Elizabeth Warren releases sweeping student debt cancellation and free college plan

Since it's a campaign issue, I figured I'd put the thread here.

Elizabeth Warren releases sweeping student debt cancellation and free college plan

(CNN)Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Monday proposed eliminating the student loan debts of tens of millions of Americans and making all public colleges tuition-free, staking out an ambitious stance on one of the central policy debates of the 2020 Democratic primary.

Student debt and college affordability have become a key dividing line in the Democratic race, between more progressive candidates who favor sweeping new tuition and student-loan benefits and others who support more incremental adjustments to the way Americans pay for education.

Warren's new plan would forgive $50,000 in student loans for Americans in households earning less than $100,000 a year. According to analysis provided by her campaign, that would provide immediate relief to more than 95% of the 45 million Americans with student debt. The Massachusetts Democrat and 2020 contender is also calling for a drastic increase in federal spending on higher education that would make tuition and fees free for all students at two- and four-year public colleges and expand grants for lower-income and minority students to cover costs like housing, food, books and child care. ​

... https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/22/poli...-student-debt-college-tuition-plan/index.html

I support some kind of debt relief for existing student loans, as the burden can be quite massive, especially with interest always piling on more debt, and I definitely support eliminating tuition.

I feel that college and trade school is a vital part of a modern education in order to prepare students for the modern working world. No matter what a person goes into, they're likely to need some kind of education beyond K-12. There aren't that many unskilled jobs left, and those that remain don't pay well for basic economic reasons. That change in particular has been a long, long time in coming and is far overdue, and really should not be a partisan issue at this point. It's just good sense, in my view.

As for debt forgiveness in particular, Warren proposes numbers that seem a bit too generous. If I were making $100,000 a year or more, I'd be able to pay my loans off in less than a year at my current costs of living with frugal enough living. The limit of $50,000 forgiveness is reasonable, I think. I know it's more than I owe in total, so I would absolutely love it for myself. That would free up a lot of cash for other things.

I suppose, extrapolating that out, that this debt forgiveness would be a significant but perhaps short-lived economic boost. The elimination of tuition, however, would make a massive difference going forward, because it would allow more Americans to accomplish more economically both in terms of being qualified to do the kinds of jobs we need to be doing in the modern economy and having more of those earnings available to spend.

 

Thank you for bringing her extremely ridiculous beliefs to the forefront. People need to know what crazy looks like.

 

Pretty easy to campaign with other people’s money.

 

Whats to stop me from borrowing to my hearts content knowing that a politician will pay it all off in the future? If tuition was eliminated, whats to stop universities from raising tuition and excessive spending knowing that students will sign on knowing their tuition is free? Also, many students will sign on to useless majors taking useless classes knowing that this will all be free.

College doesn't necessary teach the skills employers want. Even though more people are college educated than ever, we still see so many graduate and can't find a job, and so many employers who can't fill technical roles.

Problem is that the vast majority of graduates don't earn $100,000 per year starting out. They might only be starting out with $40,000, assuming they can find a job and aren't working at Pizza Hut. Some people just haven't found a job with the major they have.

 

Why should people be forced to pay for other people's debts. I did not borrow this money for college they did. It should be the borrower's problem to deal with. I am already paying for my kids college education , now they want me to pay for someone else's. 1.25 trillion over 10 years, we cannot continue to keep giving away money like this.

 

Liz said, we'll destroy the ability of successful folks to accumulate wealth so we can pay for the cost of other folks who are destroying wealth by consuming education that doesn't generally make them more skilled.

 

Yeah what's an extra trillion dollars into the deficit each year.

Crumbs.

 

You don't have to borrow if tuition is free, do you? As for tuition going up, I suppose that either these institutions will be funded the way current public schools are, or they will be subject to price controls that will avoid price gouging. Unlike the students who are presently going into insane levels of debt to afford college, government has power enough to keep that sort of thing under control. Government is how we the people take control of things that are otherwise beyond our control, isn't it?

The $100,000 threshold for loan debt forgiveness could obviously be tied to additional stipulations. There is a program now, for instance, where people making income-based payments for 20-25 years could have the remainder of the debt forgiven after that time. Besides, that is only for forgiveness of current loan debt and would not apply to future, tuition-free college attendance.

Many other countries already have free higher education, and it works great for them. There is no reason we can't have that also. The only thing that stops us is fear and hand-wringing, and partisan obstruction for no better reason than demonizing the other party in order to win the next election at the expense of the very people they pretend to serve and represent.

Oh, don't pretend to be concerned about the deficit. Obama was reducing it, while Trump has sent it skyrocketing, and you obviously don't care about any of that.

