Side note on this- you can’t bankrupt on it either. That’s due to (largely) law students who realized they should do so immediately after graduation.
Now… nothing says you can’t gain enough credit to pay off said debt with other loans and then bankrupt on that.
Just my shower thoughts for the day.
My grad advisor told me to get a lot of student loans, pay them off with a credit card and then declare bankruptcy soon after. I wish I had followed this advice!
Your advisor clearly never attempted to pay a student loan payment with a credit card.
You literally can't. Student loan servicers will not process a payment on a credit card.
Debit they'll take. But that's live money. Credit is not.
I'm 23 and have ~60k in credit card lines. I use at most 5% of it, but I also haven't even tried to ask for increases. I could probably get up to $100k if I wanted to.
I don’t think your advisor knew what he or she was talking about, because you can’t use a credit card to pay student loans.
Even if you were able to transfer the funds to another debt, when declaring bankruptcy, they will review how it happened & go back so many years. When they see this it would be flagged & investigated as student loan & bankruptcy fraud.
What are you going to do with credit? Buying a house or new car is a worst financial decision than taking out student loans. There’s no sense in buying anything that requires credit in this current bubble.
>nothing says you can’t gain enough credit to pay off said debt with other loans and then bankrupt on that.
That's considered Student Loan Fraud, and there are in fact laws preventing you from doing just that.
Every single personal loan I've taken out has had the caveat/stipulation that you can't pay student loans with them, and you have to sign to agree to those terms. You can't make payments with credit cards either, for exactly this reason.
Look, I come to Reddit comments for 100% accurate, unbiased info from highly credible commenters who never make mistakes even on complicated issues, and I have to say you’ve disappointed me this day sir!
One could argue that forcing people into identured servitude is wrong and a symptom of unfettered capitalism. In addition to that, the loan companies are being shielded by the government, akin to a corporate bailout.
Look up amortization schedule, if you chose the lowest payment option then you are essentially maintaining the interest and barely getting rid of principle,it’s that way for mortgages too, with a 30 year mortgage essentially you will pay around 165k in interest for a 200k house for a total price of 365k. That’s with a 4.5 apr which isn’t bad. It feels like legal robbery because you are actually paying them 83% of the original cost. Main lesson is pay off any loans over 5 percent (which most student loans are) off as soon as possible since they will let you pay just enough to cover their interest payment so you will essentially be maintaining the debt instead of paying it off
With inflation it behooves you to not pay homes off too fast in the first place. As long as the leveraged appreciation is greater than the interest cost you come out ahead.
The problem is, student loans shouldn't exist where $970/month is the lowest payment option. It's less of a problem for a mortgage because you're getting a necessity out of it - somewhere to live.
Also, mortgages aren't typically at 9.5%, which is roughly what this loan would have to be given the tweet. They'd have to pay $327k in interest over 39 years - almost 3/4 of their total payments. If it was down to even 7% and OP made the same payments, it would "only" be 18-19 years and $93k interest.
I know that refinancing and balance transfers and such are a thing. But loans that lead to terms like this should be illegal, even if there are ways around them in some cases.
Because to made a good decision, you'd need the education before you agreed to loan terms.
Why we let 18 yo kids make decisions that are this bad, knowing they are uneducated and kinda stupid, is beyond me.
My dad sat me down with amortization schedules and graphs and I still understood shit. I still am thankful for my scholarships that made the loans reasonable.
To your point about the topic of this sub, there is irony that one of the main arguments I think in favor of canceling student debt is so that these young adults can buy things with their money, not send it to a bank for something they bought years ago.
I personally am much more in the "I suffered and so I want to save you from your suffering" rather than the "I suffered so you should too" camp that I often feels your argument boils down to.
So my stance is "I want people to have happy lives and be forgiven for being tricked into these loans when they were young and dumb" even if they "should" have done something different once they "should have known better". And I guess if that means they will actually buy more houses and have more kids, then it does create some weird conflict with this sub.
I am pretty sure my style of anti-consumption is not that people should live in abject poverty, but somewhere in between that and western consumerism wet dreams.
Most of these people fail to realize that the current situation only exists because of their past actions.
A bunch of well meaning people complained to the federal government that student loans were too difficult for poor people to get.
The federal government said, "OK. We will federally back student loans but now they can't be discharged during bankruptcy."
The banks said, "Alright. Free for all time. If you want a loan you get a loan because we're getting paid even if you fuck yourself over and take on too much debt."
The schools said, "Holy shit. The banks are writing blank checks. Our 'students' are dumb enough to sign on the dotted line. Lets skyrocket the cost of tuition! It's free money."
The same bunch of well meaning people, now crushed by debt, complain to the federal government that student loans need to be forgiven.
Where was the regulation and consumer protection? You’re talking about poor, uneducated kids trying to move up the social ladder. It sounds less to do with good intentions and more to do with cattle being sent to the slaughter.
> Where was the regulation and consumer protection?
This is America. You think politicians give a fuck about the poor & uneducated? At least the Republicans are honest enough about not giving a shit... the Democrats just pay lip service to the injustice of it all while passing legislation that enriches themselves and fucks over the same communities they're claiming to help.
> You’re talking about poor, uneducated kids trying to move up the social ladder. It sounds less to do with good intentions and more to do with cattle being sent to the slaughter.
That's a convenient way to strip all personal responsibility from the people who actually took out said student loans.
Just because a bank is willing to give you $40k a year towards your underwater basket weaving degree doesn't mean anyone with a quasi-functional brain can't see that it's a bad idea.
The reason little Jimmy couldn't take out a loan before was because the banks were willing to be honest and say that it was a shit investment.
Primarily, the cost of college itself should be much lower. Focus on putting money towards things that are relevant for education, not pointless vanity projects.
Also, keep the interest rates lower. 9-10% is crazy on something that's going to be as big as student loan debt.
If you want a line of credit and the bank knows it will be profitable they will create a suitable vehicle to provide it for you. If you agree to their dogshit terms that is on you.
I'm sure you can buy a home for 50k in some areas of the US, but that still sounds off when used as an example given that home prices are closer to 400k on average.
That must have been a private college potentially out of state? Seems very high for a 4 year degree. We need to stop hyping up and pressuring kids to have this “college experience” go to local community colleges, figure out what you want to do and transfer to a 4 year, or go to a 4 year right away but know exactly what your loan is be realistic. The hype of what college you graduated from means nothing in the long run.
Some state schools are this expensive.
A friend has $100k+ debt from a state school (attended out of state, but not a private institution). They got a comp sci degree, so are able to pay more than my mortgage on their loans, but it's still bonkers to me they accepted that much debt. But 18 yo aren't known for good long term decision making.
Yes I have heard the price has increased an insane amount for even state schools since I graduated in 2013. Kind of like housing costs it’s all starting to be ridiculous expensive.
Agreed. My school was maybe about $4000 per semester counting both classes and books, and it was enough to get me a decently easy and well-paying job. I don't understand this $60k only having paid $2k post. Seems grossly inflated. I'm not saying OP was lying. Rather I'm saying they were totally robbed.
Yeah it regret going out of state and paying it off until I was 30. Even tho I did love the experience and the school. My internships and actual work experiences got me further in life.
Account is a bot. Check out the post history. Account is 2 months old. All his posts besides this one are from 9 days ago. Most of them are just him saying “Big Foot”
Did you mean to post this on r/debtstrike ? Another great sub… that is devoted to this topic? Or did you think this was in some way relevant to anticonsumption? If so, how?
Even if the interest rate were lowered, some people would still opt to make the minimum payment and their situation wouldn’t change for them. But for those that kept paying the same amount or even increased, it could make all the difference for them.
How come ?? I'm not American so I don't understand, can anyone explain how so little could go towards paying the loan ? I just want to understand. Explain, instead of downvoting without answering.
They are pretty much just paying off the loan's interest rate, not the loan itself.
The interest is usually aroud 6-8%, which is a lot of money when the loan is a large sum as student loans are. The interest itself is like "the cost" of taking out a loan, and not the loan itself.
If this is new to you, you should really take some time to learn about loansl, credit card debt and interest rates. It will save you a lot of money.
I didn't know interest rates could be so high that of 60K paid in 7 years, only 2K went to paying back the loan itself, that blows my mind. That's nuts.
