I’m old enough to remember when the grocery store accepted only checks and cash for purchases.
The average debt load of American households has been rising steadily for a few decades. As it has risen, high debt levels have become normalized. That’s what this article is reflecting and that’s what is behind this social push for debt forgiveness. It’s just people who don’t think of debt as debt. They see it as free money.
I am old enough to remember when you could call the neighborhood market, they’d deliver the brown paper bags to your house and run a bill, and your mom would send you down to the store later in the month to pay the bill.
Our town’s local grocery store still allows this!! It’s cute to see the elementary school kids in the store, and upon checkout say charge it to (family’s name) account.
I think social media is a factor in the whole living beyond one’s means and trying to “Keep up with the Joneses” that you see so much these days.
By comparison, there’s a small but growing trend of minimalism, not living beyond one’s means, the whole ‘tiny house’ thing, etc., which has become more attractive to some. From an outsider’s point of view, the whole ‘tiny house’ living idea seems to attract a fairly wide range of people, but one common thread amongst a lot of them is a very strong desire to live within their means, reach the ‘debt free’ milestone quickly, and maintain a debt-free or nearly debt-free lifestyle.
If the couple in the article wanted to be student debt-free bad enough, there’s ways to achieve that. But you have to be willing to look outside the box a bit at times.
That is a pretty big generalization. Who are these “people” of whom you write, who think of debt as “free money”?
Money that a person owes but doesn’t pay back because of XYZ, which is exactly what is detailed in this article. It’s just not that complicated.
Nothing in the articles says the couple isn’t paying their debts. In fact, the couple is saying because they are paying their debts they cannot afford to have children.
It’s not complicated unless you want it be complicated - to advance a narrative
That is was how I interpreted the article as well. The couple is ambivalent about having children because of they think it is impossible to manage the expense of children while paying off their loans. I still question that premise (speaking as someone who didn’t finish paying off educational loans until her oldest was in late elementary or early middle school). On their income, having children may require careful budgeting and making other sacrifices, but really whether or not children are affordable while paying your own student loans depends mostly on how high the total debt is and what your other budget constraints are. Or they can just wait a few more years. Honestly, the article seemed overly pessimistic given their relatively high combined salary.
I’m not asking what “debt” is, I’m asking who are the “people” of whom you speak. That is not a complicated question.
You must have some specific people in mind, and I’m curious as to who these specific people are.
The people profiled in the article. People with federal student loans of all income levels have enjoyed a suspension in the cost of borrowing that borrowers with other types of debt have never enjoyed. That cost is interest. Interest has been suspended for these special types of borrowers since the pandemic began.
If they have not taken advantage of that special benefit by paying down the principal on their loan, why? Why was that not their priority over the past three years?
People who think this way always have a list of “but I need…”, “but I want”…
When the problem lies in defining wants as needs. “I need a bigger house” is the one mentioned in this article.
Thank you for the clarification.
The reason the pause was started was because covid meant the loss of income for many of those who owed student loans. They didn’t make payments on the principal because they weren’t earning the money to do so. The couple in the article only had a big increase in the last year but not all did or can work a second or third job. They (students) didn’t prioritize paying the principal because they were prioritizing food, rent, utilities, toilet paper, and gas. And they still are. Have you been to the grocery store lately?
If they all had the money, Trump and then Biden wouldn’t have paused the interest and payments. If the pause hadn’t been enacted, my daughter (and many others)would have had to do an IBR plan (of probably $0 monthly payments) and the interest just would have grown and grown on her loan. She would have been a lot worse off and the government still would have collected $0.
Well, many people ‘enjoyed’ benefits under covid relief that others didn’t. The PPE loans were a boon to some businesses who didn’t lose any earnings and a blessing to others who really needed the extra help. I know several people who made more from unemployment than they did when working ($600 extra untaxed per week!). Friends have 6 kids and were getting $1600 in extra child credit per month and nothing changed for them employment/benefits wise (he’s in the army). The PPE loans, the child credit money, unemployment was all money going out of the treasury; at least the student loan pause was only money not coming back to the government, not more going out.
Wish I could like your post multiple times. We didn’t qualify for any of the gov’t aid during Covid and all I felt was grateful that people who needed help were getting it and that there by for the grace of God - we were in a position to not need it.
One of my kids has some loans for professional school. During the pause, she paid off all of the interest that had accrued before the pause. Which was smart. She is fully ready to pay off these loans on the next three or four years.
The degree of fraud (as a total cost to the federal government) far exceeded the benefit to individual Americans. You can find this information out by searching publicly available government reports.
People of middle class incomes can budget. This couple is flirting with the line of upper class income, based on where they live (suburban NY). If they choose not to for whatever reason, that is not a reason that Americans without this particular type of debt product should subsidize those Americans who have this special debt product. That is based on statistics available from the Census Bureau and Pew Research.