Alstein
4220
That’s the problem, and Manchin is dead set against helping poors. There’s really not much Biden can do unless he starts going Trumplike authoritarian, or breaking the law himself.
DoubleG
4221
How have the republicans been able to consistently advance their agenda whether they’ve been in power or not? The argument from the center that Democrats haven’t been in a position to do anything meaningfully progressive in 40 years is baffling to me.
This isn’t true – there’s plenty Biden could do legally, he’s the president of the united states. He can use an executive action to cancel federal student debt, or direct his Justice Department to pursue anti-trust aggressively.
If Republicans are capable of doing so much harm when they’re in power, why aren’t the Democrats able to do anything when they hold the same offices?
The Republican agenda is cut taxes, which they can do with 50 votes in the Senate. And instead of being baffled, just point to the period in the last 40 years when you think Democrats were in a position to do the right stuff, and tell me what that right stuff was.
DoubleG
4223
How about right now and cancelling student debt
How much student debt, and which student debt?
MrGrumpy
4225
2008.They had 60 seats, briefly, and then they had 59. But they had enough votes to reform the Senate filibuster in any way they saw fit to get legislation passed.
They chose not to.
They punted on climate change because it wasn’t politically expedient.
They passed a recovery bill that was too small in order to appease Republicans and so-called moderates.
They spent a year on health care but ended up with a weak bill again to appease Republicans and their so-called moderates.
And for all their “sensible middle” legislation, they suffered historic losses in the mid-terms.
Google it, it’s not hard.
The so-called moderates they had to appease were…Democrats. They didn’t have the votes for the things you wanted. I’m saying that we can pretend that Democrats in power don’t have to bend to the political realities inherent in their big tent caucus, but I don’t see how pretending that does any good at all.
Google what? How much student debt, and which kinds of student debt, you want Biden to cancel? Google is going to tell me that?
MrGrumpy
4227
I know. They could have changed the rules so that instead of needing 60 votes and/or relying on Republicans to filibuster shit, they had the power to change the rules and chose not to. IOW they could have marginalized Max Baucus and the rest. Edit: They needed 50 votes and the will of the Senate leadership to make sweeping changes, but the leadership chose not to.
It is, there have been numerous articles on it. Warren et al have been lobbying Biden to do something with student debt that fall within the purview of executive action (Or go to visit the American Prospect, they’ve spent a lot ink on what Biden can do)
Houngan
4228
I’ve never really understood the debt relief thing for college. I guess I come from two sides, one is that if everyone goes to college, then college loses a lot of its value, we still need tradesmen and other blue collar jobs to make the world run. Expand it out to relieving debt for trade schools, business investments for other workers like helping them buy the equipment they need to make a go of it, etc. etc. The other side is petty and personal, I went to college and failed, but incurred no debt, then I went back, again on my own dime, and didn’t fail per se, I just realized (with a 3.5 GPA) that even if I did it would just slot me into some job ten years behind where I already was. There may be a point in my life coming up where I really, really need to understand calculus but . . . I just taught myself my trade and the things that every professional needs, like communication skills, to the point where I’m always shocked at how illiterate materials are coming from multibillion dollar corporations.
I was still able to secure a trade, college just wasn’t for me. While I regret never getting a degree because of the irrational value placed upon it, I also don’t regret making the bad decision to roll all my dice on incurring massive debt to get a piece of paper to prove I had gone through the system correctly.
Yes, I know these things. I think it very likely that Biden is going to do something about canceling some federal student debt, though I doubt seriously he will cancel it all, and the question I’m asking is, how much does he have to cancel to satisfy the challenge for you? Or for whoever? Google can’t answer that question.
I basically did the same. But I understand the calls to do something about historically high levels of student debt, caused to a great extent by movement conservatism and its desire to cut all state taxes and effectively kill state funding for universities. There’s a whole generation of young people buried under debt, and that has knock-on effects for the entire economy; and the bargain they were offered turns out not to have been true. They can’t get jobs that pay well enough to retire their debt.
