based on what we expected I could likely afford in the future. I didn't graduate due to health issues but because of that conversation being burned into my brain, I didn't have student loans that were so expensive, I couldn't afford the payments. I'm now 40 years old and the loans I took out back then are paid off. The best advice I was ever given as my husband did _not_ have that advice and I married a man with nearly $80k in student loans. We'll be paying _those_ off for the next couple decades, I'm assuming. Amazing what a difference our situations are. The good news (at least), is he's in an industry where he can afford the ridiculous monthly payments.
I started Law School at age 43 as a military retiree with some Vietnam-era Montgomery VA benefits and avoided borrowing money. My peers were mostly not so fortunate. We were told during initial orientation that within five years of graduation, only half of us would be working as lawyers. Why didn't your school give you the dose of reality at the start of school, allowing you to avoid the trap? Answer: they got their money. For public schools, the law school may be a cash cow for the university and law students are subsidizing some of the more expensive graduate schools. I am an admitted cynic but cynics are made, not born.
I had a job at a stepping stool factory, but had to leave due to a number of short falls.
so you stepped out on them?
Hey, good for her. Not quite apropos but there's an old Greek paradox about paying off law school fees, known as the counterdilemma of Euathius. The sophist Protagoras took on Euathius as a law student on the understanding that Protagoras would be paid his fee when Euathius won his first court case. However Euathius after finishing his tuition decided to go into politics instead. So Protagoras sued him for the amount he owed.
Protagoras argued that if he won the case, he would be paid his money. If Euathlus won the case, Protagoras would still be paid according to the original contract, because Euathlus would have won his first case. Euathlus, however, claimed that if he won, then by the court's decision he would not have to pay Protagoras. If, on the other hand, Protagoras won, then Euathlus would still not have won a case and would not be obliged to pay. We're not told how that played in court and one wonders how it would play today.
Lol under water basket weaving lmao I remember my economics teacher in college talking about that.
Another problem with trying to declare bankruptcy is that the person is left with no credit. It also takes seven years for that to be removed from your FICO score, so a mortgage and most types of loans aren't going to be available to that person. On top of that, moving into a rental becomes a problems, because they'll want two to three months of rent as a deposit, if not more.
Credit Ratings = Scam @ Best Michigan Ties it Into auto Insurance Rates - WTF
It's the fault of the lenders and the universities for extending that much credit for a long-shot course of study. Universities should be made co-signers on student loans... it would solve sooo many problems in higher education!
I GIVE UP! Why do I work SO HARD and save SO HARD just to have others SCREW THE SYSTEM, and make me PAY FOR THEIR FOOLISHNESS!!! Yes, I have sympathy for my fellow citizen, and yes, I wouldn't wish her problems on an enemy, but MY LORD, she knew she had these ailments early on, but CHOSE to CONTINUE PILING ON FOR YEARS! I am sick of it. Her bad decisions should not be covered by my tax dollar. It just shouldn't. The entire higher educational system has turned into a criminal bad JOKE!
So far I'm the only person I know of who's graduated, in 2014, with no student loan debt. & No, my parents didn't pay anything.
First off both of my parents were unemployed, 2008, so I got Maximum Federal Pell Grants every semester. 2nd I had Hope Scholarship via Georgia Lottery, for having above 3.0 average. Lastly and Most Importantly,
I applied for EVERY SINGLE FUCKING SCHOLARSHIP that I qualified for. After submitting around 50 or so scholarship applications, every semester, there were always several where I was the ONLY APPLICANT WHO APPLIED. I was able to get lots of free $$$ for school that way.
I still don't understand why everyone goes straight for the student loans without ever even TRYING to get scholarships.
@Evey Sweeney That’s exactly what my daughter did! She started applying for scholarships in ninth grade and never stopped!!! Most of the time she was the only applicant!!! She also worked 4 jobs while going to school. Her dad and I paid a little. Then the college she attended chipped in a little. Every little bit helped! She graduated from Vanderbilt University debt free after 4 years!
That's awesome 😎!