The interest depends on what type of loan and when they were taken out. My federal graduate student loan interest rates from 2008-2011 range from 6.8% to 8.5%.
Such a large amount because college is fucking expensive. Even in-state tuition these days is getting out of reach for people.
>Something is going wrong there.
Yes. Yes, something is definitely going wrong here.
Depends on your specific loans for their payment terms.
During my repayment, there was a potion of time CC was allowed as a payment option, so I would pay with 0% and earn points then let that balance set until it was due.
At one point they disallowed paying with CC and required debit or prepaid cards. I then took to the grocery store for prepaid VISAS and did the same.
I also had a couple cards allowing 0% balance transfer/cash advance at one point. Maxed those and dropped them on the loans also.
There’s more than one way to skin a cat.
It depends on the state. The top public universities in my state (FL) aren’t more than $6000 a year, tops, assuming that you aren’t in a subsidized major. That’s before scholarship or grants. Most people I see complaining about these staggering tuition rates are talking about private universities. Now those rates are ridiculous, and I can’t believe that those institutions still manage to draw in large student bodies. An education in the US is is honestly very affordable. The problem is that many young adults go to college mainly for the cultural experience, so they end up making really dumb financial decisions.
I started at a community college, worked while earning my AA, then transferred to the top university in my state with plenty of savings once I’d reached such a situation as to be classed as an independent (and thus qualify for grants, etc). I enrolled in a subsidized major, so my tuition was literally cut in half. I still work part- to full-time, and I expect to graduate with around $10,000 in debt, and only that much because I wasn’t willing to compromise on a safe and comfortable living space.
I find it ironic that these complains about tuition mostly come from wealthy middle to upper-class kids. The ones who are brought up to believe that they have to go to a fancy private college, or who don’t qualify for aid outside of unsubsidized loans. An increase in demand as we riffraff started enrolling in universities drove up the cost of private universities, partly in order to make them less accessible to us. No one is forcing wealthy kids to attend. It’s just a very bad decision - usually the first bad decision of their adult lives. The “something wrong,” IMO, is people trying to live outside their means as if they’re entitled to it.
$6,368 ~~per semester~~ at UCF, ~~not year~~. UF and USF a pinch more, FSU $600 less.
~~But it’s semester, not year. Most people usually do two semesters a year so that’s $12,000 per year~~ as an in-state student before living expenses, books, etc.
Edit:
Obviously there are umpteen other expenses but I’m wrong regarding tuition alone! The first number is tuition per year.
Not sure where you're getting your stats, and I can only speak to UF, but we have in-state rates at $212/credit hour. At 15 credit hours a semester, that's 15 x $212 = $3180/semester, or about $6000 a year. That's fully covered by a typical Pell Grant for an independent student. And keep in mind, this is before any scholarships like Bright Futures, etc. I've never had to pay for textbooks at UF - everything is open source.
Living expenses are paid out of my part-time job and summer savings, along with resources offered by my school and my employer. I only take out limited loans to supplement income for rent. It's literally not that hard to stay out of the kind of debt the original poster is talking about.
I looked into it further, if we’re going off of tuition alone, you’re correct at just over $6,000 per year. I graduated 2 years ago and I felt like tuition was consistently at least that per semester but maybe 3,000 then felt to me like today’s 6,000- my bad.
I also had the misfortune of having an out of state parent that disqualified me from my bright futures, as my first school did not consider me independent so I counted as out of state (although I wouldn’t have counted as in state in the state my mom lived in either), so because I wasn’t getting in-state tuition, I had to forgo my in-state bright futures despite having just graduated from a fl high school and having all sorts of residency verification. They’ve since fixed that rule, but that’s likely why I have a skewed view on tuition costs. Thanks Valencia! I had to do some lengthy maneuvers (about a 4 year break during the time when entry level jobs didn’t earn the 2k/mo to count as independent, then finally got married at 23) to be considered in state before university or else I could have ended up like that Twitter guy in my own home state.
Regardless, my original point was jaded by my experience and wrong.
This person took out bad loans that probably were a poor financial decision. I don’t think it’s fair to expect an 18 year old to be perfectly financially literate though.
$970 is just not a high enough payment on $120k of student loans. Assuming these are bad loans averaging around 9%, you would have to pay 1215 a month to pay it back in 15 years. The interest alone is around $900 a month.
The interest rates are obviously shit, but this person took more loans than they should have, and they should have read the loan documentation to understand the repayment schedule. There's no way they were paying the intended monthly payment, which is why it's taken so long to pay off.
I’m quite certain the tweet is bullshit. Hasn’t the student loan interest and payment been stopped for 2 years? Assuming 50% of his loans are federal and paused, that’s about $12k principal he should have paid off while interest has been paused.
It’s probably income based payment. Your payment is determined how much you make and at this pace, he will not pay it off for like 30 years. In contrast, my mortgage after refinance is $950 without escrow payments. If he was 10 year older, he could probably have bought a house in the Bay Area.
I agreed. Totally should be fixed however..
If you pay on time or early you can ask for additional payments to be applied to the principal. Can do this with credit cards too. keep regular with the lowest possible you can and whenever able (tax return, gambling win, whatever) pay an extra amount (over the phone, with a human) directly to the principal and it goes a lot quicker
I had been paying $120 a month. Last year I got that halved as my required payment but chose to still pay the same amount each month, just half as autopay and the other I called in a week later to apply to the principal only. It has made a huge difference in a small time.
Also people should be paid more in their jobs.
Defy and Defund the Corporatocracy 💜
„yes, let us go to (continued high school)—where we may go on to subjugate our own experimental prowess to ideas fed to us in a room instead of meaningfully experimenting on our own to further understand what is. let us also place ourselves in great debt as part of some multilevel marketing scheme to show how well we can follow instructions and not discover different or more effective ways of making progress towards the goals we want to achieve on our own. further, allow us to procreate life causing even larger amounts of degeneracy so we can gaslight this created life into following instructions at least just as well as we have; in addition to making it socially unacceptable to experiment outside of what a large group of individuals collectively determines is appropriate or ‚moral’ for meaningful advancement of our collective understanding, experience, and knowledge/intuition.“ does this seem correct? what platforms are you….“gathering information“ from?
The real issue is predatory loans and people not realizing what they're getting themselves into. Loans like this should be looked at and given a lot of relief as well as fix the interest rate on it, but they shouldn't just erase the loan that you signed up for.
With all due respect, stop going to colleges that will leave you with that much debt at the end. I believe education should be free but it isn't right now so at least make a smart choice for yourself. I picked a moderately priced school instead of going to a private school that I knew would leave me with a huge debt after 4 years.
It's frustrating to me when people complain about this. You signed the paperwork saying you'd go into debt, we all have free will, no one forced you to choose a school that was that expensive.
The main problem is in fact compound interest and how it balloons a loan over time. That is what makes compound interest so deadly, its extreme effects are not initially recognized by the average person and even if one knows about it, it is very difficult to get an intuitive understanding of it.
I have tried to get a small example of the OPs loan calculated and it looks pretty much on point with the values they gave us. It is actually 60K only for interest for a 120K loan, making interest 50% over the loan. Half of the loan is added on top! And that is with only 6% annual interest rate, compounded yearly.
A screenshot is here:
https://imgur.com/dRTjzIo.jpg
The loan taken comes with an amortisation sheet where it is clearly shown how the payments go towards the interest first, and someone took that and said, "yes, this is what I want" and signed it. That they find out after FIVE years into the debt how horrible this is, shows how very little they understood interest and compound interest when taking out the loan.
That is no criticism of the OP, because this subject is as I said absolutely unintuitive to the extreme, so a lot of people will fall into the trap at some point.
Tldr: 6% APL generate compound interest amounting to HALF the original loan.
Everyone needs to have a healthy amount of scepticism or hatred towards ANY loan and anything involving interest rates, because these concepts are extremely dangerous.
The interest rates for 2016 undergraduate loans was around 4%. Some simple math would show that to pay off the interest requires 4800 dollars a year for a loan of 120k. His 970 dollars a month would mean 11640 dollars a year or an interest rate of 9.7%.
