Massive Student Debt Cancellation Would Just Be Wrong

By Neal McCluskey of Cato.

"With Senator Chuck Schumer calling on President‐​elect Joe Biden to enact massive federal student debt cancellation by executive fiat, perhaps we need another reminder why such a policy would be terrible.

As I am pressed for time with other projects, I’m going to make this short.

First a chart, from the Urban Institute, laying out who has most of the student debt (hint: not low‐​income folks):

Next, a reminder from Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce that the average person with a bachelor’s degree can expect to make around $1 million more over their lifetime than someone with only a high school diploma. Oh, and a lot of debt is for graduate studies, like law and medical school, which lead to even bigger lifetime bucks:

Finally, here is a host of links to on‐​campus pools and lazy rivers:

• University of Missouri (including “your on‐​campus beach club”)
• NOVA Southeastern University
• Louisiana State University
• Missouri State University
• University of Houston
• University of Alabama
• Auburn University
• Southeast Missouri State (seems to be a leisure pool arms race in MO)
• Texas Tech University (We’re number…wait…just four?)

What’s the point of all this? Massive loan cancellation would primarily help well‐​off people, and have taxpayers bear even more of the cost of “education” that for many students is also kind of “luxury cruising.” We would be socializing costs for huge private profit, which would not only be bad education policy, fostering even worse tuition inflation & empty credential demands, it would be patently unjust."