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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez


markstanco

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In all serious, if she wants to be potus, she’s going to need a few crash courses in foreign policy/diplomacy.

That’s probably her weak spot because I have yet to hear her articulate her worldview of America’s role in the world.

It’s also the most challenging area of politics these days, scholastically speaking. 

So many competing forces expanding and contracting all at once right now. 

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Not "cancelling" all debt, but yes addressing this ever increasing problem where higher education is unaffordable to many middle-class families.
And this is largely the case because of readily available, cheap student loans. It caused a bubble. Course, doesn't help when people get useless degrees for their 100 or 200k in loans.
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2 hours ago, PenelopeWitherspoon said:
On 1/11/2019 at 11:02 AM, GSU&UT said:
Not "cancelling" all debt, but yes addressing this ever increasing problem where higher education is unaffordable to many middle-class families.

And this is largely the case because of readily available, cheap student loans. It caused a bubble. Course, doesn't help when people get useless degrees for their 100 or 200k in loans.

Cheap?

Student loans aren't cheap. 

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And this is largely the case because of readily available, cheap student loans. It caused a bubble. Course, doesn't help when people get useless degrees for their 100 or 200k in loans.
Myth. Tuition increases at public universities have generally been in line with reductions in state funding. I'm on mobile so I don't have it in front of me but I remember reading an interesting piece that really laid out the numbers. I'll link it later.

The main culpability student loans have are that politicians that want to cut ed can fall back on them as a funding source. They've filled the gaps but they haven't driven up the price. Not at pubic schools anyway.

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Myth. Tuition increases at public universities have generally been in line with reductions in state funding. I'm on mobile so I don't have it in front of me but I remember reading an interesting piece that really laid out the numbers. I'll link it later.

The main culpability student loans have are that politicians that want to cut ed can fall back on them as a funding source. They've filled the gaps but they haven't driven up the price. Not at pubic schools anyway.

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There is that as well. It is also this.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/569884/

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2016/03/01/why-college-is-so-expensive-and-how-to-fix-it/amp/
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Please continue to lecture us that student debt is the fault of the students and not of a system that places entirely too much emphasis on obtaining a degree to increase your earning power. Also, save me any bs about technical school and skills gaps, that has largely been debunked as companies started offering those jobs to less skilled workers once the effects of the recession faded.

As far as worthless degrees? I got a STEM degree and couldn't find good work in 2010 and had to take temp jobs before I found a lab tech position that wanted a college degree to pay about 30k a year.

Edited by GSU&UT
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14 hours ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

In all serious, if she wants to be potus, she’s going to need a few crash courses in foreign policy/diplomacy.

She isn't even eligible for 6 fucking years, tap the brakes. 

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56 minutes ago, PenelopeWitherspoon said:
1 hour ago, Asithappens said:
Cheap?
Student loans aren't cheap. 

2-3% interest rates ARE cheap.

Where are you finding 2-3% student loans?? My loans originated in the late aughts and early teens, and my lowest interest rate is 3.6% from a subsidized federal loan, of which is my smallest percentage of lent money. The majority of my loans are 4.5-6.6% interest. All through state of TX or through the federal loan system. And that was when interest rates were low.

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1 hour ago, CooterBrown said:

 


and yet, no one gave a shit about it until a year ago when it became a thing for who knows what fucking reason.

 

To say no one had a name/label for it until about a yr ago = correct.

To say no one gave a shit until a yr ago = incorrect.

It's been grating for a long, long time.

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8 minutes ago, Captainant said:

Where are you finding 2-3% student loans?? My loans originated in the late aughts and early teens, and my lowest interest rate is 3.6% from a subsidized federal loan, of which is my smallest percentage of lent money. The majority of my loans are 4.5-6.6% interest. All through state of TX or through the federal loan system. And that was when interest rates were low.

Maybe the 2% rate was for students at Trump University?

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21 minutes ago, GSU&UT said:

Please continue to lecture us that student debt is the fault of the students and not of a system that places entirely too much emphasis on obtaining a degree to increase your earning power. Also, save me any bs about technical school and skills gaps, that has largely been debunked as companies started offering those jobs to less skilled workers once the effects of the recession faded.

