Since Senator Warren’s run for President, the idea of canceling student loan debt has been a regular topic of national conversation. Rashida Tlaib re-ignited this conversation a few days ago, with this (1 minute) video clip going viral.
In it, she asserts that she owes $70,000 (down from $200,000) on her law school education, and implies that her debt was unpayable in part because she went to work for low wages at Legal Aid and other non-profits after earning her law degree.
I don’t trust any politician’s self-narrative, so with the caveat that she very well may be lying—if she’s not, well, I get it. I like my work (data science) quite a lot, but it’s not my dream job. My dream job would be to open, help run, and teach mathematics at a charter school for traumatized kids. I would like to create a place that meets their academic and other needs, helping them learn the coping skills for resolving the trauma that can be resolved and skillfully living with the consequences of the more permanent sorts of trauma. Why not do that instead of data science?
One day I might, but not anytime soon. Because I have massive student loan debt.
I went through school on financial aid for every penny of tuition, fees, books, etc., as well as to buy a laptop. My school’s financial aid team got me some grants on various oppression metrics—being disabled, being poor, being a woman in STEM—but I still ended up with quite a lot of debt.
Before I make the argument against student loan forgiveness, it’s important to explain how I’m addressing my debt. So many articles on financial journeys mention in the fine print that the person being profiled lives in a house their in-laws gave them as a wedding present, or works for a hedge fund their father started, or otherwise hide some massive level of privilege that obscures the author’s perspective. That is not the case with me.
The CARES act froze student loan balances. They will remain frozen until January 31, 2022. (Edit: this has been extended another three months.) This has provided a grand and glorious opportunity, one which I’m taking advantage of to the best of my ability. A full-time job, two side hustles, and this Substack keep me busy from 5am to 10pm nearly every day. It’s more than worth being constantly tired, as every payment made now comes directly off the balance. Every payment now is money on which there will be no future compounding interest.
At my current pace, which I hope to continue (though the need to pause paying extra and replace a 17 year old car may interfere) I will be out of debt during the spring of 2023. Faster, if this Substack grows (paid subscriptions all come directly off the student loan balance—thank you!!). I stand a decent chance of paying less than $1,000 total interest if my car lasts another 18 months, less than $3,000 if I have to pause and take Ubers to therapy for awhile, paying minimums and saving for a car.
Not having a child, and having found a couple of side hustles with flexible hours, (including one that I would do for free, as it is deeply meaningful and provides a lot of happiness), are fortunate aspects of my situation that I do not discount. So yes, I’m lucky. I would never deny that. But I’m also determined. I’m going to get this effing bill paid and done with and get this particular government hook out of my life.
The Case Against Forgiveness
I do not want the government to forgive student loan debt. I think it would be fine if they regulated it much more strictly. In particular, they should stop making it worse. I got an email yesterday that started with this:
It is not hard to imagine a version of myself that didn’t succeed in earning the mathematics degree but instead transferred to Creative Writing or Studio Art or something else in the humanities. That Holly received this email, cried, “Thank God!” and immediately signed up to pay $50 a month instead of $600.
This option is one aspect of how situations occur like the below, which I found on Twitter.
So yes, the government should stop making it worse. And I would be fine with an absolute cap on interest, to prevent situations like the one in the screenap above. I would also be fine with making student loans bankruptable, as people have to prove that they can’t afford to pay in order to file bankruptcy. That change would also likely have positive downstream effects, like rules changing so that majoring in something where you’re unlikely to be able to pay your debt back is disincentivized.
But I do not want loans forgiven—not mine, not Rashida Tlaib’s, and not anyone else’s, either.
Why not?
The life of someone with a degree is, as we saw most recently during lockdowns, often far easier than the life of someone without a degree. Yes, tradesmen can earn good money, with several careers in the trades making above-median salaries. But even those are a hell of a lot more difficult.
Plumbers crawl under houses and face snakes and, quite literally, deal with shit.
I sit in my climate-controlled, comfortable home, and make computers do maths for me.
One of my best friends is a stay at home mom. Her husband goes out in all weather to keep the internet working so that people like me can keep working from home, streaming Star Trek episodes or Pandora on the extra monitor.
There is no world in which having them subsidize the choices of Rashida Tlaib, their children’s pediatrician, or me makes any sense.
Even if this could somehow be morally justified, the government does not need to be in the business of subsidizing bad behavior. A country does not thrive when its people are encouraged by their leaders to behave like weasels.
By making sacrifices and delaying certain types of gratification—like renting for now, not going on vacation for at least a couple more years, etc.—I can pay my loans off very quickly. And I am working hard to do so.
