Student Loans

The Student Debt Crisis Is Exploding

April 18, 2017 Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers, www.PopularResistance.org Resist! Debt, Education, Student Activism, Student Debt, Student Loans

By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers for Popular Resistance. The level of student loan debt has risen to $1.5 trillion and defaults are more than 40% and rising. U.S. student loan debt has grown to overwhelm all other categories of non-housing consumer debt in this nation. Underneath the crisis are rising tuition costs, a predatory student loan industry and an absence of consumer protections for students. What is the student debt movement to do? Of course the Biden bankruptcy protections should be repealed but that is not enough. We need a complete student loan debt forgiveness program. These debts are ill gotten gains and should be forgiven. If the government refuses to forgive these debts, people must rise up together and refuse to pay any student loan debt. The people have the power to end this injustice and must mobilize to do so. A student loan debt jubilee, whether mandated by law or put in place by the people, will bring economic freedom to tens of millions, end their debt servitude and allow them to participate in the economy. It will be a significant economic stimulus, but more importantly it will end an injustice.

NY Governor’s ‘Free’ Tuition Plan Will Make Student Loan Crisis Even Worse

April 14, 2017 Alan Collinge, www.thehill.com Educate! New York (NY), Student Loans, Tuition

By Alan Collinge for The Hill - New York Governor Andrew Cuomo unveiled a plan last week to provide for free tuition for people taking undergraduate courses at both the state universities (SUNY) and city universities (CUNY) in New York. He unveiled the proposal alongside Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who hailed it as "revolutionary." Unfortunately, the plan isn't revolutionary. In fact, it isn't even good. The plan, dubbed the "Exelsior Scholarship" is similar to schemes proposed by both Sanders and Hillary Clinton. It creates a new pot of money for the colleges to draw from, and apply it to tuition charges. This in itself, would be a good thing for students if all else were equal, but the fact of the matter is that colleges are very good at using public funds such as this without passing the benefit on to students. They can, and certainly will, raise the prices of their other billable items to make up for any decrease in tuition charges.

The Next Financial Collapse Is On The Horizon

April 5, 2017 Lee Camp, www.youtube.com Educate! Economic collapse, Finance and the Economy, Student Loans

By Lee Camp for Redacted Tonight. In 2008 after our country's huge financial collapse, everyone was too busy watching the trainwreck that was our economy to notice how unnecessary the support for Wall Street was. Our government bailed out the big banks that screwed us over, while Americans continued to drown in financial instability. Now a similar financial crash is looming--only this time with student loan defaults. Compare today's student loan rate figures to mortgage delinquency rates after the 2008 crash and it becomes clear that Americans may be on the cusp of an unfortunate deja vu. History has shown us that when a financial or natural disaster hits the fan, the government uses the opportunity to wield its power to push through a controversial agendas that otherwise would not have been acceptable to the population. Are we approaching another crisis? How will it be handled? Lee Camp goes into detail on how crises are used and manipulated by politicians in a new episode of Redacted Tonight.

Profit Making Colleges That Loaded Students With Debt, Now In Government

March 21, 2017 Annie Waldman, www.propublica.org Educate! Higher Education, Profit, Student Loans

By Annie Waldman for Pro Publication - Taylor Hansen lobbied to weaken regulation of for-profit colleges. Since he joined the Education Department, it’s started doing just that. Until June 2016, Taylor Hansen lobbied for the largest trade group of for-profit colleges. At the forefront of its agenda: eliminating a rule known as “gainful employment,” which can take away federal funding from for-profit colleges if their graduates fail to earn enough to repay student loans. Last week, that goal started to become a reality. The U.S. Department of Education delayed the deadline for colleges to comply with certain provisions of gainful employment, saying it plans to review the rule.

Student Income Loans Transfer Wealth To Investors, Risk To Students

September 15, 2016 Kenneth J. Saltman, www.truth-out.org Resist! Student Loans

By Kenneth J. Saltman for Truthout - At more than $1.3 trillion dollars as of 2016, US student loan debt has become widely discussed in the media, the business press and academia as a new debt bubble with the potential to burst and trigger a global economic crisis that puts everyone at risk. The student debt bubble is regularly compared to the subprime mortgage debt bubble that resulted in the failure of banks, the great recession and the public bailout of Wall Street and the auto industry in 2008.

7 Million Graduates Not Paying Student Loans

August 10, 2016 Marlee Kokotovic, www.nationofchange.org Resist! Student Debt, Student Loans

By Marlee Kokotovic for Nation of Change - In 2016, former students are being burdened by student loan debt stronger than ever before. It is time to make a change. Former students are taking a stand and are refusing to pay off their student debt saying they feel scammed by their universities and government. After attending college, many are feeling as ill-equipped in life, and entering the world, as if they had not gone to college at all.

Who Got Rich Off The Student Debt Crisis

June 29, 2016 James B. Steele and Lance Williams, www.revealnews.org Educate! Student Debt, Student Loans

By James B. Steele and Lance Williams for Reveal News - Jessie Suren is an energetic 28-year-old who wanted a career in law enforcement. Albert Lord is a 70-year-old former accountant who became a multimillionaire executive. The two have never met, but their stories tell the history of America’s student debt crisis. Suren attended a free boarding school for underprivileged youth in Hershey, Pennsylvania, and enrolled in La Salle University in Philadelphia. Scholarships didn’t cover the cost of the private college, so she borrowed about $71,000, much of it from Sallie Mae, the financial giant of the student loan industry.

