Posted on 06/08/2015 5:27:26 AM PDT by Sir_Humphrey
Years later, I found myself confronted with a choice that too many people have had to and will have to face. I could give up what had become my vocation (in my case, being a writer) and take a job that I didn’t want in order to repay the huge debt I had accumulated in college and graduate school.
Or I could take what I had been led to believe was both the morally and legally reprehensible step of defaulting on my student loans, which was the only way I could survive without wasting my life in a job that had nothing to do with my particular usefulness to society.I chose life. That is to say, I defaulted on my student loans.
As difficult as it has been, I’ve never looked back. The millions of young people today, who collectively owe over $1 trillion in loans, may want to consider my example.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
We disagree. The government should not decide how much money you borrow or for what you use it.
Just give both sides nuclear weapons. Make the loans discharchable in bankruptcy. College costs will drop like a rock when loan officers start looking at SAT scores and tying the loans to hard science classes.
Absolutely true IF they are not the ones lending the money. If they are, like a private bank, then they have every right to make these demands.
Wonderful decision....so hundreds of thousand of dimwits have taken loans that half will simply default and leave the burden to the public. It’s the same with mortgages that leave some idiot the idea that he can buy a $400,000 house when he only makes $40,000 a year and pays next to nothing on the down-payment. I’d rather see it as personal responsibility, but you can’t convince some kid getting a degree in French literature that he’ll never be able to pay back $90,000 that he takes out for a long-term loan.
Man, if you tie SAT scores into this....a kid like Al Gore would never have been able to attend college.
And the problem is not that they don’t set enough limitations, it is that the government uses tax payer dollars to compete with private business.
The problem is not the lack of additional government regulation, the problem is the government lending out tax payer dollars to individuals.
Have three daughters and offered to pay for college instead of a wedding. All took the education. I did had control over their major. They graduated with environmental science, teacher and international business degrees. I spent 20 years paying off their college, all state schools. I didn't run away from the loans. They were my responsibility. Unlike the writer, I accept my responsibilities and paid them off.
This is just proof that some degrees are worth more than others.
The fluff degrees were viewed as degrees for those who would be living in the ivory tower teaching the fluff courses to those who had “real” degrees and the fluff was to make them well rounded individuals.
Of course those days fluff meant literature, or social sciences. Not radical PC studies.
Forgiven debt is taxable income.
These losers should never be able to borrow another dime for the rest of their lives.
Non PC constructions.
I didn't know that was still possible. During my sophomore and junior years I worked as a janitor in university housing to pay for my housing. During my senior year I dried glasses in the dorm dining room to help pay for meals. However, that was over 60 years ago. I'm glad to know people can stil do t hings like that.
We already know why. It’s because you’re a lying deadbeat.
“The DOE should pursue this loser and dock any proceeds from his illustrious writing career until his debt is paid. If not someone else has had to pay it.”
Two things about that :
1> He’s probably close to retirement already. It really wouldn’t matter.
2> The New York Times printed this drivel. I’ll bet we just saw what part of the POTUS debate will be next year.
I’d actually risk agreeing with the lib-trash on canceling student loan debt so long as all federal subsidies to universities are cut to offset Federal commitments that back guaranteed loans (not rate of growth cut ... I mean a real cut to $0 and loans are limited to $30K). After all, it’d be for the children, right, and we’d be focusing on making college affordable? What’s another trillion dollars in the grand scheme of things? The mass layoffs in useless departments and the subsequent whining would be worth it.
I noticed none of his books get better than a 3 star rating as well. Probably from the one reader of his books, his wife.
Mr. Gore, this is Bob Smithers over at Wells Fargo. I just got the results of your P Chem midterm and, well......
But I have found, after some decades on this earth, that the road to character is often paved with family money and family connections, not to mention the 14 percent effective tax rates on seven-figure incomes.
As I get older and read stuff like this I wonder if the tenth commandment isn't the most important commandment. He wanted to do this the trust fund way, and not have to sweat the small stuff. The average American way is tough, takes time and sacrifice. I think the people that can stomach that make us great.
They’d be really mad if Obama started forgiving student loans.
They did the right thing.
Yes, this is the right thing to do, to pay off the loans and not shirk the responsibility as the author of the article did.
My son's student loans were probably close to what your daughter and her husband paid off. He and his wife were fortunate they were offered teaching positions in a brand new charter school in Douglas County, Colorado, the day before graduation. They live frugally and as with your daughter and son-in-law, will get the loans paid off within a 3 year time period, in September 2016. Then maybe they'll start looking for a house.
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