<p>"We afford credit card deadbeats and subprime speculators the option of bankruptcy. Students are trying to better their lives and become productive members of society. Shouldn't we afford them better terms than those trying to scam banks or society?" </p>
<p>BC Eagle, Lord yes our society should. But to date those who've been economically subjugated by this industry haven't had the ear of our representatives. Those who so desperately need the restorations of these basic consumer protections have been too busy going economically subterranean or they live in incredible and actual fear of these companies and their abusive powers. </p>
<p>As far as the problem of fewer lenders, or higher rates, if bankruptcy protections are restored vis a vie student loans perhaps that will be the case in the short term, but keep in mind that our current system is a fairly new phenomenon. One which largely resulted from the privatization of a system which had worked well and was equitable prior to the 'takeover'. Now its a system which works poorly for students and is about to collapse from its own excesses. So take your choice, a few million bankruptcies or some trillions to bail out this problematic industry. Either alternative will be economically hard to digest. </p>
<p>And anyway, the bankruptcy filings should they occur in large numbers would largely be those who've been so wracked by the edudebt industry that there's nothing left to wring from them. So whether or not these rights are restored the systemic results will still be the same. </p>
<p>Socially however the whole mess will get appalling. There have already been suicides because of the situation, some fairly high profile. And in conversations with students, they are expressing fear about their own educations. And that fear is largely premised on the concept that all their education will get them is a crushing debt. And those social attitudes could be much more destructive in the long term than some bankruptcies, interest adjustments, or reduced access to a already predatory industry. A loss of hope and belief in our own systems especially in those systems which transmit our social mnemonic...can't bode well. And if our younger and most intelligent members of society continue to see nothing but exploitation tied to their efforts to improve themselves and by implication societal improvement... it's almost assured they will direct their energies or resentments in heretofore unforeseen directions. And that condition is inherently socially destabilizing...</p>