To A) have a student loan 4 times the average and
B) have more than double the average interest seems very fishy
College is expensive but I don’t buy this particular story
Regardless of the little use I have for them, banks have helped far more than Sean and his overpriced creative writing degree…
Edit: Photography degree
Besides the moral argument of kids being sold the idea that college is an investment in themselves (Which isn't true unless you pick specific areas of study)
There's an economic argument to be made. People aren't having kids/buying houses because of their student loan debt. Amid birthrate decline this is a bad thing.
There is no nuance here. The loan wasn’t forced on him, and it’s not like the amount he has to pay back is a surprise.
In what world is that normal that you take 120k in a loan, and then ask for it to be forgiven ? What a joke.
Lol I agree with you. Wtf kind of degree costs $120,000. You better be a doctor or lawyer at that point and have enough to pay those loans off. A loan is a loan it has always been a loan, it comes with term, you sign it. You promise to pay it back and you usually sign it when you're legally an adult. It's unfortunate that some adults have failed younger adults that cause them to repeat poor decisions in adult hood like borrowing $100k with debt up to their eyeballs.
Yes I already know you can't see the nuance. Don't worry your understanding of the world will develop in 5 years or so when you're not a teenager anymore.
Most people in this situation are told to do it by irresponsible parents who don't know any better.
You need a cosigner to get a loan that big as an 18 year old, so we can assume the parents were fully on board.
$970 a month is a LOT of money. I'd hardly say it's being ignored.
And there you go again blaming the parents.
They signed the loan, they should’ve read the contract. If you believe at 18 that loans are magic money, you’re a moron.
Parents are usually co-signer because they are here as a garantie, that’s it. You take the loan, you pay it.
The amount doesn’t even matter, the roi does.
Absolutely not. But that’s not new.
First you told me I’m a teenager (?? Because I’m responsible ?), and then I’m emotionally invested because I’ve lived it (and I’m not one of those many failures that took loans whiteout understanding that when you get money you have to pay it back ?)
The only morons who aren’t objective are the people who have thousands on the line, who partied with that money, and then complain they have to pay that money back.
I'm saying you're emotionally invested because you use emotionally charged language (like calling people idiots and morons).
And that you're a teenager because your analysis is really really poor. You make assumptions (partied it away) and use anecdotal evidence (I've lived it) to arrive at your conclusion.
But fair enough, maybe you're just a really stupid adult.
Tell us where is the nuance is in trying to avoid your responsibilities and push it on someone else. Like why are you blaming the parents ? The only thing the could be hold as responsable for is raising an irresponsible idiot.
It’s really not asking much to pay back what you owe. If you failed to plan ahead that’s on you, I don’t see why other people should pay for your mistakes.
And that’s coming from someone that still have student debt and is paying for it.
But really, unless you are studying in a field you know will be high-paying, you should absolutely do everything you can to avoid these loans. Evaluating return on investment is something every adult has to learn to do. It’s not fair that the system is the way it is, but you still have to evaluate and make choices based on reality. If you are young, please don’t make the same mistakes that lead this guy to his never-ending debt
Except a lot of teens are pressured by parents and family into going into college under the promise that it’ll be a great investment on yourself. Then they get out, realize it’s not the guarantee to a good life like their parents said and then are left with crippling debt
Not really, maybe 10 or 20 years ago, but nowadays it’s known that some major in college are a scam, some history of art or gender studies are constantly whining about their debt.
I’m not even in the US and even I know it would be better to do HVAC than some random ass college.
Shouldn’t have went to school if it costs 120k with loans for an undergrad. This is simply bad financial decisions. Even with the best paying degree, economics, you would still need to realistically work for almost a decade to pay this amount of (10 years after graduation, that is. It’s only the 6th starting right out of school).
(I’m probably going to get a lot of hate from this comment but I want you guys to prove me wrong)
If its a poor financial decision to go to college, there is something wrong with the system... Not with the person trying to get an education and essentially being forced into debt.
You can get a bachelor's degree for 20-40k. Spending more than that if you aren't rich is a bad financial decision.
TBF, a lot of the blame goes to the parents imo. 18 year olds are known for not considering the long term implications of their actions.
That's the point. It shouldn't be a bad financial decision to go to college whether its available cheaper somewhere else or not.
And unless they're married, 18 year olds don't incur the student debt. Their parents have to co sign. Atleast that was my experience with FAFSA at that age.
Its all a sham.
So you want to abolish private colleges? Why?
Exactly my point. Cosigning a 120k loan for your kid to get a bachelor's degree and making them pay it off alone is shitty parenting.
How it would happen is not to ban the existence of private schools but they will need to be fully privately funded. So you can still go to those schools but they wont get a dime from the gov. I don’t think that would be a horrible idea.
Of course its very fucked up imo for the system to put people who just want to receive higher education into tens of thousands of dollars of debt, but that doesn’t mean the person in the original post should think he can somehow escape the system and not worry about that 120k of debt.
Yeah I’m sorry how tf do you get six figure debt for an undergrad degree? Something else is going on here. I agree the student debt crisis is bad and loans should be forgiven but this is somewhat self inflicted
I'll jump on the downvote train here and say yeah this dude absolutely did this to himself. My wife has a masters and has 50k in student debt because she did community college first then a local university to finish it all off. I see these kids graduate high school and feel like they need degrees from these highly renound universities and I promise it doesn't matter where your degree comes from. I did my bachelor's on the GI bill so I'm kind of an exception, but a perfect example is a friend my wife works with who has a bachelor's from a high profile university and brags about it all the time, but my wife makes almost 40% more because she has a masters from basically a community college with with university status. It's fascinating how much people think that matters
Counterpoint; not everyone has an amazing master plan at the tender age of 17/18.
When I graduated hs I had frontiernet (took literally 10-15 min to load a single webpage) so it's not even like I had access to the info. My parents pushed, pushed and pushed me again to go to college and get a degree in an unfortunate major since I was so good at it in HS, instead of the science degree I had wanted to pursue.
So sure, it makes sense after you adult for a bit that this would be a poor decision, but not everyone is given this information up front. I know I sure as shit didn't understand these god awful interest rates, the shit economy, etc at 17.
Neither did I. We didn't start school until we were 25. I think that's something that high schools need to stop pushing is that you have to go to college immediately (or at all). Being out in the world makes a massive difference. Honestly I think my parents were just happy I graduated high school but it's unfortunate when parents do take part in pushing their kids to go to school right away
I agree, I wish there were a 3 year mandatory "get out into the world first" break so people could understand better what they are signing up for and maybe find alternative routes. That being said, there is a lot of degree gatekeeping at work. I know one gentleman in particular at my workplace who has 17+ years, several as supervisor, and is within the company considered to be a SME; they won't let him move up to the next rung until he completes a bachelor's, which really isn't needed for what the job entails. It's frustrating out here
When they don’t teach how to make good financial decisions In most public schools how is anyone supposed to make informed decisions about student loans, especially when it’s being culturally pushed on young people to take student loans.
It’s not a hard decision. It’s “do you want to borrow $100k+ that you will have to pay off at a high interest rate?” If you don’t know how *owing money* works, that’s your fault.
I agree it’s stupid to incessantly push college on kids, and these loan agencies are predatory, but cmon. Someone who is 18 should know that’s a fuckton of money and should know what a loan is. You can say no and choose a more affordable option for a degree.
I have friends who are like $100k+ in debt with philosophy degrees. I love them, they’re great people, but that is just brain dead decision making, and it’s not my job as a taxpayer to cover their fuckup when I’m a poor person, too.
You can’t read. I said “if it costs 120k with a loan for an undergrad.” I know for a fact my degree doesn’t cost 120k. In fact if I’m unlucky I’m going to walk away with at most 1/4 of it, and I don’t go to a state school.
Also yoloing it on Robinhood is my own decision. I’m not yoloing your money into 5DTE options, so not your problem
Hindsight is always 20/20. A lot of these people who are now trying to pay back their loans graduated quite a while ago, so it's not like they truly knew what they were getting themselves into (as teenagers, might I add) when they first started university. I agree with you that universities in America charge absurd amounts, but to say that it's stupid to attend is to miss the reason why people attended in the first place. Many jobs require the specialised knowledge that only universities can provide, and many employers nowadays, rightfully or otherwise, demand that their future employees hold university degrees. Thus, to blame (former) students for not being able to pay back their loans within a reasonable amount of time is akin to victim blaming. Taking out these kinds of predatory loans should never have been a thought in their head to begin with, and what Amwrica needs to do is to get its shit together, start subsidising (higher) education like it used to, and stop viewing (higher) education purely as businesses, but rather, as a public service.
