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I totally agree. Will force these kids to work harder.
It's big business. That means the government has to get a little populist and force the institutions to downsize some of their payment. And that's taboo, becoz they are used to such mounting profits. I recently read an article on Yahoo Finance about the top ten debt owing institutions in America. Some have hundreds of thousands of dollars of monthly payments coming in from students. And total student debt owed crosses billions.
Why should education be so costly?? This is unheard of in other countries, Asia in particular, given that Asia is poor and not very advanced like the West. If such practices were to be adopted in some Asian countries, there will be student rebellions in the streets.
Is it too difficult for colleges to give away at least 100 out of say, 300 yearly seats completely for free, based on a merit test? Guess that's asking for too much Wonder what they do with their billion dollar endowments.
honestly, people make such a big deal about NYC cost of living. truly, it's not nearly as bad as people make it out to be. you don't have to pay $800/month, but you could do it. $25,000/income probably isn't feasible, but i know people who have started at $30,000 and have done just fine. and there's a lot of people that make less. i'd take a $105/month metrocard any day over a car + insurance + gas + oil changes + tires + etc. etc. people don't realize how much money new yorkers save because they don't have vehicle expenses, don't need a lot of stuff because they don't have space for it, all the free entertainment that exists, etc etc. COL calcs for NYC are very misleading. Yes, it could easily be very expensive, but you could go weeks without spending much money at all if you wanted to.
I've lived there, so I know. My first paycheck ($39k job) was $1187 every other week. My rent (spitting a 1 br apartmetn with a roomate) was $905. My student loans were around $250 back then. Half of electric & cable was $100ish every month. Left me about $1000 a month to budget for EVERYTHING else- food, entertainment, several $300 plane tickets a year back home to Texas, clothing (because when you graduate you don't have a professional wardrobe and when you move from TX you don't own a winter coat/ boots/ etc). Plus, I owned no furniture or home things (dishes, microwave, etc).....that first year or two was ROUGH with a $250 loan. I can't imagine having swung a payment 2-3x more on my salary back then.
I guess the main question I had was is it wrong to tell your child that you will not pay some huge amount to put them through school, especially if they go for a less usefull degree? I asked my parents not to question my choices as to my major and I guess I would have to grant my child with the same benefit. On the other side of the coin, I would like my kids not to have too many loans when they graduate.
My parents helped ***some***. They were very, very clear that they were going to contribute "x" amount towards tuition/room/board and would continue to pay for gas & car insurance & health insurance until I graduated. If I wanted to go to a school that cost "x + $25,000" or "x+$70,000" or even "x+$3,500".....I had to figure out how to fund the difference (scholarships, summer job, part-time job, loans, etc).
I went to the school I wanted to. My parents amount of "x" paid for my first 2 years. For the second 2, I covered costs by:
-$22,000 in student loans which covered tuition, fees, & books.
~scholarships of $2,000ish each year my junior & senior year for keeping a high GPA in my major (4.0), which defrayed tuition costs.
-working full time every summer & part-time during school (~$15,000 per year) that paid for my living expenses & other expenses (ie, flights to NYC to interview for jobs my senior year, etc).
This is what is the problem with educational institutions in America.
They SCAM these kids. They literally SCAM them.
50 to 100K+ in student loans and sending them to a job with little upside potential. And make no mistake we're living in the age of offshoring. Nobody wants to hire an MBA from Cornell or whatever, when they get a better Indian/Chinese guy at 1/8th the cost. That's what shareholders love, they want revenues in every quarter and increasing ones. A little patriotism is costly, it's like 12% in stock devaluation. Now they call themselves MNC's, it's not a national company anymore.
But........ sure as they know it, these educational institutions do not prepare the kids here for that. Becoz they just care about their coffers only.
Losers here are just the kids themselves and some of the unsuspecting parents who pay for it.
BS. BS. BS. I am 10 years out from school and make $110-140k per year. I would NEVER EVER have been able to advance to this point in my career without a college degree- it's a REQUIRMENT at my company & others in my industry. My $22k of student loans were just the price of admission to a much better lifestyle & I'm perfectly fine with that. NO SCAM.
I was educated outside the US. Based on a merit test, and my ranking, my government paid for my entire college tuition fee, it was the leading engineering school in the country. I walked out of college debt free.
I wonder why the American colleges cannot do this. Even with top notch GRE and TOEFL scores, nothing is for free.
That is truly sad.
Again, your government DID NOT PAY. Did your family pay taxes in the old country? At a much higher rate than in the US? Your TAXES paid for college- for everyone's college, whether they went or not. How does any government acquire wealth to fund things? Through taxes (or US aid deals.....)
Seriously, go back to your high tax countries if you don't like the US system.
^^American's hate paying taxes. Taxes are always an issue. We don't even want to raise taxes to provide better for our American children's elementary/primary education - the foundation of it all. There's no way American's would vote to pay extra taxes to povide free college education - even if it does seem like a better way to a lot of us. It totally does make more sense to spread it out and for us all to chip in so that we all may benefit. But that's just not how mainstream America tends to think. We're too self-obsessed and insular.
