If This Shocking Photo Doesn't Convince You That We Need Student Debt Relief, Nothing Will

[Playinghardball]

An actual student loan statement from one of the organizers of Occupy Graduation


Found on the website of Occupy Graduation/MoveOn.org

[qwlauren35]

1. OUCH!

What school did s/he go to?

[msongs]

2. this doc smells bad...

tried these numbers in a bunch of different calculators and got nowhere near the $172,256 and that's without paying ANYTHING on the debt at all

[hfojvt]

9. I just got $191,855.73 after 20 years at 9%

but I am not sure why somebody being a 20 year deadbeat is cause for student loan relief.

But that person may also have had some runs of bad luck, or also made some bad choices. Lord knows I have had both. But getting in huge amounts of debt is not a mistake that I have made.

But I am not sure how the student loan business works either.

[EOTE]

3. If those numbers are accurate, then the person paid nearly nothing for 20 years.

Yes, if you don't pay anything for 20 years on a 9% interest loan, at the end of those 20 years, you're going to owe about 5 to 6x the amount of the original loan.

That being said, yes, student loans are a huge issue that need to be addressed.

[tomkat364]

5. College should be free

The government has determined that medical care is a basic human right and will be gradually reducing how much hospitals and doctors can bill for health care. Why don't they apply the same principle and determine that everyone should have access to further education and make colleges charge less?

[kestrel91316]

6. Enjoy your stay.

[sabrina 1]

13. What do you disagree with in that statement? Isn't HC a right in most civilized countries, and

education the most important way to ensure a civilized society? The current system is making it impossible for many people to go to college. Are you happy to live in a society where ignorance is so highly valued and only the wealthy can afford an education?

[bhikkhu]

17. Health care being a right doesn't require it to be provided free of cost

any more than food being a right requires me to be supplied with free food several times a day, or water being a right requires people to build dams and pipes and infrastructure to supply me with water at no cost.

Everything has its fair value, which mostly involves the value of the labor involved in supplying things needed. College shouldn't be free, but it should be affordable. In most cases it is.

[sabrina 1]

18. Did someone say it should be free? I assumed that we all agreed that HC should be available to all

Americans, in the same way it is available to all Europeans.

[bhikkhu]

19. In the same way, college should affordable and available - not free

going back the the beginning of the thread.

[tkmorris]

7. Welcome to DU

Nothing is quite that simple of course, but I do believe the government should take steps, and CAN take steps, to make higher education less of a financial burden.

[SomethingFishy]

8. So.. then hospitals will no longer be able

to charge me $80 for a box of tissues and call it the MRS... Mucas Removal System? What a terrible thing. I'm not sure the country can handle it.

[tomkat364]

10. Health Care

This is off the point of the original post. Why on earth are you going to a hospital in order to get tissues? They sell those at many local grocery stores and mini-markets for a couple dollars. Some even double coupons. It seems to me that it would be much more financially responsible for you to blow your nose at home than to do it in an institution created to treat very sick people and then criticize the amount they charge for their services.

[likesmountains 52]

11. You're back! That didn't take long!

[uppityperson]

12. That is rather a large leap. If you are already in the hospital, and they "give"you a box of tissues

they also charge outrageous rates.

whoosh, right past you

[sabrina 1]

14. If you are in the hospital already, you can't exactly run to the supermarket. What is your point?

[tomkat364]

15. Really?

I apologize. I was being a bit facetious because I have never seen tissues on any of my itemized medical bills. Was I supposed to take his fictitious charge for tissues with a completely ridiculous "medical" name to be a serious issue. Yes, medicine costs a lot. But what some people fail to realize is that medicine costs a lot because a lot of people don't pay their medical bills (forcing those who do pay to pay more), lawsuits force doctors to overtest and overtreat to limit risk, and the government enacts lots of unfounded and overly burdensome regulations to "protect" the public.
But, seriously, I thought we were talking about student loans. Is there another thread that we can discuss health care in?

[SomethingFishy]

20. Are you serious?

I'd explain that I didn't go to the hospital to buy tissues I brought my wife in for chest pains and the hospital charged us $80 so she could blow her nose.

But that would obviously be too much for someone as brilliant as you to handle.

Fuck off Moron. And thank you for reminding me why I shouldn't come here anymore.

[bhikkhu]

16. The trick with loans is you have to make payments on them

...which probably came up at some point in the whole application and disbursement period. Seriously, it is pretty screwed for the individual, but anyone taking out any kind of loan ends up screwed in the long term if they don't make payments to at least cover the interest.

Contrary to what is sometimes said, a judge in bankruptcy court can adjust or decide forgiveness for student loans, if circumstances require.