Gov. Noem and Colleagues Oppose Student Debt Forgiveness Plan

22 thoughts on “Gov. Noem and Colleagues Oppose Student Debt Forgiveness Plan”

1. God forbid we help out the middle class. Rich farmers and business owners should be the only ones who get financial handouts. Noem needs to go.

   1. I paid off my school loans 25 years ago. When do I get that money back plus 25 years on interest? I’m middle class don’t I deserve a break?

      Cry me a river…..you take out a loan and can’t find a good job because you chose a worthless degree program, Well that’s on you. It’s called responsibility.

      1. I paid off my student loans as well but I have no problem helping others with theirs. I want to live in an educated society. I didn’t get the $8k housing credit. I didn’t get ppp dollars. I didn’t get food stamps or pell grants or housing assistance. Big deal. Others getting help isn’t going to upset me because I am well off. Claiming this is all because of “worthless degrees” proves your ignorance on the topic. Is it responsible to hand out billions in loans to business owners and forgiving them? How about the trillions that have been handed out to farmers? How about the 287 million Trump had forgiven? It’s about time we invest in the working class.

         1. Again. It’s called personal responsibilty….something you obviously don’t get.

            1. Is it personal responsibility to give banks taxpayer dollars to lend out risk free on the backs of those who need it? It sure was a sweetheart deal for them to use our own dollars to exploit more money from us with no risk and get rich doing it. I have a helluva a lot more personal responsibility than you and I bet i even have a bigger bank account. Who cares? It’s about helping your fellow man for the benefit of all society. You poor souls are still trying to find the dream of being wealthy so you shoot yourselves and others in the back because you have this dream of it actually happening.

               1. I actually am quite well off and I paid for my education out of my own pocket but it’s not my responsibility to pay for those individuals who made a choice to take out loans to attend college. No more than it is my responsibility to pay for a car loan or a home loan for someone else that took out the loan with no plan on paying it back. And I think you are confusing personal responsibility with enabling.

                  If you want to help your fellow man, then find someone who has student loan debt and tap into that “bigger bank account” and write them a check every month directly. But don’t force anymore debt on folks like me because we already have to pay off enormous amounts of debt already….debts that were made and obligations forced on us without our consent.

            2. Trump still owes money to Sioux Falls.

               1. Then let Sioux Falls go after him for it.

   2. which middle class are you talking about? The median household income is about $80,000/year.
      That’s the middle class. Less than 7% of households in the US have annual incomes greater than $200,000. Biden’s plan is to have individuals making up to $125,000/ year, couples making $250,000/year, eligible for student loan forgiveness.
      If your household income is $250,000, you aren’t middle class.

      1. In most of the country, 100k to 200k per household is middle class. The majority of the recipients will be middle class. There is no sense throwing this out because a few who probably make at the higher end might get dollars even though they will likely have theirs paid off.

         1. in other words, anonymous at 9:01pm, middle class isn’t a matter of income, it’s a state of mind?

            No it doesn’t work that way. A household with an income of $80,000 is middle class. A household with an income of $200,000 is in the top 7%.

            Any metric which ranks you above the 90th percentile is considered exceptional: whether it’s your height, weight, test scores or income.

            My kids have student loans. If I want to help anybody pay off their loans, I’ll help them first. But they know better than to ask for that help.

2. On its face, I oppose it, too.

   There are university actors who have committed massive crimes against their students in my opinion.

   We have over 300,000 Chinese nationals in our universities as of earlier this year (that number is actually down).

   Some degrees – mostly technical – are being devalued through programs like H1B and EB5 and others, after congress sold students on the notion that they would protect the jobs that were in our economy for these graduates.

   A wholesale forgiveness of debt is not appropriate, but damage has been done. Those who caused the damage should pay for it.

   Start with Pelosi, Swallwell, and Feinstein.

   Disclosure: I grew up in many different slums, but mostly I grew up in a single-wide trailer with an addition with a very difficult (at times) home life. I perservered and graduated college twice with a Master’s from the nation’s top program. Because of my moral sensibilities, I found it difficult to advance in IT because every job I had required that I violate the constitution and law enforcement seemed impotent to do anything about it. Eventually, I was pressed-out and black balled (supposedly illegal, and again .. where is LE?). As a recipient of Pell Grants for my undergraduate degree, I’m in-line to receive $20,000 forgiveness, which doesn’t even touch the interest on my loans.

   I’m willing to consider that, as it states in the Arizona constitution, “[higher education should be as close to free as possible]”. Profiteering from education means human rights and privacy violations the likes of which usually precede an invasion (call it social recon).

   Get your heads in the game.