MrGrumpy
4231
My understanding is $50 billion (that is, that’s what he can do with an EO). I don’t know the details and the wherefores, it’s not a top of mind issue for me but I’ve seen numerous articles addressing it.
It’s easy for me to believe that something like that is coming, and impossible for me to believe that he’s going to cancel the whole $1.7 trillion.
DoubleG
4233
Okay, so it is possible for the democrats to do something progressive?
Houngan
4234
That’s a great point, but I kinda see it as kicking a bad ball down the field. If we screwed up by promising them that going to college was a panacea for life, and then we screwed up by not getting them through college, and then we hit the reset button for everyone, the first two mistakes will just keep rolling along. I’d rather see college being integrated into a broader reach of self improvement, bring the liberal arts that I do think have value into a broader spectrum of trades and subsidize those people to follow their dreams and skills while also getting the more nebulous advantages of a college education.
Then value those skills more highly by reducing the gross inequality that exists in other fields. We still need doctors and engineers and other critical skills that should require the highest level of learning and certification (talking civil engineers, not software) but by and large a brilliant welder has as much value to the world as a mediocre-but-degreed communications major.
$10K was one of Biden’s campaign promises. It’s not unreasonable for voters to expect him to follow through on it.
Sure. I’m not arguing that they can’t do any progressive thing. I’m resisting the idea that they can do any progressive thing they want to do. Some things require enacting laws, and they’re going to be limited by the size of the willing caucus for that particular progressive thing.
No, it isn’t unreasonable for them to expect that, and I think he’ll do something along those lines. I don’t think he’ll cancel all student debt.
Maybe, but we are talking about the kind of thing that can be done unilaterally by executive action, because there clearly isn’t going to be any legislation that dramatically changes the cost / value relationship of the state university system. Not with this particular Congress.
Wasn’t the 10k something he promised he would sign if it got through Congress?
Honestly, as a Federal Employee, loan forgiveness is not an issue for me, that it is for other people, since Public Service Loan Forgiveness is my ticket to freedom.
That being said, the sticky point with loan forgiveness is that it primarily impacts people that are (in general) in the best financial position possible. Or will be.
But that doesn’t mean everyone with loans are in the same position.
Another problem is that it doesn’t impact people with private loans, which really hurt some people.
A third problem is that it doesn’t help with the cause of Student Loan Crisis, which is the huge increase in cost.
That all being said, one solution that gets kicked around is reducing the loan interest to near 0. And another is making the 20 year loan forgiveness tax free (which it isn’t, unlike the PSLF).
From what I have read, much of his talk of cancelling debt is in the context of a larger legislative agenda which is now dead. So partially yes? But getting back to DoubleG’s point, after a certain point refusing to use the tools available starts to look like weaponized helplessness.
The NPR piece had this bit:
Mustaffa Bishop co-authored a recent survey of nearly 1,300 Black borrowers. The report, “Jim Crow Debt,” produced in partnership with the Education Trust, unpacks how pervasive racial inequities, including widespread wealth disparities and persistent workplace discrimination, have left many people of color drowning in student debt.
A 2019 report from the Institute on Assets and Social Policy at Brandeis University found that “Twenty years after starting college, the median debt of White borrowing students has been reduced by 94 percent — with almost half holding no student debt — whereas Black borrowers at the median still owe 95 percent of their cumulative borrowing total.”
(I’m not an expert on the distribution of student loans, so I’m not sure how cherry picked this data is.)
All fair points. The BBB did have parts for free community college which would help with the costs of college going forward. And now that you’re saying it, rather than debt cancellation I think it would be fine to say that “yeah, as long as a Democrat is President, student loan repayments are paused.” Clearly Biden has the authority to do that, since he is already doing that.
From the post, I would argue that we should forgive the loans of African Americans?
Okay, that was Sort tongue and cheek, although honestly some sort of reparations to the African American Community is in Order.
Anyway, continuously paused Loans have been great.
