No, I have not. I’m saying that administrative bloat isn’t a myth…
Oh, bummer!
I was responding to this, not the bloat question.
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Worth noting - even if only in passing - that NYC was going bankrupt when they made this change (they literally had other fires that they were putting out). That they didn’t return to free tuition after the City got back on its feet is significant.
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Ah! Gotcha! By profs, I just meant all of us teaching, however they’re employed…
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Yeah thanks, I see that now.
Funny/not funny, within the neoliberal austerity context, how normal that all-encompaasing usage has become. I’ve wondered if calling all who teach college courses “professor” further erodes the notion that tenure is somethingthatshouldeven exist at universities. OTOH, it may well bring the tenured down a deserved peg or two! Toward realizing that they too are vulnerable “workers,” who’d also do well by getting unionized.
@anon33932455 , thanks for the informative rundown. As much of a mess as ever, it seems, as the mighty dollar holds ever greater sway.
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That is about to start happening, because some states are starting to figure out ways to end the tenure system. The tenured folks who shrugged at the very real struggles of their grad students struggling to get through their programs without taking on extra work to pay for their education and who did not seem to care as those same students struggled to find full time employment within academia, might finally take notice if tenure does just go away, and they become just a vulnerable as we are.
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They took out the loans they need to pay them back and the interest. Cancelling student loans is a horrible idea.
Welcome aboard.
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Only for the loan company sharking kids who want to learn, for everyone else it’s a win.
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That is rather a contentless comment.
Please do elaborate, new comrade:
Why is student debt forgiveness or cancellation a bad idea; especially when student lending is often highly predatory and unethical?
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Requiring student loans is a terrible idea. Allow me to place just one issue before you for consideration. In my field, pediatrics, we cannot recruit docs. Why? Because most folks graduate from med school carrying $200-300k in debt. Considering the income of a starting peds doc, carrying that kind of debt is untenable. But if you go into a high paying field, like dermatology or orthopedics, it is a minor inconvenience. This skews the whole field away from primary care to specialties. Where are the shortages? Of course, in primary care. Student debt is just plain evil, and targets the most vulnerable among us. That is the “horrible idea.”
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American society as a whole would benefit more from having a workforce freed from student debt than it would benefit from the interest paid to lenders (including the Feds).
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Stop; you sound far too logical, reasonable and worst of all, compassionate about other people.
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Nevermind that it’s a win-win-win for everyone but the predatory student loan companies.
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Indeed! The best return-on-investment in public spending is, and will always be, education. At every level. Young, educated adults entering the workforce without crushing debt benefits a huge swath of the economy. It’s well past time we stop coddling one tiny, predatory niche that only exists because too many of our congresscritters are cheaply bought out by lobbyists.
Full disclosure: I paid off my student debts in full and enthusiastically endorse cancelling all student loan debt. We can have nice things, we just have to stop feeding the Pentagon so damned many of our tax dollars.
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Same, and Amen.
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So did I. Back in the Good Old Days™, when bank loans and working full time year-round were enough to pay one’s way through a good private school. And the bank loans were small enough that repayment was done in 10 years. That’s so far removed from the reality students face these days.
There were a number of years early on in that 10 year period when I was unable to afford even basic stuff because my loan repayment was most of my monthly income. I’m one of many who went through that. But again, in comparison to now, it seems like child’s play.
I’ve also traveled (and lived) around the world. I’ve seen the difference in developed civilizations that understand the entire country is better off when students can concentrate on their studies. Heck, Germany doesn’t even charge tuition to foreigners, as long as they stay in the country to work for at least a few years after graduation. Why? Because they know that educated workers are more committed to being a positive part of society, and they pay more in taxes due to higher wages. The country as a whole benefits from well-educated workers.
So, as a Boomer, I tell you: cancelling student loans and restructuring how higher education is paid for is an excellent idea, and in fact is crucial if we ever want to earn our way back into being recognized as a “civilized nation”.
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Same here. It took me a bit longer to pay mine off. That was only possible by cutting living expenses to the minimum and being lucky enough to work during the initial dot com boom. As a member of GenX it horrifies me to see the combination of predatory lending, attacks on decent wages, and anti-employee/labor tactics supported by businesses making it impossible for younger students to ever escape the cycle of debt.
Instead of being progressive, I believe too many heads of major corporations are deliberately supporting the forces of oppression. They don’t care about what benefits society, only themselves. Gone are the days when the CEOs of fast food franchises complained that public education was lacking because they had to ask NCR to make registers with pictures on them and automatic change dispensers. 
Now, instead of demanding public schools do a better job to enable kids to succeed, they’ve defunded it multiple ways to increase unskilled labor. They figure automation will bridge the gap. They want workers who won’t think too much about the terrible conditions, wages, hours, lack of benefits, and reliance on the company store that they’ll face every day.
Those “regressives” long for the social control TPTB had when only wealthy men had any choices, and everyone else had to fight for the basic necessities of living (or beg them for it). This is the source of their anti-intellectual bs messaging that everyone doesn’t need college, we should bring back child labor (kids will learn more at work than in school), nobody wants to work anymore, everyone shouldn’t be able to vote, critical thinking is overrated, etc… If we don’t continue to fight and drag them kicking and screaming into the future, they will continue trying to set the world back to the way it was in the '50s…
…the 1850s. 
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