Senior Citizens Saddled with Student Debt: Reason #5,684 Not Everyone Should Go to College

Student loan debt: It's not just for kids anymore. Here's a depressing chart, based on a new report from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York:

And—because taypayer-funded grants and subsidized loans are all too often the bait that lures in the college-unready—here's a depressing video:

Comments

[Joe M]

Anyone else have a problem with Chrome idiotically resizing the graph image and thus causing the video to overlap some of the comment buttons?

[kilroy]

AdBlock to the rescue.

[Joe M]

Well yeah but now the video is gone.

[kilroy]

Yes

[Episiarch]

More debt for everyone! Debt all around!

[Almanian]

Oh! None for me, thanks!

[Episiarch]

Too late, sorry! We have to bail out some bankers and some union workers, so fuck you!

[Spiny Norman]

Can I borrow money to pay off my debt? 'Cuz that'd be a sweet deal!

[fried wylie]

so, like, a bailout^2?

[Almanian]

Spiny said he'd pay off my obligation to assuage his guilt.

Thanks, Spiny!

[Pro Libertate]

Age unknown goes with whereabouts unknown and refers to Sen. John Blutarsky. Who, apparently, took out over $10 million in student loans and never paid them back.

[Realist]

"Reason #5,684 Not Everyone Should Go to College"
There are at least that many reasons. In fact most should not go to college.

[Almanian]

That's why I told my kids to get good grades - cause I wasn't paying for their college for them. I got a free ride on academic scholarships. You want no debt coming out of school? Do the same thing.

Or be an athlete (Tebow > Tuition)

[R C Dean]

I got a free ride on academic scholarships.

Me, too, as a wee tad of an undergrad.

Law school, well, my folks were so shocked that I got into a good school (rather than getting a correspondence degree from a jail cell) that they picked up the tab.

[Auric Demonocles]

Did my undergrad for free as well. Still not sure if that was a good idea, as I ended up needing to go to grad school so people wouldn't ditch my resume as soon as they looked at the school.

[Bill]

Free ride scholarships are rare and hard to get. Tuition has risen faster than inflation and so few large scholarships are given out.

The availability of student loans has caused a bubble and costly regulations impacting higher education, from Title IX to Homeland Security to Equal Opportunity, have caused many more administrators and lawyers to be hired.

My kids all got free tuition but had to pay $10K per year for room/board and so took out loans to cover part of the cost. You still end up with a small amount of debt ($20K) and start paying them back at 22 over 10 years. The payments can be 200 per month on top of several kinds of insurance, rent, etc. Which is why so many 25 year olds live at home still.

The problem is that it is so easy to get the loans and many kids end up $60K in debt so have to pay it off over 20 years.

[R C Dean]

Ok, under 30, sure.

But anyone over age 30 with student debt who isn't paying off their medical school loans has made a serious, serious mistake.

[Hugo Longbone]

Any grad school mon osite, going to a Tier III law school, was a bad idea, going $100K into the red for it an even worse idea.

[Auric Demonocles]

The standard repayment would have you finish at 32 (typically finish undergrad at 22, then 10 year repayment). Of course you can save a lot of interest by doing it faster, but even if it's a master's that leaves you with just 5-6 years.

[wef]

I liked the suggestion of someone recently who suggested that we add the cost of contraception to student loans.

And why not?

Or better yet, let's require insurance companies to cover university costs. A doctor could write a prescription saying that, for medical reasons, this or that patient had to take four years of college.

[fried wylie]

Obamucation.

[fried wylie]

oh, yeah, fuck the prescription, when all it takes is a mandate.

[Almanian]

I "deem" you to have been educated.

NEXT!

[fried wylie]

at first I wasn't happy about Obama forcing me to pickup tens of thousands in student loan debt, but after a few classes, I learned that I was just being racist.

[Almanian]

Hey hey, ho ho!
Student loan debt
Has got to go!