Our leaders regularly say things that make me feel like a fool for paying at all (much less extra), and I won’t be surprised if some midterm bribe to get out the 2022 vote results in other people getting loans forgiven that I’ve already paid off.
Our leaders go to the floor of the House and argue that people should not have to pay back debt they voluntarily took on.
This is not how we build a culture of self-reliant, responsible citizens.
Two Arguments For Forgiveness That Are Semi-Persuasive
The first argument that’s persuasive has to do with one aspect of how our government has handled the pandemic. They’ve issued forgiveable loans to many small businesses. In order to get these “loans” forgiven, all the business has to do is stay in business. Thus, they are essentially six-figure handouts to business owners. Many businesses were terribly affected by the pandemic, including the government not allowing them to operate. But many were not. People in businesses that benefit from financially comfortable people spending more time at home, as one example, are doing quite well. My handyman had his best year “by more than 50%” in 2020. People newly working from home suddenly wanted painting, repairs, and remodeling. A classmate put off graduate school and made over $40,000 part-time, driving for DoorDash.
This grants-masquerading-as-loans program really annoyed me when I learned about it. But after thinking about it for awhile, it doesn’t matter. Government is corrupt on every level. If nepotism, waste, or other aspects of corruption are a good argument against my repaying my debt, then I will always be able to find something. Excuses are a dime a dozen.
We all get to choose the kind of people we want to be. I do not want to be the kind of person who finds an excuse to fail to live up to my responsibilities. If this makes me a fool, so be it. Buy me a dunce cap.
The second argument is more persuasive, but I think it is an argument for re-vamping higher education altogether, moreso than loan forgiveness.
My company, as one example, employs STEM graduates in other countries. They earn about a third of what I earn, and are upper middle class or better as a result. This means my company gets three good employees in other countries for the cost of one American. My colleagues in other countries can afford to work for the wages they work for, in part, because they do not have to take on a small mortgage’s worth of debt, as I did, to earn their STEM qualifications. Their education is almost free to individuals.
As a nation, we should be identifying STEM talent at younger ages and doing what other countries do—investing in people who are capable of doing good work in the industries that will determine the future. Instead, under the grip of Wokeness, we are doing the opposite. We are ending advanced mathematics opportunities for our kids and changing instruction to focus on “equity.”
How Should Higher Education Be Fixed?
I have read and heard many arguments on this question. The most persuasive argument is to force the universities to take responsibility when a student is unable to pay back their loans. This would cause a frantic and immediate re-thinking of all the grievance studies majors, as well as the niche degrees that qualify a person to go to graduate school and do little else.
A focus purely on jobs, as this proposed change would likely cause, would de-emphasize the humanities. How long would the option to major in English, history, or philosophy last?
I’m uncomfortable with this possibility, as reading great literature, history, and learning about the art and music of the great masters has been immeasurably enriching to my life. It saddens me to have to say this, but I think the number of universities where this sort of study occurs free from Wokeness polluting everything can probably be counted on two hands. It’s no longer worth propping up the system. So this is a good option, from my perspective. I wish it wasn’t.
Making community college free, as high school is presently free, is a second option that makes sense to me. Community colleges offer (for the most part) a no-frills education. They can’t afford to sponsor a Multicultural Center for students to sit around discussing their oppression and their students don’t have the time or money to do mandatory diversity courses in pursuit of a practical certification with which to gain employment.
Out of curiosity, I just checked the local community college’s course offerings online. With the exception of material I learned in two courses (in highly advanced statistical methods), I could have learned everything I use in my job in community college. A local community college expanding their offerings just a little and offering a certification in data science would’ve met all my needs at a fraction of the cost.
Conclusion
The debate over student loan forgiveness is not over. The more our leaders argue for it, the more normalized the idea that American citizens should not have to live up to their word and repay their own debts becomes.
If this ever happens, other arguments will follow. If I don’t have to pay back my student loan debt, why should my handyman have to pay back his car loan? His business truck is just as much as investment in his career as my education was in mine.
We are already perilously close to accepting fundamental precepts of Marxism. The CDC declaring that landlords had no right to collect rent, which happened with minimal pushback, was a much more important event than most people seem to realize. They essentially declared that there is no such thing as private property, only government property that you are sometimes allowed to use as you see fit. And they got away with it.
Ultimately, though, none of this matters. I am an adult. I was an adult when I signed the papers saying I would pay back my loans. No tragedy interfered with my ability to get a job and make the payments.
I choose to be someone who makes sacrifices as needed to live up to her obligations.
I wish our government wasn’t full of people determined to make me into a fool for this.
If push comes to shove and I have to choose, then I’ll be a fool who can look in the mirror and respect the woman looking back at me.