When talking about college loan and the much awaited handout, words really do matter. So does logic. The former are weak and the latter is on a multi-year spring break. One dirty little secret is that, by actions in congress, where constitutional authority resides, a vast amount of current debt will never be repaid. First, payment is means adjusted with the first $20K of income exempt, more than the IRS standard deduction. Then, there is a 20 year limit. This doesn't trigger a balloon payment as it should but instead it is the end of payments. And remaining debt is forgiven making many US college graduates charity cases just as they enter their prime income generating years. The ill effects are far worse than undermining any character that might remain in the younger generation and are detailed by the American Institute for Economic Research. Maybe if more parents listened to economists (or knew how to drive a spreadsheet) we would not be in this pickle.
The defense, if you can call it that, of the administration's unconstitutional efforts to exacerbate all these problems by wiping out even more what is due to be paid to the public coffers defies even a cursory review. Incredible numbers have applied for the handout (college was supposed to be the hand-up, right?) and are a round-up of the usual suspects. And the politicians offer no surprises, only nonsense. One of the finest examples is Georgia's very own Hank Johnson by parroting the left-wing "median household income in your ZIP code" blather. The average income of families around you has nothing to do the amount of your college loan debt no more than it sets your salary. Remember that whole "college degree means more money" chant you've heard all your life? Hank exposes the lie pointing out that half his constituents have a bachelors degree but "many others" have debt but no degree. Therein lies the problem. Some folks do not belong in college, based on these results. Colleges have no business promoting degrees carrying a loan burden that offers no chance of loan repayment. The loan, the commitment to repay and the acquisition of the ability to meet that commitment is a business contract. It is simple business logic. And that logic and that commitment is simply missing.
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