The issue on student debt has always been a concern for many Americans today. In response this being that President Biden mentioned giving out a $20,000 loan-forgiveness in student debt relief around the time of his campaign. But afterwards the supreme court struck down this policy in late 2022. But so far, the administration’s officials are coming up with a new plan under the higher education act hopefully canceling student debt by 2024. And if this does happen, many former students would find it very beneficial, and we would all most likely enjoy an improvement in the economy.
This policy would be life changing for many that are still stuck paying off student debt that should’ve been taken care of. As for those in support, Senators Cory Booker and Bob Menendez were among 87 lawmakers who, in August of 2023 wrote “We are extremely disappointed and concerned that the Supreme Court substituted politics for the rule of law to deny as many as 43 million hard-working Americans life-changing relief from crushing student loan debt…”. Also, on May 12, 2023, in Washington, DC there was also a group of loan-borrowers that showed up to the white house, ordering that Biden should urgently cancel student debt. All this showed that there were many that were looking forward to this plan succeeding. Not only this, but also allowing the student debt relief plan to take place would allow for borrowers to spend money on other areas. Following debt forgiveness, statistics on wealth and spending would allow us to see what groups benefitted from this plan. The policy would also allow for narrowing the racial wealth gap among people.
As for the criticisms that may cause some to oppose this plan: it could be unfair to those that don’t have debt or already paid off their debt. This is understandable because the main target audience for this plan is for the loan-borrowers. And it makes you wonder about where this helps the other percent of Americans that don’t have anything to do with this plan. For example, some people may have saved money every month for many years to prepare for when their children would be ready to go to college, while other households with even higher incomes may not have saved anything at all, and then just taken out loans when their children went to college. Paying off everyone’s loans would penalize the households that had cut their consumption so they could afford college with little or no debt for their children, and would reward households that failed to prepare for the expense.
Speaking of not including everything, this plan does not address the crippling costs of college which could be added. That is, if students can get loans, then schools can raise the costs of attending, certain that their students will be able to get loans and grants to pay whatever fees and tuition they decide to charge. Another reason why this could possibly be an issue is that it could cause people to take advantage of the system and influence those to take on more loans in the future. But some of these issues can be fixed with a bit of modifications to this plan. One thing that is a bit concerning is the cost and inflation concern of this action. Because what everyone is seeing is how it will cause many of Americans to be loan free, but what those don’t see is how much spending is going on here for this program, and excessive government spending could contribute to inflation.
This plan originally applies to federal student loan borrowers, The White House site stated “income-driven repayment (IDR) plan that calculates payments based on a borrower’s income and family size – not their loan balance – and forgives remaining balances after a certain number of years. The SAVE plan will cut many borrowers’ monthly payments to zero, will save other borrowers around $1,000 per year, will prevent balances from growing because of unpaid interest, and will get more borrowers closer to forgiveness faster.”. Making it more efficient for those with student loans and providing breathing room for families. As for when it comes to income, the student aid site stated “To smooth the transition back to repayment and help borrowers at highest risk of delinquencies or default once payments resume, the U.S. Department of Education will provide up to $20,000 in debt relief to Pell Grant recipients with loans held by the Department of Education and up to $10,000 in debt relief to non-Pell Grant recipients. Borrowers are eligible for this relief if their individual income is less than $125,000 or $250,000 for households.” Also the website mentioned that individuals working for nonprofit, military, government, federal, state, tribal, or local level may qualify for complete loan forgiveness through the public service loan forgiveness program (PSLF). Seeing what it takes to qualify shows that there is room for a variety of individuals to receive this plan.
Altogether, this policy is very complex and is not an easy one to have solutions for. There still needs to be some final adjustments overall for there to be improvements in not just the loan-borrower but the economy altogether. Student loan forgiveness is beneficial for students that have been stuck paying loans off instead of using money for other things. It would have a major influence on those that want to go to college but can’t. However, it also raises questions about what the outcome would be from this. How would this affect the economy, and would it do harm or do good things?
Reference
https://studentaid.gov/debt-relief-announcement
I realize that you are coming back to academic writing after some years out of college, so I'll work with you more on writing style, but this is really fairly good. You had a lot to cover in this paper. You might have organized the paper along these lines:
Opening paragraph about how Biden promised to bring debt relief to persons burdened with debt on student loans, but his methods for doing this were thwarted by a lawsuit brought by the State of Missouri, which gave the Supreme Court an opportunity to say that the White House didn't have the authority to cancel student debt. But, since the Supreme Court's decision, Biden has found other ways to give some debt relief.
Then, you would have a paragraph (or two or three) about the problem. People go to universities that are expensive, and they either have never had the financial resources to afford their costs of study, or they have simply not actively saved and planned for college. You might say something about the human right to an education, and whether it applies to some persons who would like to attend a university. You could comment on the costs of study in a university, and discussions of how to keep costs low. The people who go to college and incur the loan debt were not responsible for deciding whether or not to save up for college because they were children without significant income before going to college. Perhaps half of the benefit of people gaining a college education is enjoyed by the wider public, and not merely a benefit to the individual who becomes educated. Student loans are not erased when a person goes through a bankruptcy. Student load debt may have high interest rates. Many people have this debt, and many of them have very high debt where their payments on student loans prevent them from purchasing homes, cars, or starting businesses.
Then, you would summarize the arguments in favor of eliminating some or all of the student loan debt.
Then you would offer a paragraph summarizing the arguments opposing forgiveness of most student loan debt.
Then, you would use a paragraph to describe some loan forgiveness programs that have existed for a while. For example, in many cases social workers who pay their student loan debt every billing period without fail for ten years while working as social workers in non-profit or public entities will have remaining student loan debt remaining after 120 payment periods (ten years) wiped away.
Then, you would have a paragraph about what the Biden administration tried to do.
Then, you would have a paragraph about the Supreme Court that blocked it.
Then, you would have paragraph about what the Biden administration has been doing to forgive some loans since the Supreme Court case.
Your eleventh paragraph could be a summary of where things stand now. Maybe look at some polling data to see what attitudes are toward debt forgiveness. Is Biden gaining credit among persons who've had their debts decreased or wiped out? Are Republicans suffering a loss of support for thwarting the loan forgiveness policy?
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