Category: Education

I hate to beat a dead horse on student debt, but I keep seeing unchecked fallacy after unchecked fallacy filling the blogs and news copy. In one prevalent fallacy, writers and commentators refer to college graduates as “the younger generation” or something similar. That is, they cast student debt as a generational issue affecting the… Continue reading Stop saying “the younger generation” when referring to recent graduates

Recently much was made of total student debt reaching $1 trillion. Although sensational, the number is not terribly meaningful unless it is accompanied by information about how many borrowers there are, what the median debt total is, how the debt is distributed, and so on. I’ve gone over that before; so I wont repeat it… Continue reading Professional degree holders have the highest debt

All education financing systems try to solve the same problem: students need education before they can make the money necessary to finance it. The natural solution to that problem is to let students get the education first and then pay for it later. This is true of college education just as much as it is… Continue reading Do not double student loan rates

As I wrote previously, student debt is generally an overblown issue. Students, as a class, are a relatively affluent bunch and are set to make, at the median, an extra $1 million over the course of their lifetimes. Like most groups, students would like society to give them more money, but to present that desire… Continue reading Balance sheet accounting for student debt

I left some things out of my previous post on the politics of student debt. First, there are a variety of other ways to use means-testing to help poor kids afford college. One way to do so is through price discrimination, something many private schools already do. Private schools have very high sticker prices for… Continue reading A few more notes on student debt