The History Of Student Loans Goes Back To The Middle Age

March 29, 2016 Jenny Adams, www.theconversation.com Educate! History, Student Loans

By Jenny Adams for The Conversation - In 1473, Alexander Hardynge, who had finished his bachelor’s degree at Oxford nearly two years previous, borrowed money through an educational loan service. The loan came with a one year repayment deadline. With some of that money, he rented a room at Exeter College and offered tutoring services to college students. He soon repaid that loan. In 1475, Hardynge took out a second loan – again, in part to rent teaching space.

Why Student Loans Are Creating A Permanent U.S. Underclass

February 27, 2016 Derek Royden, www.occupy.com Educate! Arrest, Student Loans

By Derek Royden for Occupy - The case of Paul Aker – a man recently arrested in Houston on a warrant that, authorities say, was issued for his failure to appear in court regarding an almost 30-year-old, $1,500 student loan – isn’t unique. As many as 1,500 people are facing similar penalties in Houston alone, and many thousands of others elsewhere across the country. Still, the image of seven heavily armed and armored U.S. Marshals taking a shackled man to jail for an ancient, unpaid student loan of such a trivial amount put the college debt crisis back into the spotlight – if only for a few days.

US Marshals Arresting Those Who Owe Overdue Student Loans

February 19, 2016 Staff, www.prorevnews.blogspot.com Educate! Arrest, Student Loans

By Staff of Undernews - Fox News, Houston TX - The US Marshals Service in Houston is arresting people for not paying their outstanding federal student loans. Paul Aker says he was arrested at his home last week for a $1500 federal student loan he received in 1987. He says seven deputy US Marshals showed up at his home with guns and took him to federal court where he had to sign a payment plan for the 29-year-old school loan.

Lessons And Tactics From Past Debt Resistance Movements

April 19, 2015 Devon Douglas-Bowers, www.occupy.com Strategize! Student Activism, Student Debt, Student Loans, Student Protests, Youth

What are the lessons we can take from these movements that apply to today? With regards to Shays' Rebellion, we can look at two things: • The protesters had a clear, coherent message and stuck with it • They escalated the situation over time. With regards to a clear message, the best thing student debt activists can do today is to get on the same page with one another so that there is one, coherent message that gets repeated again and again. This will help serve as a guiding point for the goal that is to be achieved. This means activists can up the ante and bring more attention to their cause by doing things like blocking roads and disrupting the status quo in a variety of peaceful, nonviolent ways.

Students Occupy Clegg’s Office While At Prime Minister’s Questions

March 5, 2015 Mikey Smith, www.mirror.co.uk Resist! Law, Parliament, Student Activism, Student Loans, United Kingdom (UK)

Police broke up a student protest occupying Nick Clegg's constituency office today. Around 15 student activists from the Free University of Sheffield group piled into theLib Dem leader's office in Sheffield Hallam, wearing Nick Clegg masks. The protesters demanded the scrapping of university tuition fees, unfurling banners both inside and outside the office. One banner read "Nick Clegg betrayed us, we want revenge." Police were made aware of the protest shortly after 11.30am and arrived shortly after to break up the protest, but they say no arrests were made. According to Sheffield student newspaper Forge Press , one protester said: "This is retribution for Nick Clegg’s student betrayal. We want to inspire students to act on their ideals."

Four Reasons Young Americans Should Burn Student Loan Papers

March 3, 2015 Paul Buchheit, www.commondreams.org Resist! Debt, Student Activism, Student Loans

Fifty years ago students burned their draft cards to protest an immoral war against the people of Vietnam. Today it's a different kind of war, immoral in another way, waged against young Americans of approximately the same age, and threatening them in a manner that endangers not their lives but their livelihoods. There are at least four good reasons why America's young adults— and their parents—should take up the fight against financial firms who are holding high-interest student loans that total more than the nation's credit card debt, and more than the total income of the poorer half of America. Fifteen former students of for-profit Corinthian Colleges recently announced a debt strike against the company and its predatory loan practices.

US Government Could End Student Debt Crisis Today

November 14, 2014 Raúl Carrillo, www.yesmagazine.org Organize! Debt, Education, Student Loans

At a basic level, the U.S. federal government doesn’t need to scrimp and save to fully fund higher education. It can just spend money rather than lend it, without incurring any significant negative economic consequences. Although I’d love to reduce spending on, say, prisons, the federal government doesn’t even need to take money out of other programs in order to alleviate student debt. You may find this argument hard to believe. The way most politicians and journalists talk about the national debt and deficit spending makes free higher education sound impossible. But there’s another way of looking at the problem, a vision advocated by a growing movement of economists, lawyers, students, and financial practitioners who deal with the institutional nuts and bolts of the economy on a day-to-day basis.

Student Loans Are A Bridge To Nowhere

November 14, 2014 Robert Shetterly, www.commondreams.org Organize! Debt, Education, Student Loans

As you know, that debt burden of student loans has nearly quadrupled in the past 10 years. Today it stands at $1.18 trillion. The average liability per student—whether they earn a degree or not—is nearly $30,000. The poorest 25% of the student population—people with less than $8,000 in assets—own 60% of that debt. How does that debt shape—or should we say engineer?—the direction and quality of their lives, their ability to contribute as citizens and creators of culture? How does that debt narrow the choices available to them, making their young lives into a burden rather than an adventure? College and advanced degrees have always been promoted as the key to advancement, good jobs, and upward mobility. Today, college education is still promoted with those claims, but the key has been thrown away. The student graduates into a lock box of debt.

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