[Almanian]

Hey hey!
Ho ho!
Stedent-loan debt has got to go!

[Almanian]

I see my typing skills have not improved with more alcohol.

EXcellent!

[John]

This is generation retard. So much stupid in this video.

http://www.thecollegefix.com/post/10258

[Auric Demonocles]

Don't hold this against my whole generation. Pretty much everyone I know in our generation are productive members of society (of course I work at a software company, live with a guy who works at another software company, and the closest I ever get to Occupy Boston is when I stumble past their downtown camp drunk on the weekends).

[Dan]

I'm 29 work in software too. Really hard workers here... As I'm reading Reason at work!

[Auric Demonocles]

I said productive, not hard working. They're not necessarily the same thing!

[fried wylie]

They're not necessarily the same thing!

Smart Work is far more productive than Hard Work.

[Auric Demonocles]

I was pretty clearly the least hard worker student in my high school, but I still produced the best grades.

[Episiarch]

It's funny how paternalists go apeshit over payday lenders because they view them as profiting off of poor people who don't know any better, but they encourage colleges and universities to profit off of poor teenagers who don't know any better.

[John]

That is money that goes to the right people. Kind of like how they think people going bankrupt from medical bills justifies single payer healthcare. But the fact that legal fees are just as outrageous would never justify single payer legal.

[Joe M]

But they are centers of learning! For teh childrun!

[Episiarch]

One of the most amusingly hypocritical aspects of the left is how they will excuse any behavior, no matter how much they supposedly oppose it, by anyone who just mouths the right platitudes. Like, for instance, Obama. I can't even imagine how stupid he thinks his own supporters are.

[Joe M]

We must enslave you to set you free.

[Auric Demonocles]

I had an argument Saturday night with a girl trying to claim that Obama was different than Bush because "he got the troops of out Iraq". When I pointed out it was on Bush's timeline and 2 years longer than his campaign promises, she said "he still got them out".

[fried wylie]

she said "he still got them out didn't keep them there, cause shit, we gotta fuckup Iran and Syria".

ftfh.

[Episiarch]

That must have been a scintillating conversation. I must assume she was attractive, or else why were you talking with her about this stuff?

[Auric Demonocles]

We've been friends for a few years. She randomly went off on a Rush/slut tangent. I put up with it because she was bringing me to a party that was looooooaded with hot chicks.

Also I was busy mostly ignoring her and trying to hit on deaf girls at the bowling lane next to us.

[fried wylie]

Also I was busy mostly ignoring her and trying to hit on deaf girls at the bowling lane next to us.

Is there a charset for sign language? My joke won't work without it.

[Res Publica Americana]

What's American Sign Language for 'sugartits'?

[fried wylie]

What's American Sign Language for 'sugartits'?

without the appropriate charset, no one will ever be able to post the answer.

well, i mean, they could describe the actual signing, but where's the fun in that? ("you cup both hands together in front of you, raise and then lower them slightly three times, then touch a finger tip to your tongue while smiling.")

[Auric Demonocles]

I got one to laugh and shush me when I caught her throwing an extra ball and made the sign for "cheater".

[Auric Demonocles]

Note: the shushing was because her friends didn't see her.

[Episiarch]

Dude, I'm disgusted that you would sink to hitting on retards. Are you really that desperate?

[Auric Demonocles]

This was before the party with all the hot girls. Gotta warm up.

Besides, I'm pretty sure I've clearly demonstrated that I have no standards besides legal female humans. You shouldn't be disgusted by now.

[Episiarch]

I'm disgusted, but impressed. I admire a man who will hit anything. It indicates a certain joie de vivre.

[juris imprudent]

See why we have to protect our white women? That is some gullible on a galatic scale.

