The reverse class resentment on student debt/free college is disturbing.

[DanTex]

28. Of course it's a silly argument, just like the silly argument that debt relief is regressive.

If you look at the Social Security tax alone, then it is regressive, because it's capped. But when you look at the entire program, not just the revenue half, then it's not regressive.

With debt relief the argument is even weaker. Not only do you have to ignore the revenue half of the equation to make the case that it's "regressive", you also have to measure by income and not by wealth. If you include the revenue in the equation, it's progressive by any measure. If you measure by wealth then the benefits themselves are progressive, so by that measure it's a progressive tax with progressive benefits. Only if you ignore both of those things do you get to "regressive".

Actually the argument is worse than that even, because, relative to income, the debt burden is higher on lower incomes. So, even ignoring the revenue side, and even ignoring the wealth issue, the distributional effect of the benefits alone would be progressive in the same sense that cutting taxes on low incomes by 2% and cutting taxes on high incomes by 1% is progressive. In order to build the "regressive" narrative, you to ignore basically everything that people usually consider in analyzing policies.