What's your take on student loan forgiveness?

Not your political take on it, but your gut level instinct take on it.

My take on it is that we need to do something about the cost of education, consider even if there should be for profit learning institutions and if so, how can we bring the costs in line with the realities of life for those struggling (financially) to get an education.

This 10 to 20k forgiveness program is fine, even in many cases needed, but I think it should be only the first step in a radical overhaul of higher education in the United States.

EDIT:

If you bring politics into the discussion I will delete your comment. If you start using labels, or start throwing insults, I will delete your comment.

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REMsleep · 41-45, F

My mom graduated in 1999 with about 39K in federally guarunteed student loan debt. She paid double the minimum ( she might not have specified that the extra was to go to the premium, I dunno) for about 7 years. ( around 650/month).
Then her loan was sold to a new lender and she found at that time that she now owed around 42K.

We were a struggling family and she had invested so much of her income into paying the loan down but the intrest rate was horrible. She didn't know about trying to refinance, she didn't even realize the situation that she was in.
She got frustrated and stopped paying for 3 years. Then she started again and has paid faithfully for many years but only the minimum because of her experience and also because the loan was sold several more times. Today she owes 75K from that loan.
That is criminal.

REMsleep · 41-45, F

@REMsleep I will tell you guys how it works. When you obtain a student loan it doesn't always come from one lender so many times you have several lenders each with different intrest rates and conditions once you are no longer in school and each one of them can sell that debt at any time. Its a mess.

Ontheroad · M

@REMsleep Your mother and many, many other mothers, especially single mothers have been and will in the future be caught in the same situation. They are alone, they have children and their options are few. They can take out massive loans to get an education so they can support their children, or live in poverty and draw government benefits while working two or three jobs.

Eventually they reach retirement age and beyond, and the debt is still there, still being paid on and they live paycheck to paycheck, barely getting by.

Why? Because they wanted more for their children.

I agree 100% with you, it is criminal and unconscionable.

REMsleep · 41-45, F

@Ontheroad Yes and my mom is very responsible. Saved alot of her money in 401K, never paid bills late after she graduated.
Helped a bit put her kids thru college, paid off her house.
Just very good example but she had no guidance with this loan and she wasn't savvy and its just crazy. There were alot more shady practices involved which added to her loan amount but I don't know all of the details. You cannot negotiate with the lenders because they don't care about you and they have no intrest in assisting you. They bought the debt for pennies on the dollar and its honestly in their best intrest to add as much to the amount as they legally can and try to collect as much as they can.
My mom just retired one year ago. A couple years early to care for her Alzheimers mom. She wants a part time job now in her field but she is now caring full time alone for her Alzheimers aunt so it has become impossible.