Yeah, I mean, you are right, it has to be paid for, and that payment is a pain, and it’s $1.6 trillion dollars, and as prosperous as America is, we can’t casually brush aside $1.6 trillion dollars worth of outstanding debt.
But at the same time, I feel like if the financial constraint was not the defining factor that after people go through a process of self-discovery and attempting, you know, underwater basket weaving, or ceramics or whatever, and finding out that it’s a dead end for them, they might end up going back to college and getting a degree in law, or going to a trade school, or finding some other path to where their capabilities and the needs of society interact in a financially successful way.
I want people to have more choices, more options, and the more choices they make, the higher likelihood that they will find something that is wildly successful for them.
I want people to succeed.
Iwant people to do something that is wildly successful for them, and when they do they will generate tax revenues for the country far in excess of what it cost for them to make that mistake.
That’s the purpose of social programs and society itself, in my opinion.
My life experience has shown me that people who succeed do succeed… and those that don’t blame everyone else for not giving them enough. And that is often regardless of where they come from or what they studied or own much debt they took on.
I would like them to succeed too… but we can’t save people from themselves. What a lot of people in this thread don’t seem to be able to acknowledge is that many many people… as soon as you forgave them their debt… would just go and pile it back on again and make the same crappy choices and end up in the same situation all over again.
social programs are very effective when they are setup correctly and they provide future forward incentives… not ‘fix your mistake’ incentives.
You also have to understand that the social contract and incentives break down when you visible reward awful behavior and punish good ones. If people feel like their loans will be forgiven anyway… they won’t be incentivized to become successful. Why not just party it up and wait for the government forgiveness to kick in? then repeat the cycle? I mean you think if your friend just gets her loans forgiven she will magically be successful in life? I doubt it. Maybe she would, but there are plenty of people who would take that forgiveness and just pile the debt right back on and demand that debt also be forgiven.
limited loan forgiveness phased in over time makes a lot more sense and avoids the moral hazards.
I’ve told this story before elsewhere, but, like, I graduated high school a year ahead of my class. I was the valedictorian.
Four months after I graduated high school, while I was still a 17-year-old teenager, I found myself homeless, because my mom is a dick.
My dad attempted to jumpstart my life for nearly a decade after that. The women I loved attempted to jumpstart my life for nearly a decade after that.
My friends put themselves out of their way to jumpstart my life for nearly a decade after that until it finally clicked.
I have been bailed out of being a miserable piece of shit more times than I deserve.
I know that I am still a miserable piece of shit on the inside, but thanks to the help of all of the people that kept coming to my rescue, I am a moderately successful miserable piece of shit.
If the world has conspired to give that to me, I also want the world to give that to all of the other pieces of shit out there, in hopes that, even though we are all pieces of shit, that eventually we will break down into fine, healthy compost that will nourish seeds of some other plant that isn’t a piece of shit.
Yeah, I mean, you are right, it has to be paid for, and that payment is a pain, and it’s $1.6 trillion dollars, and as prosperous as America is, we can’t casually brush aside $1.6 trillion dollars worth of outstanding debt.
But at the same time, I feel like if the financial constraint was not the defining factor that after people go through a process of self-discovery and attempting, you know, underwater basket weaving, or ceramics or whatever, and finding out that it’s a dead end for them, they might end up going back to college and getting a degree in law, or going to a trade school, or finding some other path to where their capabilities and the needs of society interact in a financially successful way.
I want people to have more choices, more options, and the more choices they make, the higher likelihood that they will find something that is wildly successful for them.
I want people to succeed.
Iwant people to do something that is wildly successful for them, and when they do they will generate tax revenues for the country far in excess of what it cost for them to make that mistake.
That’s the purpose of social programs and society itself, in my opinion.
My life experience has shown me that people who succeed do succeed… and those that don’t blame everyone else for not giving them enough. And that is often regardless of where they come from or what they studied or own much debt they took on.
I would like them to succeed too… but we can’t save people from themselves. What a lot of people in this thread don’t seem to be able to acknowledge is that many many people… as soon as you forgave them their debt… would just go and pile it back on again and make the same crappy choices and end up in the same situation all over again.
social programs are very effective when they are setup correctly and they provide future forward incentives… not ‘fix your mistake’ incentives.
You also have to understand that the social contract and incentives break down when you visible reward awful behavior and punish good ones. If people feel like their loans will be forgiven anyway… they won’t be incentivized to become successful. Why not just party it up and wait for the government forgiveness to kick in? then repeat the cycle? I mean you think if your friend just gets her loans forgiven she will magically be successful in life? I doubt it. Maybe she would, but there are plenty of people who would take that forgiveness and just pile the debt right back on and demand that debt also be forgiven.
limited loan forgiveness phased in over time makes a lot more sense and avoids the moral hazards.
I’ve told this story before elsewhere, but, like, I graduated high school a year ahead of my class. I was the valedictorian.
Four months after I graduated high school, while I was still a 17-year-old teenager, I found myself homeless, because my mom is a dick.
My dad attempted to jumpstart my life for nearly a decade after that. The women I loved attempted to jumpstart my life for nearly a decade after that.
My friends put themselves out of their way to jumpstart my life for nearly a decade after that until it finally clicked.
I have been bailed out of being a miserable piece of shit more times than I deserve.
I know that I am still a miserable piece of shit on the inside, but thanks to the help of all of the people that kept coming to my rescue, I am a moderately successful miserable piece of shit.
If the world has conspired to give that to me, I also want the world to give that to all of the other pieces of shit out there, in hopes that, even though we are all pieces of shit, that eventually we will break down into fine, healthy compost that will nourish seeds of some other plant that isn’t a piece of shit.