If I had kids in high school right now, I’d make them think long and hard before taking out school loans. There’s still a theoretical edge in getting hired, but enough to justify being in debt servitude for the rest of your life?
Overdue student loans reached an all-time high as students struggle to find work after college, according to a government report renewing alarms about the rising burden of higher-education debt.
Eleven percent of student loans were seriously delinquent — at least 90 days past due — in the third quarter of 2012, compared with 6 percent in the first quarter of 2003, according to the report by the U.S. Education Department. Almost 30 percent of 20- to 24-year-olds aren’t employed or in school, the study found.
The research is being released amid concern in Congress and President Barack Obama’s administration about rising college costs and $1 trillion in outstanding student loans, the largest category of consumer debt besides mortgages. Borrowers say the burden is affecting their choice of jobs and their ability to buy homes and get married.
“Today’s economy puts young graduates in a difficult position,” Jack Buckley, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, which published the report, said in a statement. “A college diploma no longer guarantees a direct pathway to the middle class, making it harder to justify the expense of a degree.”
Nor do advanced degrees, nowadays.
Gee, wonder if this is a direct result of Corporatism going global. Obviously, students with IT degrees who are born in the US are not considered good enough to work cheap enough as H1V possible employees.
Clusterfuck time, in so many areas of this nation’s society and economy.
I would take out a 2nd mortgage before I’d allow a child of mine to do it. But, I live in Kansas where the Universities are affordable both in tuition and living expenses.
These kids who get saddled with $100,000 in loans? How do they pay that back even with no interest at all? It boggles my mind.
There are two issues here. The outrageous cost of an education. And unemployment. Our advanced educational system has become far too expensive. That’s the fault of the Republicans. If you’d like the many reasons why their at fault they can be provided. The seperate issue of unemployment is also the fault of the free market Republicans. Who believe that nothing should be subsidised and that everything should be owned and operated by a Capitalist. And some Democrats like Clinton who passed NAFTA allowing millions of American jobs to be shipped to factories and call centers overseas. Who needs enemies when we have American politicians helping us?
What fine thing marketing and words are. Used correctly, they can bring about conditions of debt servitude remarkably close to slavery, and yet still be legal.
It has been 50 years since the phrase “to get a good job, get a good education” has been true. The laws of diminishing returns have been piling up on that until now for many of our young people such that the reality is everlasting debt, not lucrative job returns.
And what is meant by that “good job” anyway? Chances are, it means fitting into the corporate system.
Our young people would be better advised to practice skills and crafts for things they truly like doing, and in areas that can be practiced by the individual and are not subject to outsourcing.
That’s the truth of the matter. But you will never hear that either from government or corporations, who would rather collude to bring about generations of debt-bound serfs.
Aw Imho: Go back and check the sordid roster of Democrats who bankruptcy reformed student loans into non-dischargeability. There in a nutshell is the problem!
Now you know why banksters and CEO’s fought so hard to get student loans excluded from bankruptcy. They knew it was coming.