In a bid to woo the votes of millennials politicians are
proposing all kinds of solutions to let borrowers off the hook for some or all
of their student loans.
For reference, student loan debt is now almost $1.2 trillion
dollars, more than doubling since 2007. And as many as 23% of the borrowers no
longer enrolled in school are in default.
Boo-hoo.
I am sorry, but I have zero compassion for them. I have even
less interest in plans to help them avoid paying back every dime they owe.
Spare me the “it’s a tough job market” argument. I also don’t
want to hear another word about how lenders took advantage of them. Or that
they didn’t know how high their payments would be.
Tough shit, kids.
Time to put on your big-boy pants and grow a pair.
Be honest: Many of you took a multi-year all-expense-paid
vacation from responsibility to “pursue your passion” and explore things that
interested you and a handful of others. Now it’s time to pay up. It was fun
while it lasted, but your Magical Mystery Tour is over. The bill is due.
That’s what it’s like to be an adult. Of course that may be
part of the problem; Mommy and Daddy have shielded them from so many of the perils
and pitfalls of growing up. Since many of these former students never had to make
their own bed, much less balance their bank account, it’s small wonder that
when they dropped out or graduated, they scurried back to home.
The world outside was just too scary. Getting as job meant
actually having to apply, and then show up for the interview – and possibly
face rejection. So getting a real job was too hard, too threatening to their
fragile psyche. Plus no one wanted to pay them what they were worth; at LEAST
enough to get a nice apartment, afford a car, dine out from time to time and go
on a decent vacation.
And even then, somebody might make a mean face at them.
Shudder.
If you are the parent of one of these pampered deadbeats,
you share part of the blame. You shouldn’t be surprised that your kid wants to
continue to avoid responsibility and expects someone else to pick up the tab
for their student loans. You taught them there was no downside to making dumb
decisions – nothing’s ever truly their fault and someone will always bail them
out.
Must have been nice for them. Now, look at the unintended
consequences.
When I left college in 1973 I had a degree, a beat-up car I
bought for a buck, and $7500 in student loans. That doesn’t sound like much debt
today, but back then it was more than I grossed my first year out of
school. Like my degree and my car, that debt
belonged to me alone.
So I needed a job – any job even remotely related to my
field – to get a place of my own and to prepare to start paying off that debt.
And I got one at the princely sum of $4000 a year, which
enabled me to move to a crappy shared apartment in a run-down part of town. Six
months later my loans started coming due.
I started paying them off. In a few years they were paid in
full. On schedule.
I didn’t think there was anything special about doing that,
or that I deserved special credit for paying back the loans. When I took out the loans I agreed to pay
them back, which I did.
Maybe all that is why I have zero empathy for someone who
ran up thousands in student loans and now refuses to pay them off. The terms of
the loans were fully disclosed to them, and typically to their parents if they
co-signed them, probably in much greater detail than they were to me when I
signed up for my loans.
Nowhere was there a promise – then or now – of a money-back
guarantee or debt forgiveness if someone’s college experience didn’t lead to a great
job. The money was loaned; the money got
spent; the debt was incurred and has to be paid back by the debtor regardless
of the outcome.
So please, please stop whining about how unfair it is that
the son or daughter of someone blew $50,000 or more on that quaint private college
they’d always dreamed of and can’t find a job. And now they can’t afford to pay
off their student loans while saving for a home.
Too many of today’s generation suffer from the mistaken belief
that the lessons they learned playing T-ball are applicable to life as a grown
up.
They’re not. If you play poorly and make bad choices you can
lose. And losing can cost you.
The quicker someone learns that, the better off they’ll be
to compete effectively in today’s world.
So the answer to the student debt issue is simple. Pay up
and shut up.
And any politician who offers any other alternative to that is simply pandering to a group that's not worth helping. Do we honestly need to reward irresponsibility more in our culture?