Old white guys: "Man I was such a dumb teenager I'm so glad social media wasn't around. I was dancing around shirtless in war memorials and hollering at every woman that passed. If a Native American was around, I was war-whoopin' and tomahawk choppin'."

Also old white guys: "Stupid teenagers today didn't make the super smart decisions I made about their educations."

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22 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

Old white guys: "Man I was such a dumb teenager I'm so glad social media wasn't around. I was dancing around shirtless in war memorials and hollering at every woman that passed. If a Native American was around, I was war-whoopin' and tomahawk choppin'."

Also old white guys: "Stupid teenagers today didn't make the super smart decisions I made about their educations."

Old people have turned into a fucking scourge on American society. 

And yeah, let's blame the kids for the student loan mess. Jesus. The "get off my lawn" crowd has gone full retard. Or full Alzheimers. 

 

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I consolidated my federal student loans in the mid 2000s at ~2%, but the remainder through the State of MN were at 5 to 7%.

What you should be getting mad at is the wholesale defunding of higher ed by state Legislatures. Not sure how it is at UT, but state funding at the U of Minnesota is half of what it was in 1996, both as adjusted dollars and as a share of total revenue. 

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1 hour ago, Js1 said:

She isn't even eligible for 6 fucking years, tap the brakes. 

. . . not to mention the youngest President ever was 42 (Teddy Roosevelt), and he wasn't voted in.  JFK was 43 when he was elected.  At that time, a man's life expectancy was 67 years.  It's now 76 years.  Scale the age at inauguration and it's fair to say that a 48 YO first term President would be "historically young".  (Or just use 43, I don't care.  Clinton was 46, Obama was 47.)

For some reason this has become a new right wing talking point.  "ZOINKS, a few libs have spoken about AOC and the White House!!!  They're all idiots!!"

Give AOC 15-20 years more seasoning and maybe we can talk.

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8 minutes ago, PenelopeWitherspoon said:
29 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:
Ah, good, another clearly uninformed poster we can all ignore. I love it when they give themselves away so obviously.

And this is the reason I usually avoid this cesspool. Mine are all under 3%. Money was cheap for a long time. It is definitely part of the problem.

Cheap loans contributed, although the period that they were 3% was really small. Even subsidized loans were north of 4% when I was in undergrad and law school. I think my loans averaged around 6% for the period of 2007-2010.  At any rate, I still think focusing on the pool of available money completely ignores the demand side of the equation. The simple fact is that employers started expecting college degrees for pretty much any entry level position. And, in concert with that, college education became expected for children across the country. I really don't understand why everyone ignores that when examining why the cost of education increases. 

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Cheap loans contributed, although the period that they were 3% was really small. Even subsidized loans were north of 4% when I was in undergrad and law school. I think my loans averaged around 6% for the period of 2007-2010.  At any rate, I still think focusing on the pool of available money completely ignores the demand side of the equation. The simple fact is that employers started expecting college degrees for pretty much any entry level position. And, in concert with that, college education became expected for children across the country. I really don't understand why everyone ignores that when examining why the cost of education increases. 
It's all of these all together. It isn't just one.
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5 minutes ago, PenelopeWitherspoon said:
25 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:
Cheap loans contributed, although the period that they were 3% was really small. Even subsidized loans were north of 4% when I was in undergrad and law school. I think my loans averaged around 6% for the period of 2007-2010.  At any rate, I still think focusing on the pool of available money completely ignores the demand side of the equation. The simple fact is that employers started expecting college degrees for pretty much any entry level position. And, in concert with that, college education became expected for children across the country. I really don't understand why everyone ignores that when examining why the cost of education increases. 

It's all of these all together. It isn't just one.

Yep.  And I think the administrative bloat that grew while states were cutting funding indicates that freely available money was a major factor.  It apparently is an issue at places other than UT with the PUF as a backstop.

Also, it isn't that the loans are cheap, it's that they are freely available.  Naive students and their families could get them easily, finance an entire education, and without due regard for the impact that the loans would have on post-education "liquidity."