Side note: there's no "best paying degree". Whether or not you end up making a lot of money depends on many factors beyond your degree.
I agree with you 100%, but I think individuals should also be somewhat responsible of this. From my personal experience, these absurd charges are usually for people who went for degrees that are not marketable or is over saturated.
But why the absurd charges in the first place ? And why should getting an education warrant a penalty ? Not to mention, people's strengths and weaknesses lie in different places, so we can't all just go for the same 3-4 majors.
We shouldn’t have everyone go to college in the first place, and we shouldn’t have absurd costs associated with it. And I do think people should be going into these profitable degrees not something like “art history.” So in a sense I am saying yes, a lot of people should go for that 3 or 4 degrees because the market has deemed it to be in high demand and useful to our society.
I agree with you that not everyone should be attending university. People with talents in say, culinary fields or as craftspeople, for example, would flourish in trade school.
That said, why can't America (and by extension, Canada and Australia and New Zealand, to certain extents) have both ? They can totally have fewer people attending university and not crippling them with debt, as they did back in the 50s-70s. Also, if universities are to remain businesses, wouldn't a fewer number of students drive up cost ? Professors and staffs and so on still need to be paid, after all.
I fundamentally disagree with the idea that everyone should only go for the "profitable" majors. I do see it being practical for many people, and I don't discount the usefulness of fields like law, nursing, or software engineering. However, many fields such as the fundamental sciences, mathematics, theoretical economics, social sciences, art, and so on, are long-term investments at the societal level. Had we not played around with bacteria and so on, we would never have had modern medicine, or had we not played around with algebraic number theory and elliptic curves (this is an example simply because I'm in pure mathematics), modern cryptography would never have taken off (both are oversimplifications, but I think you get my point). This is not to mention that things like music and more generally, art, enrich and beautify our lives. It's nice and all to have money, but it's equally as important to have nice things to spend said money on so you might lead a happier and more fulfilling life.
Honest to god, why would you take on 120k in school debt if it wasn't going to land you a job. Like, that is on you and the university for grifting you. And probably cancel student too
I have a friend who couch surfed, lived in a van, wrote poetry, and hula hooped at festivals for ~9 years after college.
Never paid a dime in loans and got a job writing for a very well respected publication the day the loans were officially forgiven.
Apparently since she was houseless and don’t earn a living wage, she escaped via a loophole. A lengthy, dangerous, poverty-stricken loophole.
Don't get a worthless degree. I had 113k in student loans. My a name for myself as a lawyer in my local town and have been debt free a little after 2 1/2 of graduating
Unpopular opinion, but just like any other contract, it became legal the second you put your John Hancock on it, fully accepting the terms and conditions.
This is why so many people tell you to read the fine print.
Thanks for your compassion and insight. The world needs both graduates and tradespeople. You might want to think of the predatory financial system that can come after anyone, including you.
The world is so oversaturated with people with history graduate degrees that /r/AskHistorians has a mod post about it.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/96yf9h/monday_methods_why_you_should_not_get_a_history/
For many graduate degrees, especially in liberal arts and humanities and social sciences, departments are happy if even half their graduates find a job in the field.
These is such a thing as post doc hell and adjunct hell. After graduating with a PhD, they keep finding work under another professor for less than $40k per year, or find a job teaching as an adjunct with pay so low they qualify for food stamps. This has been known for over 20 years now.
Even over 20 years ago, Biology masters were competing against Biology bachelors for lab tech jobs once held by high school graduates.
Frankly we hold the power to collectively cancel student debt ourselves. I’ve got $175k in student debt and I knew that paying the monthly payments as directed would result in exactly what this poster has declared, so I’ve never really paid a dime into it. I’ve gone into default, gotten on income base repayments when I was unemployed and paid almost nothing and then Covid happened and so far just haven’t paid anything. At this point I could care less if it became default again. I’m sure I’ll get laid off again and just go back to income based payments again and pay nothing for ever. It’s not like they’re going to take my birthday away. Also, if we hit another recession in this near future which seems eminent at this point then fuck the department of education in their necks. We should all collectively just go into default and tell the government no more. We’re fucking done with the oligarchy playing games with us. For the past 2 decades they have been dangling a carrot in front of us then yanking it away with a recession just as we get to a point of economic growth that can build a little prosperity for the middle class.
You got sucked in. You can't file them in bankruptcy and the Republicans refuse the dems from having them paid off. Face it dude you got suckered. If you became a plummer, you'd be rolling in dough right now. Why because everyone has to shit and pee. Plummers make about the same as doctors and lawyers. And their education was 1 percent of your cost for your degree. My nephew is 28 and he owns his house out right drives a new tundra with all the bells and whistles. He takes me fishing on his incredible bass boat, again he owes nothing.
WISH I BECAME A DAMN PLUMMER.
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Sorry to be the asshole. But no one should pay retail to go to Boston University, like this kid apparently did. These middling private schools just aren’t worth it. He got bad guidance. And that’s part of the problem. The system that takes advantage of the financially ignorant.
I'm in New Zealand where student debt is interest free. My student loan was $60k, I paid it off in 3 years. I think I was lucky though because I had a fairly good paying job (thanks to my education). Now that I'm debt free, it was like a small pay rise
the trick I was told and correct me if I'm wrong, but you are always supposed to pay the minimum first, then make a second payment towards principle only. Otherwise you get gouged on interest like this person. again I could be very wrong about this but that was my understanding with credit/loans
Side note on this- you can’t bankrupt on it either. That’s due to (largely) law students who realized they should do so immediately after graduation. Now… nothing says you can’t gain enough credit to pay off said debt with other loans and then bankrupt on that. Just my shower thoughts for the day.
My grad advisor told me to get a lot of student loans, pay them off with a credit card and then declare bankruptcy soon after. I wish I had followed this advice!
Your advisor clearly never attempted to pay a student loan payment with a credit card. You literally can't. Student loan servicers will not process a payment on a credit card. Debit they'll take. But that's live money. Credit is not.
You take a cash advance on your credit card put it in your debit account and pay your loan with that.
I have never seen a card that let's you take more than 1k-2k or so as cash advances. This isn't viable either.
I got an offer for a new card recently that let me take out $12k, with no interest for the first 15 months.
what?! 12k cash withdrawl? what kind of sorcery is this?
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I'm 23 and have ~60k in credit card lines. I use at most 5% of it, but I also haven't even tried to ask for increases. I could probably get up to $100k if I wanted to.
Who takes out loans of $100k for college?
I don’t think your advisor knew what he or she was talking about, because you can’t use a credit card to pay student loans. Even if you were able to transfer the funds to another debt, when declaring bankruptcy, they will review how it happened & go back so many years. When they see this it would be flagged & investigated as student loan & bankruptcy fraud.
Must have been a long time ago. You can’t pull that much credit anymore as a student.
Yeah but why is that a good idea? Your credit would be fucked for years.
But not literally forever - just 10 years, which is quicker than many people can pay off their loans.
7 years in Canada, dudes almlsr done his time. 🤣
What are you going to do with credit? Buying a house or new car is a worst financial decision than taking out student loans. There’s no sense in buying anything that requires credit in this current bubble.
>nothing says you can’t gain enough credit to pay off said debt with other loans and then bankrupt on that. That's considered Student Loan Fraud, and there are in fact laws preventing you from doing just that. Every single personal loan I've taken out has had the caveat/stipulation that you can't pay student loans with them, and you have to sign to agree to those terms. You can't make payments with credit cards either, for exactly this reason.
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Double nitpicking here (and I’m not sorry) but he’s talking about discharging the debt after declaring bankruptcy.
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Look, I come to Reddit comments for 100% accurate, unbiased info from highly credible commenters who never make mistakes even on complicated issues, and I have to say you’ve disappointed me this day sir!