Exactly! There are plenty of scholarships out there too. You do have to look for them . If you have a high GPA in high school and did very well on your SAT's , You should be able to get all the financing you need without a loan. (Unless you want to live off campus.)
Unaffordable and predatory students loans are one of the three biggest financial issues in this country. The other two are healthcare and housing
If there is anyone who deserves relief it may well be this gal. But I think the burden of her endeavor should be shared with the schools she was accepted into along with the origin and lenders and not just the taxpayers.
Steve thank you for sharing. She was not your typical case.
Awww! So she wants a free ride because it's too difficult to repay but she 's going to stick the bill to taxpayers without regard to their ability to bear her burden.
I am more than willing to give her a free ride through my taxes. I'd just like them to be around half the taxes that currently go to into politicians bank accounts.
People need to learn where to fight.
I think we see here part of the reason many attorneys make questionable choices in terms of what firm they choose to work for or what kinds of clients they take outside of trial practice. When you're under a mountain of debt and you're in a profession where it's hard to get started (people generally hire an attorney based on their reputation in the particular field of law, and that makes it hard to compete when you've not done anything much as of yet) you can find yourself doing things that may not be what you want to do, but you do need to do. (I'm VERY glad I didn't end up with any student debt.)
Getting a degree related to cinema was where you started f-ing up
Kind of a typical LA/Hollywood story, but with the addition of huge loans.
Where’s the parents advising their kids? Pretty dumb to get a degree that’s only slightly useful in a couple cities in the world. If you move to a different state…
@@roberthudson1959 haha no generally no, and if they relied on my desire they would go bankrupt and all actors would be fired. I watch these videos...
Why stop there? Why isnt any degree at a price a f-up??
@@newagain9964 well because some degree paths put you In a field where a 100k/year job is likely to be available
She likely provided a long history of medical issues. This works with our loan and welfare system. Example: long ago in the housing collapse, I briefly used food stamps, but recovered. The GA drones I met were below-average people who often misunderstood legal stuff. It looks bad to beat up on the sick, and doctor notes are very powerful!
Here's an idea if you don't want student debt. Don't go to college or join the military and use the GI Bill that pays for your school and pays for your housing. Otherwise if you do get a student loan please remember that loan is your responsibility not the tax payer.
Or...if you don't want student loans, cash-flow college.
I'm proud of her!
"The only thing that matters is how well you walk through the fire." - Bukowski
Nothing like taking student loans out for a basket weaving degree. I'm glad he said that at the end of the video cuz that's what I was thinking the whole time
Someone hire this woman! If she can navigate the courts, imagine the things she can do for an employer!
settlement, the ultimate silver bullet to ever getting a judgement that might stop horrific practices, fix illegal laws, or give people relief
its just like appeals court declaring that qi needs a previous case to determine qi doesnt apply and never allowing that 'previous case' to happen
I recently filed for Chapter 7 and hired a bankruptcy attorney. She advised that all debts should be listed on the petition, even those that can't be discharged (like student loans and some tax debts, both of which I had) for informational purposes, because the court will consider your potential post bankruptcy situation when making it's decision. It's possible that my attorney did some wizardry behind the scenes, but I was never told about it... The court discharged my $40k in loans completely!
I was a University of Phoenix student. They require you to watch a video of Suze Ormann talking down to you like you're a bad dog, telling you about how it is literally impossible to get student debt discharged.
It feels good to have gotten this virtual also on her smug little face. Maybe she's a great person with a brilliant financial mind, but watching that video created visceral anger and hatred that I'm not proud of, and I'm glad it's gone.
Stories like this piss me off. I repaid every cent of my student loan. I owed no one anything. 6 years of surviving on Ramen noodles and peanut butter sandwiches to make the $1000/month payment. I remember making that last payment and having a little party to celebrate. Like getting a $1000 a month raise.
Well done!
Definitely something to be proud of!
I understand that feeling due to paying off my home mortgage.
There was a time when that was the biggest investment anyone would ever make.
Now it is education and health insurance followed closely by vehicles.
I paid mine off, too. However, this lady will likely die before she would repay that big amount. Also, she's not getting into the industry to studied for. So, the lower amount sounds just.