 

You liberals just like making things up don't you. No president to date has increased the national debt more than Obama has. Obama increased the national debt by 8.59 trillion. According to 0rojections based of the 2019 budget Trump will increase it by just over 4 trillion. Now unless there is some new kind of math out there you are 100% wrong. But once again facts do not matter to liberals.

 

WTF, so Obama increased it 1 bill a year on average and Trump has increased it by 3 bill in 2 years and he has not increased the debt bore than Obama. I see that he has increased it by 1/2 a bill a year more than Obama. And Obama had a much worse economy for his first two years than Trump did. I dislike Obama but I dislike 1/2 truths even more.

 

Trumps projected increase is 4 trillion using 2019 budget going out to 2021. Fact still remains Obama increased the national debt more than any other president. Complain all you want but that is the fact.

 

No the fact is it is growing by 1.5 yearly under trump and it grew 1bil yearly under Obama. to compare a total amount to debt in two years vs 8 has no validity.

 

Why don't we simply regulate the universities? Make them all provide education regardless of institution for $1500 a year in tuition? That should fix it...

 

Politicians have to make everything so hard. Just make it like work related education reimbursements. You get an A it s gets covered 90%, you get a B it gets covered 75% all other passing grades get you 50%. the rest of expenses such as room and board, books, fees etc can be paid back interest free over 10 ten years borrow 25,000 after 4 years you can pay it back interest fee over 10 years at $2,500 a year. two years at a community college and 2 years at a state college. Or if you don't do college a associate program in a technical trade type job with the same reimbursement. No income levels everybody the same. Mommy and daddy got money and want to send you to a private school, that is on them and you. No assistance except what we have now. .

 

will be too late for my children, but could help many Americans

 

I like that idea - I would put a cap on the amount covered, if your rich enough to go to a million dollar school, the tax payers should not pick up the bill

 

Oh yes, government run operations always are much better at finances than the private sector. They're very responsible.

It's at this point that I'd like to remind you that unless teachers are working for no pay, and the colleges are maintained entirely by donations, none of this will be "free".

Where do you think the money will come from for this?

 

Trumps projected increase will be 4.56 trillion in 2021. Obama grew it 8.56 trillion in his eight. The original post I quoted said Obama was reducing debt and trump is increasing it. That simply is not true. Both imo are appalling. But what the first post I commented on was completely untrue.

 

society benefits from a well educated society... the rich of course will have to pay more taxes.. but the rich benefit from society being educated too

 

The problems with US higher education is that too many graduate with majors that aren't marketable and not enough in technical fields, and universities spend too much on administration, and tack on too many fluff irrelevant courses to their majors. Our students loans also have these interest rates that make them unaffordable and this all contributes to the student loan crisis.

We can simply fix the problem by providing salary-deducted zero interest loans, by focusing most of our funding on in-demand majors and courses, and by allowing colleges to make themselves unmarketable when their administrative costs rise. We should be looking at online universities, boot camps, technical schools, and apprenticeships to create some competition.

Education requires innovative changes to courses to keep up with a changing job market and the need for higher education reform. The government just isn't good at innovation and reform and is best tasked with running things that don't change much and are pretty standard from year to year. Maybe instead of government-run universities, we have the government cover the cost in-demand majors and limit how much they will pay for that student and how much the student can be charged out of pocket if the university accepts the government-covered student.

Debt forgiveness is fine as long as its combined with real reform to ensure we don't have to do this again. Or else everyone knows its just free borrowing.

 

If you think your rich people in government, like Sanders, is going to pay more in taxes you're fooling yourself.

The rich who keep the rich people in government in power will not pay those taxes either.

They tried this in France. The rich left. Now France has been burning for months because the people who end up with the bill are always the middle class.

 

Where are the rich going to go to? Every other western country taxes the rich more than we do.

 

Agreed, No way should we absolve people of debt. I am ok with going interest free for a period of years say 7 and then starting interest. The armed services have the right idea. They have jobs that people normally don't find attractive. They give bonuses to go into those fields. we are going to need pre K teachers but after 4 years of college they make 35-40 a year. Give those people a break on tuition. We need doctors and Nurses and therapists of all sorts, just like the military have a tuition forgiveness for every year of service. If a doctor goes to some rural place in the hills that needs a doctor, After 8 years of service there forgive his loans, with nurses make it 4 years , etc. We want Calculus and Physics teachers- same thing. We don't need any more sociologist, Classic majors and history and English majors.

 

And on the heels of a report claiming the Soc. Security and Medicare will soon be broke. She's getting a half a mil to teach 2 classes while complaining about the high cost of education. Only a Democrat could expect their flock to be so stupid.
Doesn't matter since she has no chance of being awarded the super delegates by the DNC like Hillary was.

 

yes, I think sanders would sign such a bill that taxed ever dollar earned over 1 million per year more, why would he not?

the tax used to be like 80% in the past