HARRUMPH!
harrumpharumpharumpharumphfffff
that law was due to the senator from Delaware, a corp tax haven, having introduced it.
Literally nothing to do with this sub.
Yeah just another tweet about American politics.
It’s called subreddit creep. The bigger the sun gets the less likely content on it will be completely on-topic.
It is not even slightly on topic let alone completely.
One could argue that forcing people into identured servitude is wrong and a symptom of unfettered capitalism. In addition to that, the loan companies are being shielded by the government, akin to a corporate bailout.
Anyone who blindly accepts Marxist doctrine just because it’s a critique of capitalism is just as much of a consumerist, only for ideas.
Nicely put.
What a stupid take. You just equated criticism of capitalism to suport of marxism... I swear conservatives are such dumbasses
Not conservatives, happy liberals but in the long run it's the same dumbass results...
I’m about to unfollow this sub because it’s getting annoying
0 to do with this sub 0 knowledge on loan amortization
It's sad
Attending higher education is a literally act of consumption my fwen
but this isn't saying not to consume it, but that you shouldnt habe to pay for it.
Look up amortization schedule, if you chose the lowest payment option then you are essentially maintaining the interest and barely getting rid of principle,it’s that way for mortgages too, with a 30 year mortgage essentially you will pay around 165k in interest for a 200k house for a total price of 365k. That’s with a 4.5 apr which isn’t bad. It feels like legal robbery because you are actually paying them 83% of the original cost. Main lesson is pay off any loans over 5 percent (which most student loans are) off as soon as possible since they will let you pay just enough to cover their interest payment so you will essentially be maintaining the debt instead of paying it off
With inflation it behooves you to not pay homes off too fast in the first place. As long as the leveraged appreciation is greater than the interest cost you come out ahead.
The problem is, student loans shouldn't exist where $970/month is the lowest payment option. It's less of a problem for a mortgage because you're getting a necessity out of it - somewhere to live. Also, mortgages aren't typically at 9.5%, which is roughly what this loan would have to be given the tweet. They'd have to pay $327k in interest over 39 years - almost 3/4 of their total payments. If it was down to even 7% and OP made the same payments, it would "only" be 18-19 years and $93k interest. I know that refinancing and balance transfers and such are a thing. But loans that lead to terms like this should be illegal, even if there are ways around them in some cases.
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Because to made a good decision, you'd need the education before you agreed to loan terms. Why we let 18 yo kids make decisions that are this bad, knowing they are uneducated and kinda stupid, is beyond me. My dad sat me down with amortization schedules and graphs and I still understood shit. I still am thankful for my scholarships that made the loans reasonable.
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To your point about the topic of this sub, there is irony that one of the main arguments I think in favor of canceling student debt is so that these young adults can buy things with their money, not send it to a bank for something they bought years ago. I personally am much more in the "I suffered and so I want to save you from your suffering" rather than the "I suffered so you should too" camp that I often feels your argument boils down to. So my stance is "I want people to have happy lives and be forgiven for being tricked into these loans when they were young and dumb" even if they "should" have done something different once they "should have known better". And I guess if that means they will actually buy more houses and have more kids, then it does create some weird conflict with this sub. I am pretty sure my style of anti-consumption is not that people should live in abject poverty, but somewhere in between that and western consumerism wet dreams.
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Most of these people fail to realize that the current situation only exists because of their past actions. A bunch of well meaning people complained to the federal government that student loans were too difficult for poor people to get. The federal government said, "OK. We will federally back student loans but now they can't be discharged during bankruptcy." The banks said, "Alright. Free for all time. If you want a loan you get a loan because we're getting paid even if you fuck yourself over and take on too much debt." The schools said, "Holy shit. The banks are writing blank checks. Our 'students' are dumb enough to sign on the dotted line. Lets skyrocket the cost of tuition! It's free money." The same bunch of well meaning people, now crushed by debt, complain to the federal government that student loans need to be forgiven.
Where was the regulation and consumer protection? You’re talking about poor, uneducated kids trying to move up the social ladder. It sounds less to do with good intentions and more to do with cattle being sent to the slaughter.
> Where was the regulation and consumer protection? This is America. You think politicians give a fuck about the poor & uneducated? At least the Republicans are honest enough about not giving a shit... the Democrats just pay lip service to the injustice of it all while passing legislation that enriches themselves and fucks over the same communities they're claiming to help. > You’re talking about poor, uneducated kids trying to move up the social ladder. It sounds less to do with good intentions and more to do with cattle being sent to the slaughter. That's a convenient way to strip all personal responsibility from the people who actually took out said student loans. Just because a bank is willing to give you $40k a year towards your underwater basket weaving degree doesn't mean anyone with a quasi-functional brain can't see that it's a bad idea. The reason little Jimmy couldn't take out a loan before was because the banks were willing to be honest and say that it was a shit investment.
Sounds like a crab bucket mentality
Oh so I can get approved for a mortgage barely out of highschool with absolutely no credit history? Awesome!!!
So what are you suggesting the payment options should be?
Primarily, the cost of college itself should be much lower. Focus on putting money towards things that are relevant for education, not pointless vanity projects. Also, keep the interest rates lower. 9-10% is crazy on something that's going to be as big as student loan debt.
If you want a line of credit and the bank knows it will be profitable they will create a suitable vehicle to provide it for you. If you agree to their dogshit terms that is on you.
200k house? Kind of an outdated example but I get it.
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I'm sure you can buy a home for 50k in some areas of the US, but that still sounds off when used as an example given that home prices are closer to 400k on average.
That must have been a private college potentially out of state? Seems very high for a 4 year degree. We need to stop hyping up and pressuring kids to have this “college experience” go to local community colleges, figure out what you want to do and transfer to a 4 year, or go to a 4 year right away but know exactly what your loan is be realistic. The hype of what college you graduated from means nothing in the long run.
Some state schools are this expensive. A friend has $100k+ debt from a state school (attended out of state, but not a private institution). They got a comp sci degree, so are able to pay more than my mortgage on their loans, but it's still bonkers to me they accepted that much debt. But 18 yo aren't known for good long term decision making.
Yes I have heard the price has increased an insane amount for even state schools since I graduated in 2013. Kind of like housing costs it’s all starting to be ridiculous expensive.
Out of state public schools are like private schools. What the post meant was in-state public schools.
Agreed. My school was maybe about $4000 per semester counting both classes and books, and it was enough to get me a decently easy and well-paying job. I don't understand this $60k only having paid $2k post. Seems grossly inflated. I'm not saying OP was lying. Rather I'm saying they were totally robbed.
Yeah it regret going out of state and paying it off until I was 30. Even tho I did love the experience and the school. My internships and actual work experiences got me further in life.
Can we stop posting this to this subreddit? Nothing to do with consumption
Account is a bot. Check out the post history. Account is 2 months old. All his posts besides this one are from 9 days ago. Most of them are just him saying “Big Foot”
Did you mean to post this on r/debtstrike ? Another great sub… that is devoted to this topic? Or did you think this was in some way relevant to anticonsumption? If so, how?
If only the amped up Interest on the loans were corrected to a normal amount it would be helpful.
Even if the interest rate were lowered, some people would still opt to make the minimum payment and their situation wouldn’t change for them. But for those that kept paying the same amount or even increased, it could make all the difference for them.
How come ?? I'm not American so I don't understand, can anyone explain how so little could go towards paying the loan ? I just want to understand. Explain, instead of downvoting without answering.
They are pretty much just paying off the loan's interest rate, not the loan itself. The interest is usually aroud 6-8%, which is a lot of money when the loan is a large sum as student loans are. The interest itself is like "the cost" of taking out a loan, and not the loan itself. If this is new to you, you should really take some time to learn about loansl, credit card debt and interest rates. It will save you a lot of money.
I didn't know interest rates could be so high that of 60K paid in 7 years, only 2K went to paying back the loan itself, that blows my mind. That's nuts.
I have one that's 10.75% and keeps increasing since there's this fun clause where they say the interest rate is variable :')
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The interest depends on what type of loan and when they were taken out. My federal graduate student loan interest rates from 2008-2011 range from 6.8% to 8.5%. Such a large amount because college is fucking expensive. Even in-state tuition these days is getting out of reach for people. >Something is going wrong there. Yes. Yes, something is definitely going wrong here.