My wife and I, middle class earners, $20k to $70k combined income over our marriage, were frugal enough that we could pay for our child's medical education that cost over $300,000. Can you imagine how pissed I will be if the administration eliminates student debt.
@@mavamQ you had to suffer so everyone should, too?
@@mavamQ or or consider this
You are happy for people not having to suffer to study what they love
So my question has been answered. The Pastie shop I seen on my Mackinaw Island trip last month is a relative.. Awesomeness
No relation. It's a common Finnish name.
I remember Lennard covered a case a few years back where a judge gave the opinion that the undue hardship standard doesn't match the language of the law. Curious why that opinion hasn't been brought elsewhere.
When I started college in 1995 we had a manditory seminar about what we were getting into with student loans. They described the difference between subsidised and unsubsidised loans and how all of that worked. I would have freaked out if I had gotten to the end of the road and they had laid it out on me like Steve went through. It still took me forever to pay them off, but at least I was in a good field.
I've heard many arguments for and against "student loan forgiveness." Often, not always, the arguments only look at one aspect and don't take into consideration the second and third order effects of what would happen if that particular argument was implemented.
Having student loans myself, I can empathize with those who feel the weight of them hanging around their neck. I also find it ridiculous to take out 300k+ in loans in pursuit of a degree in things that have no reasonable chance of making enough to pay back the loans.
That said, I did hear a couple incredibly well thought out arguments. One was to eliminate the interest rates on all fed backed loans. Another, though an interesting idea I somewhat disagree with it, was to only offer fed backed loans to STEM degrees. Another was to make these educational institutions co-sign the loans, making them just as liable for the debt as the individual.
I don't think much of forgiveness. On the other hand, I don't believe that student loans should be protected from bankruptcy. Let the banks make the poor loans and let the students with a basket weaving degree discharge them in bankruptcy. I see no reasons schools need a defacto subsidy which is what government backed student loans effectively are. The whole reason higher education costs increases vastly exceed inflation is that they know desperate students will be able to borrow money to cover the costs.
In some countries, the payments on students’ loans is limited to a % of income. That’s been proposed here.
Was in school over 1o years sounds like she milked the money.........
Thumbs up on the puukko knives, left side of the screen, three of them in the Canadian logoed cup.
this person exemplifies "how to make consistently poor financial decisions"
There are plenty of people that graduated reasonable majors that are still buried under crippling debt with no end in sight (other than death)
Realistic is a word that is foriegn to most young people today, many of whom have never been told "no". The "guaranteed " part needs to go away. This would have a "trickle up " effect. Eliminating a lot of the worthless degrees as well as the nonsensical classes that are required for your degree, that have nothing to do with your degree.
People who file for personal bankruptcy disgust those of us who live within our means and pay our bills. Actually, we're paying their bills too, because all of the losses forced on lending institutions and credit card companies then trickle down for us to pay. They live the good life and walk away, leaving us holding the bag. You have ads on TV for people looking to get out of paying their credit card balances, negotiating "pennies on the dollar". It's typical for the times."You're not responsible", " it's not my fault", "they induced me", all typical of today's lifestyle of shirking responsibility. The penalty for bankruptcy should be far more strict, like it is in most countries. All your assets siezed, houses and their contents, vehicles, jewelry, everything. Then there should be an inability to obtain any kind of credit for ten years. Walking away with most of your assets intact is no punishment for financially screwing over the people and businesses that you owed.
When you see people keeping their houses in a personal bankruptcy, they are either in a 7 and re-affirming the debt, or they are in a 13 meaning that they are not only paying the debt but making up back payments. With automobiles they have to pay off the value if they are to keep it. It's never been an option to just wipe away secured debt and keep the collateral.
Also, you're not paying a dime more for anything because of what someone else did with a bankruptcy. Anyone that understands money and how it works can see through that argument. If you're ready for the red pill, listen to (or read) The Creature From Jekyll Island. Only after understanding the true nature of money and how it works will you understand how and why bankruptcy is a necessary part of the equation.
And if you think the banks and credit cards companies are eating that debt, you're nuts. They pass it on to the consumers in one way or another. I'm 70, buster, been around the block a hell of a lot more than you, and I know about how the monetary system works.
