Student Debt approaches $1 trillion

[sameech]

Higher Education is a racket, an industry so rife with corruption that Tony Soprano would blush. It is stacked with liberal ideologues that have no concept of free market economics and thanks to crony capitalism- no need to rely upon it. They simply turn to their toadies in government (more 'free market" neophytes) and arrange for "low cost" loans for the suckers, er I mean "students" to keep the gravy train a-rollin'. The fish, er I mean "students" line up like lemmings and jump over the proverbial cliff. After four years of reciting the correct lines, and copying the correct answers from the internet, they come out with a piece paper, an entry level job, and $100,000 in debt (that is exempt from Bankruptcy laws!!- you are paying that money back one way or another!) Then they wake up one day and realize they really don't know jack shit.

It takes cash to keep America hating bomb throwers like Bill Ayers employed!! Assholes like Ward Churchill need a constant supply of steady cash!! Who better to pay than those being indoctrinated?? It's the perfect scam.

Yes it often is a racket. Over half of college grades given in the US are A's. and the average GPA has crossed over into the 3.1 range. Parents/students see the grades, feel like they are getting their money's worth, sell the university, and make big donations as alums. Think about it--are you going to dump your money down a hole that gives you a 1.8 or one that gives you a 3.85 GPA?

 

[Steven_R]

Something else to consider is that while tuition is sky high (and getting higher at a rate outpacing inflation and has been for a while), it isn't the only expense. Look at all the fees tacked on to tuition for everything from supporting sports to supporting IT to supporting the student activities to parking. Then there are club fees and professional organization fees. Then we get to textbooks, a huge money sink in and of itself. Telling someone to just work to pay for school instead of getting loans is nice when we're only talking about 150 bucks an hour, but becomes a little more problematic when we start adding the totals up. That's before we get to the part where some schools require a degree be completed in so man years and classes older than that cut off can't be used.

Part of the earlier discussion dealt with overhead and how on the academic side they have been cut to bare bones, but that doesn't address the administrative side. There are simply too many people with do nothing and make work jobs, too many vice presidents drawing in huge salaries, and too many programs and offices and projects that don't contribute anything other than diversity for diversity's sake. Does having an entire office and staff devoted to the cause de jour really justify their expense or are they just there to shut up some group that demands to be pandered to?

And lest we forget, universities are sitting on tons of money, either in straight endowments or in assets. Even the smallest university has massive amounts of property both on and off campus, artwork, artifacts, rare books, and the like, all of which requires upkeep and maintenance, and all of which could be sold or rented to another institution if it comes down to it, but no university will even consider that course of action to reduce expenditures. It isn't just universities claiming poverty and that is why they can't reduce tuition so much as no one in the administrative side wanting to make the hard choices.

 

[editec]

heretic!!

Great idea....I like it

You want an education at $40k a year.....get yourself a job at $7.50 an hour. If you can find one

What ever happened to the good old days where the parents, working 5 jobs between them, put their kids though school? What ever happened to the days of working days and going to night school to get a degree?

Those days are done because the cost of ED rose so much faster than the incomes of most working people.

Now you MUST already know that, right?

 

[Unkotare]

I was just about to say before I made it to the end of the thread that many entry level positions require a college degree. Usually of the 30,000 per year nature.

Young people are required to incur this debt and get the degree if they want a job that is not based on menial labor.

"Manual" is not necessarily "menial."

 

[waltky]

Me thinketh a rose by any other name still stinketh...

Sallie Mae Re-Branding: This Rose By Any Other Name Still Has Thorns
August 26, 2014 — The spin-off of Sallie Mae's student loan servicing arm from its consumer banking business seemed designed to suggest that nothing drastic was happening. Just as innocuous--or mysterious--is the servicer's new name: Navient. Punch that into a search engine and you'll find that Navient is also a surgical system that lets a doctor peer into a patent's skull while performing ear, nose and throat surgery. It's also the Instagram handle for a dude who digs old cars, among other things.

"Helping our customers navigate the path to financial security is everything we stand for," said CEO Jack Remondi in a February press release. "Our new name, Navient, symbolizes the expertise, experience and dedication we consistently deliver for our clients and customers."

As though there was a critical mass of people not willing to take Sallie Mae's word for what it was doing, the Department of Education's Information for Financial Professionals Website (iFap) Website posted a guidance on the name change along with a Q&A. New loans it originates will continue to be expensive and cost more than similar Federal loans. There's nothing to suggest that its debt collection practices will change.

And the old name lingers as business done by the company known as Sallie Mae collides with the Navient brand. In the Department of Justice's complaint that Sallie Mae violated the Servicemen's Civil Relief Act buy overcharging veterans on its loans, it identified the defendants through the names "Sallie Mae, Inc." and "Navient Delaware Corp." Even though Naveint is publicly traded, there's the risk that it will still being tarred by the Sallie Mae brush.

MORE

 

[sameech]

So SLM Financial is now Sallie Mae and Sallie Mae is now Navient. Yeah that makes sense. I have less problem with their student loan business than their financing car tires at 24% APR