Again, your government DID NOT PAY. Did your family pay taxes in the old country? At a much higher rate than in the US? Your TAXES paid for college- for everyone's college, whether they went or not. How does any government acquire wealth to fund things? Through taxes (or US aid deals.....)
Seriously, go back to your high tax countries if you don't like the US system.
I have to disagree. We are from Russia and back then taxes (if any) were 10%, they stand at 13%. I would love pay 13% income tax and free tuition.
Russia being communist, means that corporations where operated for profit by the government...which is where the money came from. They groomed intelligent people to compete with the rest of the world.
this is probably true, but you could also defer for a year or two before going to college if you truly have no idea what you want to do, why waste any dollars at all? i knew what i wanted, so i didn't face this choice, but i understand the dilemna.
fair point. really i meant a low paying career. i'm thinking of people entering careers that have slower growth, so how would they manage a $700-$1,000 per month student loan payment as say, a teacher? it's doable, but very tough. and consider where it will get you...sure, columbia has an amazing program, so if you get in there, maybe it's worth the splurge, but some private school in PA vs one of the respected state schools in that field...is it worth the extra dollars? i'm not sure.
Where are you finding a 700-1000/month student loan repayment? You can buy a Mercedes and pay it off in 4 years for less than that. If you're paying that much per month, for a 4-year period, then you're doing something wrong.
My parents helped fund my education but didn't pay all of it. Guaranteed state loans funded most of the rest of it. I funded the balance by working. After I graduated, I had a year's respite before I had to start paying the loans back. The amount was $87.02/month for 12 years. And I deferred twice.
I'm guessing you can't get these types of loans anymore because FannieMae no longer exists. But I'm sure if you truly can't afford to put your kids into college, you would qualify for funding of various sorts INCLUDING grants. If your child is a solid, consistently good student, often colleges will reduce tuition costs and even offer scholarships. Grants and scholarships and reduced costs do NOT have to be paid back.
If you CAN afford to send your kids to college, but choose not to, then there's no wiggle room for complaint. Either you want your kids to have a higher education or you don't. If you can afford it, you pay it. If you can't afford it, you apply for assistance wherever you can find it. Saying "I don't want to spend a fortune" on investing in your own child's personal growth as a contributing adult in society doesn't seem like a very efficient option.
Education has value for its own sake. Even if the kid does nothing with it, career-wise, he has benefited himself by learning more about subjects that interest him. This *cannot hurt* him in the future, and can only help him, or do nothing for him. Rejecting higher education can only do nothing, or hurt him. Why would you want to risk hurting your child's future, when you could risk helping it? I just don't understand the mentality.
BS. BS. BS. I am 10 years out from school and make $110-140k per year. I would NEVER EVER have been able to advance to this point in my career without a college degree- it's a REQUIRMENT at my company & others in my industry. My $22k of student loans were just the price of admission to a much better lifestyle & I'm perfectly fine with that. NO SCAM.
You paid 22K and waited 10 years to get to this range??? I reached that range in my mid-20s, just 4 years after college and am way past it now. From a casual observer point of you, I have to say you sure have been scammed. Worse, you have the stockholm syndrome, where you love the very system which made money off you. What is your line of work if you don't mind asking? Besides, I'm curious about the degree you obtained. But 22K is still low, given that people I come across have 100+
Quote:
Originally Posted by TurtleCreek80
Again, your government DID NOT PAY. Did your family pay taxes in the old country? At a much higher rate than in the US? Your TAXES paid for college- for everyone's college, whether they went or not. How does any government acquire wealth to fund things? Through taxes (or US aid deals.....)
Seriously, go back to your high tax countries if you don't like the US system.
I just feel sorry to come across recent college graduates with mountains of debt, and drawing meager salaries, when they were scammed into thinking that their heavy student loans were a ticket to paradise.
As for taxes, if the government raised taxes, there will be rioting and real blood in the streets. I don't think my parents were paying a lot of taxes. It was pretty normal if I recall.
Last edited by Currency Pair Crocodile; 02-18-2011 at 01:13 PM..
You paid 22K and waited 10 years to get to this range??? I reached that range in my mid-20s, just 4 years after college and am way past it now. From a casual observer point of you, I have to say you sure have been scammed. Worse, you have the stockholm syndrome, where you love the very system which made money off you. What is your line of work if you don't mind asking? Besides, I'm curious about the degree you obtained. But 22K is still low, given that people I come across have 100+
I have a BA in liberal arts from a Top 50 University. My parents paid half of my education, I paid for the second half via loans & working through college.
I work in corporate retail as a Senior Buyer. Retail does not pay the same as being a hedge fund manager or big law attorney or a surgeon....but I'm good a it and I love my work. I hit the 6-figure mark at 28- figure in 2 years of no merit increase due to the recession and very low/no bonus for fiscal 2008 and 2009 and I think I've done quite well financially for my field.
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Wonder what they do with their billion dollar endowments.
