Posted on 04/06/2020 9:23:01 AM PDT by GuavaCheesePuff
The last time a serious economic downturn hit in 2008, Evan Schade was in high school and the crisis seemed like a news event that happened to other people. This time, as the coronavirus has brought the economy to its knees, it has become a personal affair.
When nonessential businesses were closed last month in Kansas City, Mo., where he lives, Mr. Schade, 26, lost his job at a carpet store and almost all of the shifts in his second job at a coffee shop. His girlfriend, Kaitlyn Gardner, 23, was laid off from a different coffee shop.
The money they have in their bank accounts, just over $1,000, is enough to cover only this week’s $800 rent check — forget about his $300 student loan payments or the health insurance he was hoping to finally sign up for. The couple have spent their time at home applying for unemployment and fruitlessly looking for new work.
“I know so many people my age who are going through the exact same thing,” Ms. Gardner said.
The youngest American adults are facing what is, for most of them, the first serious economic crisis of their working lives. By most measures, they are woefully unprepared.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
They probably majored in something that you can’t make any real money doing.
If one of these were my kids I would tell them:
1. Talk to your landlord. If you’ve been a good payer up to this point, he/she will probably take a partial payment rather than try do evict you. I know I would if I had a reliable renter especially since the courts are probably going to be backed up for years with this. Something is better than nothing.
2. Interest on student Fed loans has been suspended and it’s my understanding that payments have been frozen as well. If you are unemployed, this is not a bill you want to focus on.
3. You have to be a pragmatist about health insurance with the corrupt system we have in place. In a right world, I would say get health insurance so in the event you need care, your healthcare provider can be made whole. In reality though, all health insurance is good for now is to protect your assets in the event you require care. Otherwise, if you wind up with a 200k medical bill just file for bankruptcy.
Yep. Because if we high school teachers actually were allowed to hold them to the standards we pretend to, and grade them accordingly, 65-70% would not graduate. They can barely read, barely write, and have no interest in homework, or effort.
Did you look at the graph?
And what about the severe debt the state, local and federal governments are all going into over this? you don’t just climb in the car, start the ignition, and everything’s fine. yes, many will be unaffected. Many were unaffected in the 1930’s, but still. And let us not forget what ended that one.
How is Sarah Jeong doing these days?
Same here. I did 4 years active duty (Navy) and 7 years reserve, used the GI Bill and some loans to get my BA and MA, and then spent over a decade paying back the loans with no help from anywhere.
Make the debt dischargeable in bankruptcy. A bail out just perpetuates the status quo. Forcing “Financial Aid” to consider credit worthiness would go a long way toward fixing what most colleges have become.
True...they are obsessed with that socialist bum, that freak from Vermont.
Violent tantrums over that boneheaded loser.
I agree. I know lots of teachers - both of my daughters, in fact - who are frustrated with social advancement to keep kids with their age group, spending two months teaching to maximize state test scores, and the rest of the time acting as both parent and social worker.
What kind of education did he get for his $300/mth debt?
That’s pretty much it. I turn 55 this year. I might take a very small pension (if there still is one after all this) and leave the field. Buy a little farmhouse in southern Indiana and plant a garden. I don’t know. It’s disheartening.
>> but I’d like to give some of these kids the opportunity to work part of their loans off.
Great idea. They could do something like getting a good job, not necessarily a fun one or their first choice but one that pays the bills, and they could use some of the proceeds from that work to mail a check to the bank each month. Maybe they could even learn a trade so that they would be an “essential” employee when the Progs and Chinese collude to do this again.
Adults don’t need programs to “work off” their own debt.
My guess is that the typical Times journalist is six-figures in hock with some artsy degree from Columbia or Cornell.
Doesnt say much for the educational system.
I know of one community college that offers courses for jobs that do not require associate degrees.
I can tell you there are a significance number of college seniors at universities whose name you would recognize who could not tell you which of the following values is the smallest:
a. .1
b. .19
c. .091
When asked why they chose the incorrect answer they invariably respond: “With decimals, everything works backwards to the right of the decimal.”
Sad but true and widespread.
So, probably a new bankrupcy law?
Nothing torques me down harder than to see tax dollars go to bail out those who just couldn't live without things their incomes could not afford.
... paying $800 a week on an apartment?
There’s part of their problem right there.
Art major, social studies major, music major ... who knows?
Burdened with debt is never a good place to be.
Hey...It seems that a lot of the kids I know that went to college decided to go so they DIDN'T have to get a real job out of HS..and most of them Majored in Partying 101 and never finished...
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