<p>I’m obviously missing the point. Carry on.</p>
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We viewed it less as taking a stand and more along the lines of being able to keep our quality of life, house, cars, and future earnings. 
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We really should be able to. </p>
<p>Here is my unique financial situation:
My family is middle class. My mom is a single mother. My siblings and I are fortunate enough to be provided with the “luxuries” that we had growing up. It wasn’t always easy. People see the things that you have an automatically assume that you didn’t “struggle”. It is through her early college planning and the merit scholarships that I earned that I’m able to get my college degree. </p>
<p>EVERYONE is shocked when they get the number back saying this is what they can afford. </p>
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<p>Once again, people stick themselves with lots of debt. The bank does not force anyone to take a loan. People ask for money. It’s the individuals fault. I wonder why this is such a hard concept to grasp here. College is not a right. High cost college is not a right. If you can’t afford it, don’t go. If you don’t want debt, don’t get loans, and if that makes college unaffordable, don’t go…or move to Georgia and save up for room and board. </p>
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<p>Families stick families with lots of debt. </p>
<p>And that is the point that the author of the opinion piece clearly does not grasp (lack of critical thinking skills?). She attended a rather un-selective private college that does not meet full need. She easily could have attended her instate public at a much lower cost. She (and her parents) made the personal decision to incur debt to attend a private college. And years after, she has the audacity to complain publicly about her family’s (poor) personal choices, and even blaming others for it.</p>
<p>(No, the banks did not make her do it.)</p>
<p>In general, I agree with the idea that borrowing is the mistake of the borrower. However, in the case of kids who have recently graduated high school and families who may not have been through the process, I’m not sure I think this is true. Most of us on here have a certain amount of financial savvy. But, many of the posters on here, out of high school, have bitched endlessly when parents won’t pay. Now, imagine a first in family, whose family has been told don’t worry, college is worth it. They have no clue how much these costs have escalated over recent history, or how much the degree is really worth. I think, given the bankruptcy protection, lenders have a responsibility to be extra responsible in lending. They take absolute NO risk in these loans and they still get interest. I’m not really sure when we stopped recognizing a scam in banking as a scam in banking.</p>
<p>Full disclosure: I work for a financial institution, but not in any way related to student loans.</p>
<p>Banks take HUGE risks with these loans. The are not all guaranteed and the margin is quite low. Banks have limited amounts of capital to lend and the opportunity cost of loaning large sums at low interest that do not pay off for years is very large. Much easier to loan on a car or a house or a credit card when money begins to come in immediately and the margins are often MUCH higher than on the typical student loan.</p>
<p>Most banks bother with student loans at all to appease the politicians (who create/run regulatory agencies) and to work on gaining ‘lifelong’ relationships with future college grads. Same reason banks started with credit cards for college students. The earlier you establish a relationship with a customer the more likely you are to expand that relationship and the more likely that person is to pay you before their other similar debts. </p>
<p>One of the poorest paying loans are student loans. Repayment is so bad that it is a common subject for comics to use as a gag.</p>
<p>No degree is worth a large amount of debt. I will not say that no financial institution ever coerced anyone, but the reputable ones have more to lose at the hands of the CFPB and the OCC than it is worth to ‘trick’ someone into a loan they cannot repay. That arena is mostly a political one…but that is a topic all its own.</p>
<p>If they are such high risks borrowers, don’t lend to them. I don’t lend money to the guy with the sign at the intersection. Sure, the banks didn’t force the debt onto the families. But the banks realize that they have government subsidies and legal guarantees to ensure repayment.</p>
<p>I agree with the other posters, I am appalled by some of these CC kids who are angry that their parents won’t pay, borrow, or co-sign to cover exorbitant tuition. And yes, some families don’t know any better. At some point, the process has to change to allow banks to say no to certain loan requests. But let me admit that I don’t have the answers. Remember, the taxpayers are on the hook for the federal subsidized lending programs. That’s what I am worried about.</p>
<p>* Everyone who is middle-class should pay 500,000 dollars for a 1200 square foot house with poor insulation and windows that let in the cold,*
Sounds like my neighborhood in Seattle.