3. Sounds very republican, appealing to all those anti-education MAGA people who “already paid by muh loan”. However, she and those other 21 republican governors don’t mention that the existing law, the one already signed and what governed these loans will be forgiven and paid for by tax payers starting in the next few years. For example, one person goes to nurse practitioner school, they graduate with $150K in debt at %8.5 (the going rate for graduate loans). They make $100k a year, and $6K a year goes to that loan (after tax income based repayment), after 25 years, the nurse practitioner owes $265K, and it is forgiven and currently considered income. Nurse will have to find a new payment plan or loan to pay back about $50k. Taxpayers will still have to foot the bill for the $265K.

   1. “Sounds very republican, appealing to all those anti-education MAGA people who “already paid by muh loan”.”

      Makes you look like the typical holier than thou democrat…..oh wait, you are.

      1. It doesn’t take much to portray things in a divine light to the MAGA crowd, after-all they worship Donald Trump.

         Regardless, I could care less what political party you think I am. It may sound blasphemous to you, but I vote for both R’s and D’s, I pick the best candidate and ignore party. How about you, just a party line sheep?

4. When she pays back all the government relief money and farm subsidies that she and her family received then she would have the right to complain. Until then shut up.

5. When I graduated from the University in 1969, I had a student loan debt of $1,200. My first job paid $6,050. As I recall, my payment was $52 per month. I had a monthly payment of $100 on a $1,000 used car loan. It burned oil and blew up the month it was paid off. I had no health insurance and several bad teeth.I lived in an $90 apartment described as ” deplorable” by those who visited but I put throw rugs over the holes in the linoleum. Welcome to responsible adulthood. It didn’t prevent me from having a good time.

   I was a lucky baby boomer. There was plenty of opportunity. I also had several wonderful, patient employers and mentors. I have definitely “stood on the shoulders of others” throughout my professional life.

   I do not begrudge any young adult who participates in the student loan forgiveness program. I don’t begrudge any farmer receiving various government payments. We have a “cheap food policy” in this country, and any problems we have in the method of equitable distribution is not caused by the producer. Likewise, while I wonder at the breadth of its generosity, I do not begrudge those private businesses who benefited by PPP loans. We were all blindsided by the severity of the Covid epidemic.

   I’m pleased we can help out the next “great generation.”Besides, they are paying my Social Security and Medicaid.

   1. Student loan forgiveness is nothing but a vote buying scheme. With that being said:

      Please explain why responsible individuals who paid off their school loan debt shouldn’t be reimbursed, with interest. I am looking at retirement in a couple years and could use that money that paid those loans off over 25 years ago.

      So please, explain to me and the rest of those citizens why our bank accounts should not get reimbursed.

6. I agree with the Governor. So many grants and scholarships already exist for those who attend college or vocational school. This is just not needed.

7. The high interest rate charged for student loans was built into the Affordable Care Act as a funding mechanism. Obama promised there would be no new tax burden; the kids were going to pay for it. To keep the kids happy they were allowed to stay on their parents’ plans until age 26. This clearly was a benefit designed to placate the college students who would get the bills later.

   The student loan revenues are needed to pay the federal government’s promised share of Medicaid expansion. The petition circulators all seemed to be college-aged kids, explaining that if we expand Medicaid here the federal government will pay 90% of the cost. I never encountered a circulator who understood where that money would come from. I told one “YOU are going to pay for it.” He stared back, blankly.

   Blathering about helping your fellow man is rather pointless, under the circumstances. If you have to choose between student loan forgiveness or Medicaid expansion, which one do you want?

8. Yes Ann, one generation pays for the previous generation. I paid my parents Social Security, Medicaid, veteran’s benefit, and rent subsidy in their sunset years.
   They lived through the depression, spent four years as a combat infantryman in World War II, and sacrificed their immediate needs for me and my brother and sisters.

   The Generation following mine, now in their 30’s and 40s are paying the Social security and Medicaid of the first Baby Boomers. It is a tall order but they do it. We are in our 60’s and 70’s. We have left them several messy problems to solve. Our parents despite living in the greatest boom time ever of the US economy, the 50’s and 60’s, did likewise. They will do likewise. We will plod on. It is a great Country. You’ve got to love it.

   1. in 2014 when my mother was 90 she received a survey call and was asked how concerned she was about the national debt.
      She surprised the caller by saying she wasn’t concerned at all.

      “It’s my kids’ problem,” she explained.

      I now get young people telling me I should vote for socialist ideas and when I say no,I have actually been told my opinion doesn’t count because “you’re old and going to die soon.”

      That’s true. I’m not going to be around to pay for these things, my descendants will.

      I suppose I could add an “I told you so” clause to my will.

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