[Just Dropping By]

The distinction is that an educational loan is the equivalent of financing a capital investment (i.e., in most circumstances it will raise your earning potential over the remainder of your lifetime), whereas payday loans are used almost exclusively to cover the equivalent of day-to-day operating expenses. In the business world, the former is usually considered a very good reason for a company to borrow money, while the latter is often viewed as a bad sign about a company's health (unless it's a seasonal business or otherwise part of an industry where it can normally expect to realize huge profits in some months while taking losses in others).

[A Serious Man]

I saved myself two years of student loans going to a community college. Now I calculate maybe I'll have a little over 20K in debt for bachelor degrees in poli sci and history, which I don't think is too bad.

[fried wylie]

bachelor degrees in poli sci and history

A hair better than womyns studies I guess.

[juris imprudent]

Consigning myself to the ring of hell that will be occupied by SugarFree and Warty...

a BCH better?

[Brandon]

Your handle conflicts with your choice of degree.

[HeroicMulatto]

Indeed, how dare he study something you don't find interesting.

[fried wylie]

oh, i'm sure his course of study was plenty interesting.

Interesting doesn't pay the bills most of the time.

[Kibby]

I think I'll be at about 15K once I'm done with my Classics/Middle Eastern Studies (ie: Farsi) degree. Then I fully plan on milking the hell out of a government job, because I'm a hypocrite.

[BakedPenguin]

You could at least try to take them down from the inside.

[Kibby]

If only I were that clever.

[Auric Demonocles]

I'm about $35k of that, but I've got a master's in engineering and will finish paying it off in about 3 years.

[MP]

Looking at the article, I saw nothing about the age of the loan balance. It is incorrect to infer that individuals in their 60's are dealing with loans that originated in their 20's.

In fact, some of the data is encouraging...particularly the pie chart that shows that the vast majority of debt is below 50K, and that only a tiny fraction of idiots accumulate massive Ivy/MBA/Dr debts.

[Auric Demonocles]

My one year of Ivy education got me about $25k more a year in salary.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

In fact, some of the data is encouraging...particularly the pie chart that shows that the vast majority of debt is below 50K

That's still a shitty hole to be in for something that can't be discharged in bankruptcy.

[fry]

does this data include seniors guaranteeing loans for children and others?

[omnibot]

Fucking Social media, how does it work?

[Res Publica Americana]

Don't worry, Auric. You're a libertard capitalist professional who'll be among the first to be dragged into the street and shot by the red horde.

Long live grandfather Lenin!

/Covert Occutard

[fried wylie]

didn't get the best grades in Covertness 101 I'm guessing. More wasted loan dollars.

high marks in Liberal Parody Studies though.

[Res Publica Americana]

Go right ahead, capitalist swine. Mock us.

Our cause is just. We WON.

/Covert Occutard's aphrodisiac words.

[Zombie Jimbo]

I had a fairly small amount of student loans, going to a private engineering college in the early '80s. Do I get extra Reason online props for paying off my $3000 student loan while working overtime on the assembly line while the UAW and IAM were striking the company that I worked for as an engineer?

[Res Publica Americana]

Yeah, but if you punched a UAW thug and told him to eat shit and die at some point, you earn the Honorary Monocle, too.

[Almanian]

My fucking God! You're a hero!

*swoons*

Did you have to kill any babies to make your way to work? Or maybe you had baby for lunch!? Even better!

[Cytotoxic]

You should've taken a shit in the Union Local's fridge.

[Almanian]

Lenny fucking Dykstra - Grand Theft Auto! Real life, not the game.

What. the. Fuck?

That's awesome. Three years in the clink. I hope his dog didn't get shot...

[The Derider]

They made a good bet and lost.

[Gerholdt]

How about Bachelor of Science? (Fill in your own BS jokes.) Much easier to get hired if you can prove you're not innumerate.

[Mo]

Some of those older people are likely parents who have their children's student loans in their name.

[Tibo Mio]

That jsut makes no sense at all dude, I am talking none whatsoever man.

http://www.Go-Anon.tk

[shoes]

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