@@jpharleyd9325 Perhaps you can answer a question for me then....
1) The Feds print money and loan it to us (the national debt)
2) Said money is loaned with interest (interest on the national debt)
So how is all this money supposed to be paid back when all money in existence is merely the principal? Mathematically the system is setup so that NOT ALL MONEY CAN BE PAID BACK. But maybe you in all your infinite wisdom can figure it out.
@@Conkythedumy The feds don't loan us money. Paper money is no more than a promisory note that the money represents it's value backed up by prescious metal. Politicians put together a budget. That budget far exceeds whst it takes in every year and that's why we're in the situation we are. Lending institutions and credit card companies are private businesses owned by shareholders who exist because they lend money and charge interest on it. These institutions have a fiduciary duty to their stockholders to make money. When people default on loans and on their credit cards, their defaults are passed on to those of us who pay our bills. They're no better than people who steal from stores. The cost of those losses are passed on to the consumer.
@@jpharleyd9325 Wrong. All money is debt based. It hasn't been backed by precious metal for years. It started with the Federal Reserve Act of 1913. Again, "The Creature From Jekyll Island" required reading here, but that something you wouldn't be able to handle after spending 70 years thinking you know how the monetary system works.
What really makes me sick are those, who through their own ignorance, believe that all of this debt can be paid back with interest. It is simply a mathematical fact that some will be able to pay it back and others wont. The ones like me, and presumably you, will pay our debts because we are in the right circumstances to do so. "There but by the grace of God go I". It's not in my character to look down on the inevitably less fortunate in a system that mathematically creates winners and losers, and advocate for harsher conditions that they are already experiencing.
One of the best deals out there are the state maritime colleges. They always rank very high on the Money value based rankings. They are not that expensive and the job placement numbers are some of the highest around. Best of all you don't have to be an MIT genius to get in, just be willing to work hard. The deepwater hiring market is not great but the workboat business is doing great and getting better as the offshore wind business picks up. In addition, the logistics, shipbuilding, power and military hire a lot of graduates as well. Maine, Massachusetts, New York, Texas, California and Michigan all have colleges.
I bet she at some point she defaults on the $60 a month.
Get a CC and borrow to pay this off in one nut. CC is uncollateralized debt.
If you’re medically incapacitated the govt will discharge your debt. She likely filed and was denied so she sued. You’re just bitter about your life.
@@newagain9964 Based on the end of this comment, Id say there's a real chance you could get any student loans you might have, discharged.
OMG, By the time I graduated I had a wife and two children. We were barely getting by and ate lunch every day at the soup kitchen because we were so broke. Just buying baby formula was unbelievably expensive. We declared bankruptcy but the court said we could not discharge our federal student loans. We paid $99 a month for 21 years to pay them off. We wanted to claim that we had been paying for too long but they said every time we renegotiated the loans we started the clock over again so it was like a brand new loan. I did get an upper management job after I got my MBA so I guess the loans were worth it. It took us that long to pay back a little under $25,000 in loans. There is no way you're going to pay off $350,000 in debt. Thank God we don't have debtors prisons anymore.
If the BK wasn't completed and the loan "charged off," won't she have to now pay income tax on the charge off?
You mean stolen... Don't think they have it to tax.
Yes she will. The IRS considers it income
My understanding is that she filed for bankruptcy and lodged a second proceeding regarding the student loans.
Regardless if she gets a Tax debt she can just go bankrupt again.
I once lived near the KU Med Center in Kansas City. Lots of people training to become doctors.
Neighbor of mine was a resident Anestisologist.
Told me one night that he was probably going to have $500k in student loans when he got out.
Which makes sense, when you know that he had to borrow to pay all his living expenses.
So they have to make tons of money right off the bat, to keep their heads above water.
Which partially explains why health care costs are out of control in this country.
Too many people are making too much money the way it is for it to change.
I plan on beating the system, by dying early and suddenly. Call it taking one for the Wretched Refuse team.
Better that, than be pennyless after paying off the doctors and hospitals.
