Posted on 11/22/2011 3:53:24 AM PST by Cardhu
A number of student organizers in the US have unveiled what they call an 'Occupy Student Debt' campaign, urging borrowers across the country to default on their college loans.
The campaign was made public Monday afternoon in New York's Zuccotti Park, where the national Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement emerged, the Huffington Post reported.
“Since the first days of the Occupy movement, the agony of student debt has been a constant refrain,” said Andrew Ross, a professor at New York University and an active OWS member, while addressing a crowd in the park
“We've heard the harrowing personal testimony about the suffering and humiliation of people who believe their debts will be unplayable in their lifetime,” Ross said.
Meanwhile, the campaigns “beliefs” or objectives were announced during the rally.
The student movement has four major objectives, apart from convincing all students to default on their loans, a move for which they have collected one million signatures in a petition.
They want student loans to be interest-free, tuitions at public institutions to be federally funded, students' debt to be written off and financial records of for-profit and private institutions to be made public.
“I see my students who have to work not only one but two jobs just to afford our relatively reasonable tuition rates,” said Ashley Dawson, an associate professor at the City University of New York.
“For students faced with debt, this campaign is important because it will help provide them with a collective organizing vehicle,” Dawson said.
The campaign emerged as an offshoot of the OWS, which has now spread across major US cities as well as many capitalist countries in the world.
Members of the OWS movement have for the past two months been protesting against corporate greed, unemployment, corruption and poverty in the United States.
Students Paying More and Getting Less, Study Says
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/16/us/16college.html
“the share of higher education budgets that goes to instruction has declined, while the portion spent on administrative costs has increased.”
(Sounds like every other Gov’t program.)
Maybe they could spend some of the millions in endowements they’re sitting on.
So when’s the congressional hearing on college ‘price gouging’ ?
(College costs are up 900% since 1978)
I agree completely. An old friend married his wife and she brought with her about $150k in student loans (she's a radiologist). Bought a house during the bubble, took out a equity loan WAY above the value of the home and paid off the loans. They then walked away from the house and took the hit on their credit rating, on advice of a tax attorney. Pisses me off because I've never not paid a bill in my life, always played by the rules and then seeing people pull that kind of sh*t just burns my butt.
in the 1950’s tenure was established by communist professors.
in 1970s the baby boomer new left began taking over and
increased salaries.
in the 1990s leftist faculty reduced teaching loads by 1/3.
figure it out. leftist profs work for more money for less hours.
It’s the logical result of majoring in Blue Whale Sociology instead of economics.
I'm with you. Your word is your bond, and those who violate their word when there is any choice at all disgust me, even if a legal loophole allows them to do so. Those who take on a debt with no intention of repaying that debt, or with no clear plan on how to repay are not people I would ever trust or deal with. They are thieves, even if the law permits them to steal. [Note: defaulting on a loan after being disabled by an accident or by some other unforeseen and unforeseeable event is entirely different.]
1) Have student loans once again be discharged in bankruptcy.
2) Have colleges be on the hook for the unpaid portion of the loan.
Overnight, colleges will stop accepting so many unqualified students, and stop offering majors (except for cash) which do not prepare the student for a job.
Does anybody remember a post to FR from a college prof who outlined exactly what his duties were, pay received and benefits enjoyed? It was a while ago.
It was illuminating and revealed why tuition is so expensive.
You know, rather than have freshmen students take all those mushy, touchy-feely multi-cultural indoctrination classes, I think you have a very good idea.
Any new student loan bills before Congress should require that any student receiving federally-bascked student loans should be required to take a basic Finance class. One that introduces the student to obligations as a borrower, compounding interest, finance charges, return on investment, and simple budgeting techniques.
That goes without saying. (Kidding, of course.) But it goes deeper than that. The leftist goofballs sound like they're indoctrinated before they even arrive. That kinda puts them in a tough place -
Harvard Students, Citing Economic Inequality, Stage Walkout
Last Wednesday, 70 Harvard students walked out of an introductory economics course, citing a bias that they said “perpetuates problematic and inefficient systems of economic inequality in our society.” The walkout, first reported by the Harvard Crimson, was the subject of an open letter to the professor who teaches the course, Greg Mankiw. The letter, which appeared in the Harvard Political Review, says Mankiw’s class espouses a “limited” view of economics—heavy on Adam Smith, less so on Keynesian theory—that “fails to equip its students with a broad and critical understanding of economics.” It read in part:
“We are walking out today to join a Boston-wide march protesting the corporatization of higher education as part of the global Occupy [Wall Street] movement. Since the biased nature of Economics 10 contributes to and symbolizes the increasing economic inequality in America, we are walking out of your class today both to protest your inadequate discussion of basic economic theory and to lend our support to a movement that is changing American discourse on economic injustice.”
I had $25,000 student loan and my credit card company snuck in unauthorized credit card limit increases to the tune of $11,000 and other debt.
There were some months, when I’d skip payments on either my loan or credit card debt or some other debt, so I could focus on the principle of one of my debts, expecially if it meant that I’d pay off a debt.
I did that with the full recognition that, it might have cost me some interest, but I was able to then take the payments I was making on a now-paid-off-debt and refocus that money on some other debt.
No excuses.
If she had paid $60 more per month, she would now owe about $15,000 and would have the debt paid off in about 8 and a half more years. All she had to do was go out to eat 2 or 3 less times a month or skip that vacation or buy a used car instead of a new one or get rid of the premium movie package on the cable bill, etc. Or do more than one of the above and have it already paid off.
The problem is, these people think they are entitled to everything they want just because they want it. I have a friend who has two grown step-daughters that hardly ever work, jump from guy to guy and are off and on some sort of government subsidy all the time. He was telling one of them about he and their mom going on vacation. They were complaining about how they hadn't been on a vacation in a while. His first comment was "A vacation from what?" Then told me how they had cell phones and cable and whined because they couldn't afford a new car payment. They expected everything he had, but didn't notice that he worked every day for it.
Ping
Good, then no more student loans, period.
They can do what I did, WORK my way through college.
I worked two jobs to pay for my books and tuition, and paid the cost every quarter for four years. No loans - just diligent hard work. Sure it was tough - but I wanted it - so I WORKED for it.
Maybe things have changed, but when I got a loan for school it was spelled out in black and white how much I was borrowing, for how long and how much it was going to cost me over the period of the loan. The same as every loan I’ve applied for in my life. Never have I had a loan that the details were not spelled out.
back in the ancient days student loans were also dischargable in bankruptcy. The second they were no longer dischargable we saw the explosion of junk studies departments and unstoppable tuition inflation.
Look at the semester costs.
You can’t work through college and not take loans. To expensive.
The loans are why it’s so darned expensive in the first place.
ok we go back to allowing student loans to be dischargable in bankruptcy (after a three year period), once discharged the university endowment becomes liable to pay the loan to the bank-—EVEN IF IT IS IN A TRUST.
This will incentivize these universities to give real degrees that get real jobs and reject students who will never work.
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