RECOMMENDED READING
The push by American progressives to have Joe Biden’s incoming administration forgive $50,000 of student debt per borrower is deeply stupid, but at least clarifyingly so.
More polite language fails to capture the absurdity of singling out college attendees for an unprecedented $1tn transfer of wealth — equivalent to the total spent on cash welfare in the last 40 years. The top sources of US student debt are professional business and law degrees.
All the rationales offered — addressing “systemic inequities” and the “racial wealth gap”, providing “much-needed economic stimulus”, reducing “negative health outcomes” associated with debt — make a better case, assuming one is giving away money, for simple cash transfers to lower-income households. If “debt forgiveness” is the goal, why not car loans or credit card balances?
Recommended Reading
After Student-Debt Relief, America Must Move Beyond ‘College for All’
American Compass research director Wells King argues for building real alternatives to the “college-for-all” education pipeline in the wake of Biden’s misguided student loan forgiveness.
Biden’s Student Loan Forgiveness is Wrong. Here’s How to Handle College Debt Instead.
America has turned higher ed into a lavishly expensive sacred cow, and now we’re all footing the bill. Let’s make college debt boring again, argues Oren Cass.
Talkin’ (Policy) Shop: Financing Higher Education
On this episode of Policy in Brief, Oren Cass and Chris Griswold discuss how we should finance higher education in the U.S.