$350,000 in STUDENT LOANS?!??!?
how the hell do you spend that much on college???
Easy, tuition is way overcharged for the amount and quality of the education you get.
Grad school and borrowing up to cost of attendance, plus they accrue interest while you're there.
The mistake is thinking you're ever supposed to pay them back. Just file for IBR and if you end up making at least ten% more post tax than before you went, then you're fine.
The structural issue is really with people leaving college no better than when they started.
You can still find overhead projectors for sale on eBay. I created a large binder full of the transparencies to be projected, while instructing for the Air Training Command, back in the 70's. These tools had some advantages over power point. You could (e.g.), quickly use a grease pencil to change, correct or add clarifications to a transparency, during your instruction.
Sounds like Masters in Film Studies is a $35K/yr profession.
Sounds like a new version of the classic "Person with dreams of Hollywood ends up broke in LA."
Steve I had 3 older cousin that all started college 1980 and 1981 or so.. They took out student loans which were at a subsidized interest rate 5.5 percent. They were able to buy zero coupons bond that were at interest rate as high as 12.9 percent. So their invested money was doubling ever 5.5 years while their loans where doubling ever 13.4 years. Their scheme last about 15 years and I remember them figuring out that they had paid about 5k for both a bachelor and masters degree this included room and board. It was just a strange time between 81 and early 85 when interest rate here that high.
If your not smart enough to understand loan conditions you should not be going to college.
It doesn't matter how well you understand the loan if the college is the one defrauding you.
It’s one of those things, until you’ve felt a bit of the pain behind compound interest working against you it’s hard to wrap your head around it at 17. Even if you are smart enough to make an amortization table, and plan out paying it back it’s also hard to really understand how much life costs in your 20s/30s starting a family, etc, when your 17. They make it just TOO easy to get the money, I mean the federal loans basically are just line items on your bill that automatically get deducted unless you go out of your way to decline them. Private is obviously a little more traditional like a bank or car loan. I don’t know what they do now but for me it was literally a 15 min meeting the 1st week of freshman year where they hand a room full of people the terms of federal loans.
I read every line of the loan paperwork when I signed it. Nothing in there taught me about how capitalizing interest could snowball loans. Because you only learn about that AFTER you get the loan and are unable to repay it right away. I was a kid, my parents didnt have to deal with student loans so they had no clue either. Now a day kids dont have quite as an excuse as its clear the predatory nature/how student loans can get out of control. But that is only a more recent revelation. In 2005 when I signed my first loan in my home town these issues were not known. Student loans started off with good intentions. But now lenders see it as a good source of high return very low to no risk income source.
You should not be able to take out a student loan amount where the repayments are near or higher then the potential income of the learned profession. Mike Roe has it right, we need to be pushing more trade schools and less colleges.
Ben almost out of sight and out of mind, leaning against Mic 3, behind Mic 2, Steve's RHS
I took some classes one semester
Went to the finance dept to pay
They handed me a folder full of crap to fill out for lones and such
I laughed and handed it back said no
I pulled 4 grand out of my pocket
And the most amazing thing happened
No one knew what to do with it
There so used to the grift they could not comprehend cash
I did that a few times
And that is how I got my degree
Started out good but it looks like it became a profit racket
That was a big thing in the 1980s that lots of folks did, then had the loophole closed after they made a boatload of money.
13:37 "weaving baskets 🧺 underwater..."
So that's how they keep it flexible?!?
Commercial divers make big bucks!!
With this being discharged, I wonder if the Washington University will repo her education?
I’m thinking she may missed her calling to be an attorney. Still, it’s never too late to get a 200k student loan to go to law school🤢
People need more education on paying for education. If you have a serious health condition and financial difficulties why are you taking out a loan to get 2 film degrees to try to break into the film industry? Not only is it a competitive industry but unlike tech, it’s declining. Nobody cares about your degree on a film set. This is an utter disaster and is the reason government thinks citizens can’t make their own intelligent decisions.
With FASFA loans you do it to stop the interest and payments on subsidized loans. Ever move this lady made was calculated. Dreams of being big in hollywood. This is malignant narcisism embodied.