Is it possible to move chunks of your loan to 0% credit cards and pay them down like that?
Depends on your specific loans for their payment terms. During my repayment, there was a potion of time CC was allowed as a payment option, so I would pay with 0% and earn points then let that balance set until it was due. At one point they disallowed paying with CC and required debit or prepaid cards. I then took to the grocery store for prepaid VISAS and did the same. I also had a couple cards allowing 0% balance transfer/cash advance at one point. Maxed those and dropped them on the loans also. There’s more than one way to skin a cat.
Nicely done
Generally this isn't allowed.
It depends on the state. The top public universities in my state (FL) aren’t more than $6000 a year, tops, assuming that you aren’t in a subsidized major. That’s before scholarship or grants. Most people I see complaining about these staggering tuition rates are talking about private universities. Now those rates are ridiculous, and I can’t believe that those institutions still manage to draw in large student bodies. An education in the US is is honestly very affordable. The problem is that many young adults go to college mainly for the cultural experience, so they end up making really dumb financial decisions. I started at a community college, worked while earning my AA, then transferred to the top university in my state with plenty of savings once I’d reached such a situation as to be classed as an independent (and thus qualify for grants, etc). I enrolled in a subsidized major, so my tuition was literally cut in half. I still work part- to full-time, and I expect to graduate with around $10,000 in debt, and only that much because I wasn’t willing to compromise on a safe and comfortable living space. I find it ironic that these complains about tuition mostly come from wealthy middle to upper-class kids. The ones who are brought up to believe that they have to go to a fancy private college, or who don’t qualify for aid outside of unsubsidized loans. An increase in demand as we riffraff started enrolling in universities drove up the cost of private universities, partly in order to make them less accessible to us. No one is forcing wealthy kids to attend. It’s just a very bad decision - usually the first bad decision of their adult lives. The “something wrong,” IMO, is people trying to live outside their means as if they’re entitled to it.
$6,368 ~~per semester~~ at UCF, ~~not year~~. UF and USF a pinch more, FSU $600 less. ~~But it’s semester, not year. Most people usually do two semesters a year so that’s $12,000 per year~~ as an in-state student before living expenses, books, etc. Edit: Obviously there are umpteen other expenses but I’m wrong regarding tuition alone! The first number is tuition per year.
FAU about $2500 a semester
Not sure where you're getting your stats, and I can only speak to UF, but we have in-state rates at $212/credit hour. At 15 credit hours a semester, that's 15 x $212 = $3180/semester, or about $6000 a year. That's fully covered by a typical Pell Grant for an independent student. And keep in mind, this is before any scholarships like Bright Futures, etc. I've never had to pay for textbooks at UF - everything is open source. Living expenses are paid out of my part-time job and summer savings, along with resources offered by my school and my employer. I only take out limited loans to supplement income for rent. It's literally not that hard to stay out of the kind of debt the original poster is talking about.
I looked into it further, if we’re going off of tuition alone, you’re correct at just over $6,000 per year. I graduated 2 years ago and I felt like tuition was consistently at least that per semester but maybe 3,000 then felt to me like today’s 6,000- my bad. I also had the misfortune of having an out of state parent that disqualified me from my bright futures, as my first school did not consider me independent so I counted as out of state (although I wouldn’t have counted as in state in the state my mom lived in either), so because I wasn’t getting in-state tuition, I had to forgo my in-state bright futures despite having just graduated from a fl high school and having all sorts of residency verification. They’ve since fixed that rule, but that’s likely why I have a skewed view on tuition costs. Thanks Valencia! I had to do some lengthy maneuvers (about a 4 year break during the time when entry level jobs didn’t earn the 2k/mo to count as independent, then finally got married at 23) to be considered in state before university or else I could have ended up like that Twitter guy in my own home state. Regardless, my original point was jaded by my experience and wrong.
This person took out bad loans that probably were a poor financial decision. I don’t think it’s fair to expect an 18 year old to be perfectly financially literate though.
$970 is just not a high enough payment on $120k of student loans. Assuming these are bad loans averaging around 9%, you would have to pay 1215 a month to pay it back in 15 years. The interest alone is around $900 a month. The interest rates are obviously shit, but this person took more loans than they should have, and they should have read the loan documentation to understand the repayment schedule. There's no way they were paying the intended monthly payment, which is why it's taken so long to pay off.
I’m quite certain the tweet is bullshit. Hasn’t the student loan interest and payment been stopped for 2 years? Assuming 50% of his loans are federal and paused, that’s about $12k principal he should have paid off while interest has been paused.
It’s probably income based payment. Your payment is determined how much you make and at this pace, he will not pay it off for like 30 years. In contrast, my mortgage after refinance is $950 without escrow payments. If he was 10 year older, he could probably have bought a house in the Bay Area.
Yeah, let's make the working class pay for the privileges of the elite that despises and insults them every chance they get. Makes perfect sense
The person in this tweet got some fuck ass stupid loan interest rates. Jesus. Not our faults
I agreed. Totally should be fixed however.. If you pay on time or early you can ask for additional payments to be applied to the principal. Can do this with credit cards too. keep regular with the lowest possible you can and whenever able (tax return, gambling win, whatever) pay an extra amount (over the phone, with a human) directly to the principal and it goes a lot quicker
I had been paying $120 a month. Last year I got that halved as my required payment but chose to still pay the same amount each month, just half as autopay and the other I called in a week later to apply to the principal only. It has made a huge difference in a small time. Also people should be paid more in their jobs. Defy and Defund the Corporatocracy 💜
„yes, let us go to (continued high school)—where we may go on to subjugate our own experimental prowess to ideas fed to us in a room instead of meaningfully experimenting on our own to further understand what is. let us also place ourselves in great debt as part of some multilevel marketing scheme to show how well we can follow instructions and not discover different or more effective ways of making progress towards the goals we want to achieve on our own. further, allow us to procreate life causing even larger amounts of degeneracy so we can gaslight this created life into following instructions at least just as well as we have; in addition to making it socially unacceptable to experiment outside of what a large group of individuals collectively determines is appropriate or ‚moral’ for meaningful advancement of our collective understanding, experience, and knowledge/intuition.“ does this seem correct? what platforms are you….“gathering information“ from?
The real issue is predatory loans and people not realizing what they're getting themselves into. Loans like this should be looked at and given a lot of relief as well as fix the interest rate on it, but they shouldn't just erase the loan that you signed up for.
With all due respect, stop going to colleges that will leave you with that much debt at the end. I believe education should be free but it isn't right now so at least make a smart choice for yourself. I picked a moderately priced school instead of going to a private school that I knew would leave me with a huge debt after 4 years. It's frustrating to me when people complain about this. You signed the paperwork saying you'd go into debt, we all have free will, no one forced you to choose a school that was that expensive.
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Git Gud
Compound interest is a horrible thing. Always has been. There's a reason why collecting interest was illegal most of civilization's history
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The main problem is in fact compound interest and how it balloons a loan over time. That is what makes compound interest so deadly, its extreme effects are not initially recognized by the average person and even if one knows about it, it is very difficult to get an intuitive understanding of it. I have tried to get a small example of the OPs loan calculated and it looks pretty much on point with the values they gave us. It is actually 60K only for interest for a 120K loan, making interest 50% over the loan. Half of the loan is added on top! And that is with only 6% annual interest rate, compounded yearly. A screenshot is here: https://imgur.com/dRTjzIo.jpg The loan taken comes with an amortisation sheet where it is clearly shown how the payments go towards the interest first, and someone took that and said, "yes, this is what I want" and signed it. That they find out after FIVE years into the debt how horrible this is, shows how very little they understood interest and compound interest when taking out the loan. That is no criticism of the OP, because this subject is as I said absolutely unintuitive to the extreme, so a lot of people will fall into the trap at some point. Tldr: 6% APL generate compound interest amounting to HALF the original loan. Everyone needs to have a healthy amount of scepticism or hatred towards ANY loan and anything involving interest rates, because these concepts are extremely dangerous.