Edited by TwiceHorn
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7 minutes ago, PenelopeWitherspoon said:
27 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:
Cheap loans contributed, although the period that they were 3% was really small. Even subsidized loans were north of 4% when I was in undergrad and law school. I think my loans averaged around 6% for the period of 2007-2010.  At any rate, I still think focusing on the pool of available money completely ignores the demand side of the equation. The simple fact is that employers started expecting college degrees for pretty much any entry level position. And, in concert with that, college education became expected for children across the country. I really don't understand why everyone ignores that when examining why the cost of education increases. 

It's all of these all together. It isn't just one.

Isn't that what I said? 

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6 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Yep.  And I think the administrative bloat that grew while states were cutting funding indicates that freely available money was a major factor.  It apparently is an issue at places other than UT with the PUF as a backstop.

Also, it isn't that the loans are cheap, it's that they are freely available.  Naive students and their families could get them easily, finance an entire education, and without due regard for the impact that the loans would have on post-education "liquidity."

This may be hard for you to understand, as the idea of poor people having the opportunity to obtain a college degree must be abhorrent to you, but administrative bloat as a driver of tuition inflation is dwarfed by the decline in public expenditures.  

Quote

All of those trends add to the cost of college, but not by that much. At most, about a quarter of the increase in college tuition since 2000 can be attributed to rising faculty salaries, improved amenities and administrative bloat. By comparison, the decline in state support accounts for about three-quarters of the rising cost of college.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/fancy-dorms-arent-the-main-reason-tuition-is-skyrocketing/

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1 minute ago, TwiceHorn said:

Like healthcare and it's "death panels" (that is more or less a real thing), "free" secondary/tertiary education will require some pretty draconian screening for admission, ala GCSE/A-levels in the UK.

My preferred choice is an expansion of education scholarships/grants focused on merit/ability while retaining the ability of anyone else to apply for and pay for college on their own. 

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If the GOP really wanted to have some fun, they'd just dig up the attack ads that Joe Crowley threw up at AOC during the primaries.  And he was by many informal metrics, the next most powerful Democrat in the House after Pelosi.  

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1 minute ago, trauma babe said:

I mean, do we not already sort of have that with the college admissions tests? I know it's not quite as robust as the GCSE system, but plenty of people get rejected for schools because of poor ACT/SAT scores. 

It's going to have to be far more rigid than that.  Test scores can be compensated by grades easily.  Some school will take virtually anyone.  GCSE/A levels entirelydisqualifies whole swaths of students from university educations.

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9 minutes ago, Fozzz said:

This may be hard for you to understand, as the idea of poor people having the opportunity to obtain a college degree must be abhorrent to you, but administrative bloat as a driver of tuition inflation is dwarfed by the decline in public expenditures.  

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/fancy-dorms-arent-the-main-reason-tuition-is-skyrocketing/

Oh fuck you.  There's no value judgment in anything I am saying, just discussing the economics of education.  I actually see "privileged" white folks taking up space in mediocre majors at mediocre schools to be the biggest aspect of the devaluation of the degree, ie second or even third generation college students whose parents didn't consider providing a college education to be obligatory as an aspect of parenting, yet expected their progeny to go and graduate in something, no matter how trivial.

But if state spending is declining, where exactly are schools getting money to employ more people?

Edited by TwiceHorn
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7 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

It's going to have to be far more rigid than that.  Test scores can be compensated by grades easily.  Some school will take virtually anyone.  GCSE/A levels entirelydisqualifies whole swaths of students from university educations.

GCSE/A levels are racist

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3 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

 Oh fuck you.  There's no value judgment in anything I am saying, just discussing the economics of education.  I actually see "privileged" white folks taking up space in mediocre majors at mediocre schools to be the biggest aspect of the devaluation of the degree, ie second or even third generation college students whose parents didn't consider a college education to be obligatory.

 But if state spending is declining, where exactly are schools getting money to employ more people?

It's almost like you were wrong, didn't read the article, and then doubled down. 

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  • hayden_horn changed the title to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez


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