Soon we will be like SF and more middle class folks will be moving out than moving in.</p>
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<p>You are aware that there are 12 state universities in Fl and that many of them have satellite campuses. I am not talking about you specifically but rather the middle class broadly. It is absolutely possible for middle class people to obtain a college education without excessive use of loans. Anyone who has an excessive amount of debt (not just student loans) is suffering from a self inflicted wound.</p>
<p>Torveax, I don’t understand. Why is repayment so bad if these loans are not dischargeable in bankruptcy and one is compelled to repay them come hell or high water? I had a friend with student loans and she tried to “hide” and duck out of it but they did find her eventually (we’re no longer friends, that is just one of MANY reasons) and she’s been paying them off as far as I know. So the bank or gov’t is getting their money back plus interest, fees, penalties etc. and she can’t get rid of the debt in bankruptcy so ultimately they do make money on the loan, don’t they? I really do want to know because finance is fascinating to me even though I am math challenged 
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<p>Lending money to 17 and 18 year olds doesn’t seem like the wisest choice though I will admit. Still it seems that if there wasn’t some money to be made, lenders wouldn’t do it, political pressure or no.</p>
<p>Aren’t Parent PLUS loans where the large number are found. I mean, a student cannot really borrow all that much but I’ve seen some parents sign off on pretty large loans. Sure, it’s there own fault but the aid packages make it very easy to do this. And GC’s routinely tell families they never know what they are going to get so why not apply. It’s actually a little more complicated.</p>
<p>All of us with sensible thoughts on this subject should head on over to the threads about prestige and help talk our fellow parents off the ledge. Too often the reason people go into huge debt over college seems to be the thinking that it’s “worth it” to have a degree from [expensive private] or [“better” out-of-state flagship]. Even as we speak, families are making the decision to overextend themselves for their children’s undergraduate education based on some persistent myths about ROI. I hate to break it to them but for 99% of students in 99% of occupations, a degree from any state flagship or next-best public university is going to get them where they want to go, even if they have to put in a couple of years of community college first.</p>
<p>If my S is accepted to our flagship FL state university (we’ll know tomorrow), and if he gets the most out of bright futures (he has all the qualifications) if the cost of sending him there is above $15K, I will definitely consider any of the private schools he applied that he gets accepted as long as the difference is not putting us in jeopardy. I’m ok with my S getting a little bit of loans of no more let’s say of 25-35K in a 4 year span. If and only if that can happen should he get accepted to a private, then he’ll go. Otherwise he’ll be happy attending our state school and then maybe continue an elite private lets say for a masters of phd.</p>
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<p>I don’t think 25-35K is “a little bit of loans”. If your S is accepted into your flagship school and the cost is 15K or slightly more, what benefit will he gain by going private with that much debt? It sounds like you have enough information to know exactly how much the state flagship will cost you if he attends so what am I missing?</p>
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Yes, I am aware…I said it in the post that you were responding to…
Fortunately, Florida publics have been doing a good job for establishing satellite campuses.</p>
<p>However, FWIW, satellite campuses were no help for me because they did not have my major. Students, like me who are going in the field that I am, who wanted to stay in state had to a private school.</p>
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Oh, no! That’s like telling us to go to the front line of fire without any arms!</p>
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Not necessarily responding to your situation entirely, but I know I didn’t pick FL flagship university because of the lack of merit aid. It would’ve cost me around maybe 20K at most by the end of four years, but it wasn’t worth it considering the other opportunities given to me. That…and people boasting about how it’s a “public ivy” turned me off! ;)</p>
<p>Joblue, you’re not missing anything!!! Lol, it is really weird the attitude of some people here:)
UF will cost about $21K a year. Borrowing 25K for an engineering degree is not a lot. We will make the decision when the acceptance letters come in and obviously taking consideration of the FA offered. I’ve seen kids go to Yale paying less than state. BTW, he will not have to borrow to attend our state school. I was saying, if he gets accepted to one of the privates he applied and if he gets a good FA package including merit, then we will consider it as long as it’s not out of line for us</p>
<p>Having been involved with College Confidential for several months now, and reading on and off various streams and posts on college financing, loans, grants, scholarships, financial aid, punishment if the kid gets a job and adds to his/her income for the worthy endeavor of working, the penalties that some universities get if they do this or do that (by the government), the banks being pushed into loans by the government (and indeed they are largely hard to get re-paid, at least without a battle), the convoluted computation systems, etc., no wonder the entire college tuition issue is an utter and complete mess, just like so many things government becomes involved with. The average person in this country cannot figure financial aid out (or at least without tortured study), their own tax returns, the new government health insurance system, Social Security, or anything else as it’s all so complicated. My husband is a tax lawyer and the official Tax Code is 73,000 pages in one of the smallest typefaces I have ever seen. Sad.</p>
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Some people love a good bargain ;)</p>
<p>Just to counter a lot of the people soapboxing about personal responsibility, college not being a right, etc: A college education is a good that does not only provide benefit to the consumer of that good. It provides society as a whole with people who will be more productive and sociable. There are plenty of businesses that would not exist on the scale that they do today if college was less accessible. We would have less technology. Our political system would be as limited as it was Pre-1824, with only a few landholding elites educated or wealthy enough to hold office. You would have far fewer interesting people to talk to. The list goes on. </p>
<p>These are called positive externalities, and they are why college couldn’t be a purely free market good and why we shouldn’t let the price get so out of control. </p>
<p>All of that said, I do recognize that resources are limited and if we cannot pay for everyone, it is certainly necessary to prioritize helping those who would otherwise have no options to pay for even the cheapest school. If that is still not enough maybe we need to rethink some of our more wasteful spending. Just think how many more people we could send to college if we weren’t still preparing to fight World War III. </p>
<p>Although ultimately I think the solution will need to be more colleges rather than more subsidies for existing ones. The existence of state schools comparable to some 2nd tier private schools already creates an incentive to offer more merit aid from private schools to stay competitive, but clearly there aren’t enough of these good public schools to make a dent in the problem on a macroscopic scale.</p>
<p>“All of that said, I do recognize that resources are limited and if we cannot pay for everyone, it is certainly necessary to prioritize helping those who would otherwise have no options to pay for even the cheapest school.”</p>
<p>That is the sentence when things on these threads always get a little sticky. But, it’s not about being jealous of the poor. It’s recognizing the simple fact that we are getting to the point where the middle class can’t afford it either.</p>