Bernie Sanders' Bold, New Plan May Have Just Locked Down the Millennial Vote [View all]

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http://mic.com/articles/118576/bernie-sanders-tuition-free-college-bill-should-win-him-every-millennial-vote-in-america

By Scott Bixby May 19, 2015 LIKE MIC ON FACEBOOK:

Sen. Bernie Sanders wants your votes, millennials — and with the introduction of his latest bill, he may have just clinched them.

On Tuesday, the independent senator from Vermont introduced the College for All Act, which would make attendance of any four-year public college or university free of charge for any American student who can meet admissions standards.

"We live in a highly competitive global economy and, if our economy is to be strong, we need the best educated work force in the world," said Sanders in a statement on Sunday ahead of the bill's introduction. "That will not happen if, every year, hundreds of thousands of bright young people cannot afford to go to college, and if millions more leave school deeply in debt."

Sanders' bill addresses the root cause of student load debt: the disproportionately high cost of higher education. The legislation, an expansion of a proposal he floated in February that would have cut higher education costs in half, would provide $47 billion in federal funding per year to eliminate undergraduate tuition and fees at public colleges and universities.

"We used to lead the world in the percentage of our people who graduated college," said Sanders. "Today we are in 12th place. We used to have great universities tuition-free. Today they are unaffordable. I want a more educated work force. I want everybody to be able to get a higher education regardless of their income."

The issue hits millennials hard — and their wallets even harder. The cost of higher education has risen by 1,225% since 1978, according to Bloomberg News, a rate of inflation that outpaces increases in the cost of housing, food and even health care. Student loan debt has reached $1.16 trillion, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, dwarfing national credit card debt to become the single largest source of non-mortgage debt in America. More than 7 million people are currently in default over student loans, at an average of more than $28,000 per graduate. The class of 2015's average liability is even worse: $35,000 per graduate.

It's one of Sanders' biggest issues — and smartest bets. Sanders may be best known for his self-described socialism, rather than for being a realistic contender for the Democratic presidential nomination, but his passion and experience for student-loan reform is beyond reproach. A 24-year veteran of Congress, Sanders has sponsored the Student Loan Affordability Act, a bill which would extend subsidized federal student loan rates, as well as making employee educational assistance tax-deductible. He's also sponsored legislation that would make employee educational assistance tax-deductible for employers.

In May 2014, surrounded by indebted Vermont college students and graduates, Sanders announced that he was introducing legislation to help students earn college credits in high school in order to cut the amount of time they spend paying tuition costs.

Sanders' bill could make debt-free college the new 2016 litmus test for millennial voters. Lowering the cost of higher education was the single most important issue that would have increased turnout among Democrats in the 2014 elections, according to polling conducted by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. An ideal bill, according to a paper by the PCCC and the think tank Demos, would feature federal aid to states to lower the cost of college tuition, need-based aid to qualified students and other cost-cutting efforts like standardizing transfer credits and eliminating physical textbooks.

The notion of debt-free college has already been on the periphery of the 2016 Democratic primaries. In an email to supporters, former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley declared that the party's "ultimate goal should be simple: Every student should be able to go to college debt-free." Robby Mook, Hillary Clinton's campaign manager, has highlighted the issue as one that needs to be taken up by "a champion for everyday people."

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