The world is changing. That much is clear. And at an alarmingly fast pace thanks to technology.
College is overpriced and thus not worth the cost of admission. It’s also not preparing kids for much of anything.
It’s really just a big drinking ground for four years. Make friends, party and hookup. Nothing wrong with those things, but you shouldn’t be paying $20,000 per year for them.
The government shouldn’t be paying for that. Aside from the legitimate argument that by giving everyone a college degree, it dilutes the value of said degree to a high school degree.
The degree already lost enough value. It’s going to lose more anyway because tech is making so many jobs automated by robots or software.
Professionals will still need college: lawyers, doctors, nurses, engineers, architects.
Other than that, four year institutions will return to being a playground for rich 18-22 year olds.
And that’s fine. We shouldn’t get all butt-hurt about it. Let’s adapt.
The entire education system is broken and the institutions of “higher learning” are a scam. You can learn more relevant things about the world and useful information reading $15 books from Amazon than $250 textbooks at college. Plus, you get to decide what you want to read. So it should interest you more and you might learn more from it.
And you can still binge on Netflix from your parents home instead of a college campus.
You can learn useful skills online for free or close to free. Udemy. Udacity. Coursera. Codecademy.
More trade schools will pop up to give us more robot technicians and Tesla mechanics, among other modern needs.
With a Universal Basic Income in place, people will be free to spend their time learning what they want to learn and acquire a useful skill to better their financial standing if they so choose.
This works a whole lot better than forcing everyone to do the same thing.
Now to alleviating student debt:
We can’t afford to just give you $40,000+ when you chose to go to college. And if it’s over $30k, you probably went to a private college or out-of-state university. That was your choice. Now you are learning the consequences of poor financial decisions. And the horrible trick the government played on you: by “investing” in higher education, the federal government artificially inflated tuition rates because the schools new they would get whatever money they charged you – because it was being paid by the federal government.
If the schools had to get cash from you, they wouldn’t be able to have high attendance rates and charge the absurd prices they charge. Especially when they have ungodly administrative bloat and not enough teaching staff. And when they allow football players to cruise campus sexually assaulting women without punishment.
Also, if we give you $40k in debt relief, what about the people who made smart financial decisions – got scholarships, went in-state public school, worked to pay for college? They get screwed for being responsible? That isn’t fair. Don’t be a spoiled brat.
So, no, we can’t afford to give you all that money for a variety of good reasons.
But we can afford to not charge you interest. The government shouldn’t be making money on kids’ education. So, they should wipe out interest for all student loans. Just pay back the principal and we’re good.