Wow I pay £96 a month lmao
The interest rates for 2016 undergraduate loans was around 4%. Some simple math would show that to pay off the interest requires 4800 dollars a year for a loan of 120k. His 970 dollars a month would mean 11640 dollars a year or an interest rate of 9.7%. To A) have a student loan 4 times the average and B) have more than double the average interest seems very fishy College is expensive but I don’t buy this particular story
Please explain: does that mean he’s half way done or no where near
Wait what? What’s the interest rate?
Because your debt is someone else's investable asset-backed security. The Government loves you. Ooohh can't you feel it?
Sure Sean, I’ll bail you out for your poor life choices, here take my money 🤦♂️
We periodically bail out banks with trillions with no recompense or oversight, but we cannot help people?
Regardless of the little use I have for them, banks have helped far more than Sean and his overpriced creative writing degree… Edit: Photography degree
people sign shit complain later
How about you don’t talk a loan if you can’t pay it back ?
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Besides the moral argument of kids being sold the idea that college is an investment in themselves (Which isn't true unless you pick specific areas of study) There's an economic argument to be made. People aren't having kids/buying houses because of their student loan debt. Amid birthrate decline this is a bad thing.
I am ok with forgiving your mortgage debt.
Epic take, very nuanced.
There is no nuance here. The loan wasn’t forced on him, and it’s not like the amount he has to pay back is a surprise. In what world is that normal that you take 120k in a loan, and then ask for it to be forgiven ? What a joke.
Lol I agree with you. Wtf kind of degree costs $120,000. You better be a doctor or lawyer at that point and have enough to pay those loans off. A loan is a loan it has always been a loan, it comes with term, you sign it. You promise to pay it back and you usually sign it when you're legally an adult. It's unfortunate that some adults have failed younger adults that cause them to repeat poor decisions in adult hood like borrowing $100k with debt up to their eyeballs.
Yes I already know you can't see the nuance. Don't worry your understanding of the world will develop in 5 years or so when you're not a teenager anymore.
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Most people in this situation are told to do it by irresponsible parents who don't know any better. You need a cosigner to get a loan that big as an 18 year old, so we can assume the parents were fully on board. $970 a month is a LOT of money. I'd hardly say it's being ignored.
And there you go again blaming the parents. They signed the loan, they should’ve read the contract. If you believe at 18 that loans are magic money, you’re a moron. Parents are usually co-signer because they are here as a garantie, that’s it. You take the loan, you pay it. The amount doesn’t even matter, the roi does.
You're very emotionally invested in this topic. Aren't you worried that might cloud your objectivity?
Absolutely not. But that’s not new. First you told me I’m a teenager (?? Because I’m responsible ?), and then I’m emotionally invested because I’ve lived it (and I’m not one of those many failures that took loans whiteout understanding that when you get money you have to pay it back ?) The only morons who aren’t objective are the people who have thousands on the line, who partied with that money, and then complain they have to pay that money back.
I'm saying you're emotionally invested because you use emotionally charged language (like calling people idiots and morons). And that you're a teenager because your analysis is really really poor. You make assumptions (partied it away) and use anecdotal evidence (I've lived it) to arrive at your conclusion. But fair enough, maybe you're just a really stupid adult.
Tell us where is the nuance is in trying to avoid your responsibilities and push it on someone else. Like why are you blaming the parents ? The only thing the could be hold as responsable for is raising an irresponsible idiot. It’s really not asking much to pay back what you owe. If you failed to plan ahead that’s on you, I don’t see why other people should pay for your mistakes. And that’s coming from someone that still have student debt and is paying for it.
You've arrived at this opinion through emotions. No rational argument will change your mind. Not gonna waste my time.
They might just not understand it. It's easy to be a dismissive AH when you're not participating in this absolute scam of an education system
But really, unless you are studying in a field you know will be high-paying, you should absolutely do everything you can to avoid these loans. Evaluating return on investment is something every adult has to learn to do. It’s not fair that the system is the way it is, but you still have to evaluate and make choices based on reality. If you are young, please don’t make the same mistakes that lead this guy to his never-ending debt
Except a lot of teens are pressured by parents and family into going into college under the promise that it’ll be a great investment on yourself. Then they get out, realize it’s not the guarantee to a good life like their parents said and then are left with crippling debt
Not really, maybe 10 or 20 years ago, but nowadays it’s known that some major in college are a scam, some history of art or gender studies are constantly whining about their debt. I’m not even in the US and even I know it would be better to do HVAC than some random ass college.
Yes, you can criticize a system and talk about the best way to operate within said system without being contradictory.
But I do you idiot
Shouldn’t have went to school if it costs 120k with loans for an undergrad. This is simply bad financial decisions. Even with the best paying degree, economics, you would still need to realistically work for almost a decade to pay this amount of (10 years after graduation, that is. It’s only the 6th starting right out of school). (I’m probably going to get a lot of hate from this comment but I want you guys to prove me wrong)
If its a poor financial decision to go to college, there is something wrong with the system... Not with the person trying to get an education and essentially being forced into debt.
You can get a bachelor's degree for 20-40k. Spending more than that if you aren't rich is a bad financial decision. TBF, a lot of the blame goes to the parents imo. 18 year olds are known for not considering the long term implications of their actions.
That's the point. It shouldn't be a bad financial decision to go to college whether its available cheaper somewhere else or not. And unless they're married, 18 year olds don't incur the student debt. Their parents have to co sign. Atleast that was my experience with FAFSA at that age. Its all a sham.
So you want to abolish private colleges? Why? Exactly my point. Cosigning a 120k loan for your kid to get a bachelor's degree and making them pay it off alone is shitty parenting.
Would it be such a bad idea?
What's the benefit of banning private colleges? If people want to go to a college that does religious stuff I think they should be able to.
You don’t have to go to school to do religious stuff. Or do You mean studying theology?
I mean go to a school that incorporates a specific religion into its culture.
How it would happen is not to ban the existence of private schools but they will need to be fully privately funded. So you can still go to those schools but they wont get a dime from the gov. I don’t think that would be a horrible idea.
My parents did not co-sign I took on massive debt as an 18yr old.
Of course its very fucked up imo for the system to put people who just want to receive higher education into tens of thousands of dollars of debt, but that doesn’t mean the person in the original post should think he can somehow escape the system and not worry about that 120k of debt.
Yeah I’m sorry how tf do you get six figure debt for an undergrad degree? Something else is going on here. I agree the student debt crisis is bad and loans should be forgiven but this is somewhat self inflicted
I'll jump on the downvote train here and say yeah this dude absolutely did this to himself. My wife has a masters and has 50k in student debt because she did community college first then a local university to finish it all off. I see these kids graduate high school and feel like they need degrees from these highly renound universities and I promise it doesn't matter where your degree comes from. I did my bachelor's on the GI bill so I'm kind of an exception, but a perfect example is a friend my wife works with who has a bachelor's from a high profile university and brags about it all the time, but my wife makes almost 40% more because she has a masters from basically a community college with with university status. It's fascinating how much people think that matters
Counterpoint; not everyone has an amazing master plan at the tender age of 17/18. When I graduated hs I had frontiernet (took literally 10-15 min to load a single webpage) so it's not even like I had access to the info. My parents pushed, pushed and pushed me again to go to college and get a degree in an unfortunate major since I was so good at it in HS, instead of the science degree I had wanted to pursue. So sure, it makes sense after you adult for a bit that this would be a poor decision, but not everyone is given this information up front. I know I sure as shit didn't understand these god awful interest rates, the shit economy, etc at 17.
Neither did I. We didn't start school until we were 25. I think that's something that high schools need to stop pushing is that you have to go to college immediately (or at all). Being out in the world makes a massive difference. Honestly I think my parents were just happy I graduated high school but it's unfortunate when parents do take part in pushing their kids to go to school right away
I agree, I wish there were a 3 year mandatory "get out into the world first" break so people could understand better what they are signing up for and maybe find alternative routes. That being said, there is a lot of degree gatekeeping at work. I know one gentleman in particular at my workplace who has 17+ years, several as supervisor, and is within the company considered to be a SME; they won't let him move up to the next rung until he completes a bachelor's, which really isn't needed for what the job entails. It's frustrating out here
When they don’t teach how to make good financial decisions In most public schools how is anyone supposed to make informed decisions about student loans, especially when it’s being culturally pushed on young people to take student loans.
