Class of 2015: most indebted in history

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Only until next year though!

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Yeah one thing I am glad about marrying a Canadian is the kid will be able to go to school up north and count as a resident. I was near dumbstruck to learn that what she paid for 4 years was less than 1 semester of when I was an engineering major.

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Over in the UK, since the introduction of charging students for ‘Tuition Fees’, I am hearing about kids coming out of postgrad with around £40,000 of debt, and that’s sterling GBP. Many of these kids’ parents had mortgages less than that when the kids were born. Not good.

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And certain politicians and demagogues will blame these kids for being dealt a shitty hand.

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Empire is not a system of governance, it’s an economic pattern. In the late stage of empire, it’s easier and more productive to extract wealth out of the system than it is to generate new wealth. This class of debtors isn’t going to be more productive during their careers than the ones who came before, they’ll likely generate less overall wealth. And eventually a tipping point is reached where people stop believing that the system will help them.

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Please elaborate.

He or she means that if the pattern continues the class of 2016 will be the most indebted class in history once they graduate, not (as an alternate way of reading Daneel’s statement) that the class of 2015 will magically become less indebted next year.

Whoosh! Right over my head.

I took my degree just in time - they started charging within a year or two of my enrolling, but I stayed with the same plan as before. Thanks to my wife working while I studied, cheap rail tickets (I commuted about 90 miles most days for just over six pounds/day) and waived tuition fees, I will have paid off my student loan by the end of this summer (I graduated in 2009). The same course would cost me £27,000 if I enrolled now, and my wife’s income wouldn’t have been noticeably higher for the same pay grade, so with the increased rail costs I would be at least £20,000 worse off at this point (taking the maintenance grant into account). I honestly don’t think I would have been able to study if I had had to pay today’s fees.

I was in the last but one year to get a maintenance grant (not that I got much of one, but I didn’t have to pay any tuition) in the UK. I remember the protests on campus for the fees being brought in for the new students in my final year. Looking back, that £1,000/year fee doesn’t seem so bad compared to what it was now.

My sister and I were very lucky to have generous parents who bankrolled our whole time at uni…

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I would have had to pay £1,500/year, but it was waived as my wife earned under £25,000. I think nowadays you get a loan to cover your tuition fees.

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The point that this year’s graduates have a lot of debt is well-taken. But it doesn’t look like these numbers are correcting for inflation, so it’s hard to say whether they have more real debt than any other class in history.

Put another way: a smaller debt might have been a bigger burden in some previous year.

Not magic, and not that big of an impact compared to the overall problem, but I do like this idea.

Well, by memory inflation in the us has averaged less than what, 3% per year since '93? And if memory serves compound interest at 7% will double prices every ten years? (I seem to recall those are the numbers).

So if those numbers are true, tuition cost and loan acceptance has been double inflation for twenty years.

Edit

Whoa, it is worse than that. The last ten years has been in the 1% range.

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Bloomberg also notes that tuition has increased (and debt load) more than 2x inflation.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-11-13/college-tuition-in-the-u-s-again-rises-faster-than-inflation

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Edit 4

From Forbes.

Edit 5, the final edit

Average total tuition, fees, room and board rates charged for full-time undergraduate students in degree-granting institutions, by type and control of institution: Selected years, 1981–82 to 2011–12
Year and control of institution Constant 2011–12 dollars1 Current dollars
All institutions 4-year institutions 2-year institutions All institutions 4-year institutions 2-year institutions
All institutions
1981–82 $8,438 $9,554 $5,986 $3,489 $3,951 $2,476
1991–92 11,653 13,564 6,738 7,077 8,238 4,092
2001–02 14,533 17,418 7,302 11,380 13,639 5,718
2002–03 15,012 18,043 7,813 12,014 14,439 6,252
2003–04 15,840 18,961 8,199 12,953 15,505 6,705
2004–05 16,375 19,599 8,423 13,793 16,510 7,095
2005–06 16,735 19,957 8,275 14,634 17,451 7,236
2006–07 17,260 20,591 8,323 15,483 18,471 7,466
2007–08 17,447 20,813 8,210 16,231 19,363 7,637
2008–09 18,120 21,636 8,733 17,092 20,409 8,238
2009–10 18,531 22,147 8,959 17,649 21,093 8,533
2010–11 19,039 22,740 9,170 18,497 22,092 8,909
2011–12 19,339 23,066 9,308 19,339 23,066 9,308
Public institutions
1981–82 $6,439 $6,942 $5,378 $2,663 $2,871 $2,224
1991–92 8,461 9,374 5,965 5,138 5,693 3,623
2001–02 10,244 11,744 6,561 8,022 9,196 5,137
2002–03 10,624 12,230 7,000 8,502 9,787 5,601
2003–04 11,308 13,053 7,352 9,247 10,674 6,012
2004–05 11,710 13,564 7,568 9,864 11,426 6,375
2005–06 11,955 13,847 7,424 10,454 12,108 6,492
2006–07 12,317 14,266 7,597 11,049 12,797 6,815
2007–08 12,440 14,435 7,498 11,573 13,429 6,975
2008–09 12,993 15,119 8,023 12,256 14,262 7,568
2009–10 13,443 15,764 8,088 12,804 15,014 7,703
2010–11 13,961 16,384 8,321 13,564 15,918 8,085
2011–12 14,292 16,789 8,561 14,292 16,789 8,561
Private not-for-profit and for-profit institutions

These are adjusted for inflation and displayed in current dollars.

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Damn foreigners stealing our education, and I bet you don’t even bother learning the language.

Colour is spelled with a “u” you heathens!

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And meanwhile, credentialism is becoming more and more entrenched. Want a promotion? Get a masters from a university program designated by your professional association.

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I keep reading the headline as “inebriated.”

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well i would be inebriated after finding out i owed that much money at 22.

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