Is there a competition going on for the stupidest poster on this MB or something?
I take it you’ve seen his “Anarchist Border Guards” and " “Drug Me To The Stars” threads?
I’m actually finding this a somewhat refreshing break from our usual trolls; you know, the people who register, start one thread asking for advice on an outlandish and contrived-sounding dating or relationship situation, then disappear.
Wow, the madness of people who can see no other way through their life than deep personal debt. Those oceans either side of the US seem to really, profoundly isolate it’s inhabitants. And you think any questioning is trolling and start to circle the wagons because there’s a smell of indian in the air… So sad to see you all go down like this.
True, but well done was never in doubt. 
What a depressing comment on modern American culture (if the word “culture” can even be used any more). 
Like you said, there is this stupid loophole of owing taxes on the “forgiven portion”, which may or may not be significant. I’m guessing some people have not run all the numbers and are concerned about being hitting with having to pay tax (on earnings they have never seen) at a moment in their lives where they may be facing other middle-age situations (paying for their own kids’ education, paying for their older parents’ problems).
It’s hilarious to see you getting outraged over something that, for most Americans, is not a problem. I graduated from university in 1988 with about $20,000 in student loans. (At the time, the full cost of attendance was about $15-16,000, so this was a bit more than one year’s expenses.) I paid off the loans in ten years at a cost, as I remember, of about $200 per month. It was never a burdensome amount to pay.
From what I’m reading on the internet, the maximum amount of student loans a student can have today is $31,000. That’s about half the current cost of attendance at many schools, and most students should be making more than that each year.
But you have, you know, 10-20 years to plan for it. I’ve been socking away money for my eventual forgiveness. Just eight more years!
Cite for that $31000 number? I graduated about three years ago with more than three times as much debt. However, that does include private student loans. Those are treated the same way in bankruptcy court but come with few if any of the benefits.
Sorry. I was referring only to federal loans. If you need a cite, see this page.
I should google that and check, just on the off chance that’s not really the case.
If you take a loan for something, you’re not just investing in yourself, you’re investing in the loaner. You also lose your sovereignty by being in debt.
I don’t think you really understand debt at all. When someone borrows money, the lender is the one that is investing in the borrower. Not the other way around.
If I were lending to a group of people that looked for ways to have the debt cancelled without every repaying it, then I would charge a much higher rate, due to the increased risk, if I was going to lend to them at all.
I think the kids going into college nowadays are being very careful to get the best financial aid packages that will leave them with less debt and are choosing degree areas which lead to actual paying jobs than before.
If people want to get psych and philosophy degrees that’s fine with me. But you can’t bitch later that the only job you could get was in a call center and you’re not “using” your degree.
My wife has a MFA in music. She paid off her loans, and found a job to support herself and never once tried to manipulate the system to find a way our of her agreement to pay the loans. Win for her, win for the local music scene.
But if you are going to bitch about the financial end of the deal and try and stiff the American taxpayer (or future loan recipients due to increased rates), you need to factor in what your degree will be worth to you in the job market. Anything else is self delusion.
When I looked this up, everything I found said that this 20 years and then loans are forgiven situation only applies to loans taken out in 2007 and later. So, you know, most people with student loans do not benefit at all from this program.
First, anyone who says that Americans don’t have culture has no idea what the word ‘culture’ even means, but let’s leave that to one side.
How many people do you think go to post-secondary education now compared to 75 years ago? 100 years ago? If you think these days are worse off due to our current college culture, and wish for a return to the past, you are a rather odious classist and good people should refrain from associating with you.
There are various different programs. The limits on federal loans mentioned above, for example, where a recent addition. They were not there when I was a student. You had a maximum per year that you could take out of certain types, but one had unlimited amount, and there was no cumulative cap on the amount of money. In a way, it still is like this. The fine print mentions that some professional programs (law, medicine, veterinary, pharmacy) are exempt from the cumulative limits, and these are the programs graduating students with large amounts of debt.
As to the repayment plans, there are several types. My loans do not qualify for the most recent “pay as you earn” schedule, since they were taken in 2007 and before. Yet they do qualify for income-based repayment. That is, all of them except the Perkins loan.
How older and wiser people do it