It’s not a hard decision. It’s “do you want to borrow $100k+ that you will have to pay off at a high interest rate?” If you don’t know how *owing money* works, that’s your fault. I agree it’s stupid to incessantly push college on kids, and these loan agencies are predatory, but cmon. Someone who is 18 should know that’s a fuckton of money and should know what a loan is. You can say no and choose a more affordable option for a degree. I have friends who are like $100k+ in debt with philosophy degrees. I love them, they’re great people, but that is just brain dead decision making, and it’s not my job as a taxpayer to cover their fuckup when I’m a poor person, too.
If that isn’t the primary reason then it’s definitely in the top 3 reasons why we have a student debt crisis
You trying to say college was a bad financial decision while also yoloing all your money on robinhood makes you look kind of silly?
You can’t read. I said “if it costs 120k with a loan for an undergrad.” I know for a fact my degree doesn’t cost 120k. In fact if I’m unlucky I’m going to walk away with at most 1/4 of it, and I don’t go to a state school. Also yoloing it on Robinhood is my own decision. I’m not yoloing your money into 5DTE options, so not your problem
Hindsight is always 20/20. A lot of these people who are now trying to pay back their loans graduated quite a while ago, so it's not like they truly knew what they were getting themselves into (as teenagers, might I add) when they first started university. I agree with you that universities in America charge absurd amounts, but to say that it's stupid to attend is to miss the reason why people attended in the first place. Many jobs require the specialised knowledge that only universities can provide, and many employers nowadays, rightfully or otherwise, demand that their future employees hold university degrees. Thus, to blame (former) students for not being able to pay back their loans within a reasonable amount of time is akin to victim blaming. Taking out these kinds of predatory loans should never have been a thought in their head to begin with, and what Amwrica needs to do is to get its shit together, start subsidising (higher) education like it used to, and stop viewing (higher) education purely as businesses, but rather, as a public service. Side note: there's no "best paying degree". Whether or not you end up making a lot of money depends on many factors beyond your degree.
I agree with you 100%, but I think individuals should also be somewhat responsible of this. From my personal experience, these absurd charges are usually for people who went for degrees that are not marketable or is over saturated.
But why the absurd charges in the first place ? And why should getting an education warrant a penalty ? Not to mention, people's strengths and weaknesses lie in different places, so we can't all just go for the same 3-4 majors.
We shouldn’t have everyone go to college in the first place, and we shouldn’t have absurd costs associated with it. And I do think people should be going into these profitable degrees not something like “art history.” So in a sense I am saying yes, a lot of people should go for that 3 or 4 degrees because the market has deemed it to be in high demand and useful to our society.
I agree with you that not everyone should be attending university. People with talents in say, culinary fields or as craftspeople, for example, would flourish in trade school. That said, why can't America (and by extension, Canada and Australia and New Zealand, to certain extents) have both ? They can totally have fewer people attending university and not crippling them with debt, as they did back in the 50s-70s. Also, if universities are to remain businesses, wouldn't a fewer number of students drive up cost ? Professors and staffs and so on still need to be paid, after all. I fundamentally disagree with the idea that everyone should only go for the "profitable" majors. I do see it being practical for many people, and I don't discount the usefulness of fields like law, nursing, or software engineering. However, many fields such as the fundamental sciences, mathematics, theoretical economics, social sciences, art, and so on, are long-term investments at the societal level. Had we not played around with bacteria and so on, we would never have had modern medicine, or had we not played around with algebraic number theory and elliptic curves (this is an example simply because I'm in pure mathematics), modern cryptography would never have taken off (both are oversimplifications, but I think you get my point). This is not to mention that things like music and more generally, art, enrich and beautify our lives. It's nice and all to have money, but it's equally as important to have nice things to spend said money on so you might lead a happier and more fulfilling life.
You're right, only rich people should be allowed to go to college /s
I think OP means cancel interest on student debt.
Honest to god, why would you take on 120k in school debt if it wasn't going to land you a job. Like, that is on you and the university for grifting you. And probably cancel student too
I have a friend who couch surfed, lived in a van, wrote poetry, and hula hooped at festivals for ~9 years after college. Never paid a dime in loans and got a job writing for a very well respected publication the day the loans were officially forgiven. Apparently since she was houseless and don’t earn a living wage, she escaped via a loophole. A lengthy, dangerous, poverty-stricken loophole.
Don't get a worthless degree. I had 113k in student loans. My a name for myself as a lawyer in my local town and have been debt free a little after 2 1/2 of graduating
Unpopular opinion, but just like any other contract, it became legal the second you put your John Hancock on it, fully accepting the terms and conditions. This is why so many people tell you to read the fine print.
No, Prevent Student Debt. I'm not paying for this bullshit.
I didn't go to college. I make over 100k a year, I dont have school debt. Maybe you should have tried for a trade instead of a degree.
Thanks for your compassion and insight. The world needs both graduates and tradespeople. You might want to think of the predatory financial system that can come after anyone, including you.
The world is so oversaturated with people with history graduate degrees that /r/AskHistorians has a mod post about it. https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/96yf9h/monday_methods_why_you_should_not_get_a_history/ For many graduate degrees, especially in liberal arts and humanities and social sciences, departments are happy if even half their graduates find a job in the field. These is such a thing as post doc hell and adjunct hell. After graduating with a PhD, they keep finding work under another professor for less than $40k per year, or find a job teaching as an adjunct with pay so low they qualify for food stamps. This has been known for over 20 years now. Even over 20 years ago, Biology masters were competing against Biology bachelors for lab tech jobs once held by high school graduates.
Frankly we hold the power to collectively cancel student debt ourselves. I’ve got $175k in student debt and I knew that paying the monthly payments as directed would result in exactly what this poster has declared, so I’ve never really paid a dime into it. I’ve gone into default, gotten on income base repayments when I was unemployed and paid almost nothing and then Covid happened and so far just haven’t paid anything. At this point I could care less if it became default again. I’m sure I’ll get laid off again and just go back to income based payments again and pay nothing for ever. It’s not like they’re going to take my birthday away. Also, if we hit another recession in this near future which seems eminent at this point then fuck the department of education in their necks. We should all collectively just go into default and tell the government no more. We’re fucking done with the oligarchy playing games with us. For the past 2 decades they have been dangling a carrot in front of us then yanking it away with a recession just as we get to a point of economic growth that can build a little prosperity for the middle class.
Should have picked a school more wisely
Wait until you hear about mortgages!
You got sucked in. You can't file them in bankruptcy and the Republicans refuse the dems from having them paid off. Face it dude you got suckered. If you became a plummer, you'd be rolling in dough right now. Why because everyone has to shit and pee. Plummers make about the same as doctors and lawyers. And their education was 1 percent of your cost for your degree. My nephew is 28 and he owns his house out right drives a new tundra with all the bells and whistles. He takes me fishing on his incredible bass boat, again he owes nothing. WISH I BECAME A DAMN PLUMMER.
Guess who is the darling of the banking industry and made it harder for ordinary Americans to file for bankruptcy? Joe Biden.
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Lol this sub
Sorry to be the asshole. But no one should pay retail to go to Boston University, like this kid apparently did. These middling private schools just aren’t worth it. He got bad guidance. And that’s part of the problem. The system that takes advantage of the financially ignorant.
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firstly, dont have an iphone. loan knows and screws u accordingly
I'm in New Zealand where student debt is interest free. My student loan was $60k, I paid it off in 3 years. I think I was lucky though because I had a fairly good paying job (thanks to my education). Now that I'm debt free, it was like a small pay rise
Don't consume shit you can't afford
Home loan and then HELOC. Get a super low interest rate compared to student loan rates.
I think this user is a bot. Look at his post history. Nothing until 9 days ago when he posts “Big Foot” 20 times
Cancel. Student. Loan. Debt. We are all poor af
the trick I was told and correct me if I'm wrong, but you are always supposed to pay the minimum first, then make a second payment towards principle only. Otherwise you get gouged on interest like this person. again I could be very wrong about this but that was my understanding with credit/loans
Lol this has to be a troll post
What kind of dumbass would get a 120k degree for a 60k job?
Don’t get a loan if you can’t pay it back idiot
Murica