Student Debt Book Review

Words: 1303
Pages: 6

Americans are pushed towards college their entire life. Elementary, middle, and high school teachers around the nation promise their students that college is a surefire route towards success. While walking down the halls of their schools, students will notice advertisements lining the walls for different universities and scholarships, further pushing them towards college. Furthermore, there exists a social stigma for those young men and women who decide not to attend college immediately after their high school graduation. Many of these sentiments are correct, or, at least, made in good faith. After all, with an incredibly competitive job market, college is one of the few ways for young Americans to give themselves the edge they need to secure …show more content…
Many Americans – especially those from older generations or wealthy backgrounds – have little empathy for those experiencing the heavy burden of student debt. If those individuals had a firm grasp on the quality of life and overall tribulations that borrowers experience, perhaps, they would develop sympathy and recognize the importance of government action regarding student debt. In the preface to Student Loan Scam: The Most Oppressive Debt in U. S. History and How We Can Fight Back, Alan Collinge outlines his own personal experience with debt that inspired him to become a “...crusader for student loan justice.” Collinge describes how, while earning three degrees, he accumulated about fifty thousand dollars of debt. After consolidating his loans with a company called Sallie Mae, Collinge was quickly beginning to realize that, due to crooked federal laws and exploitative practices on the part of Sallie Mae, the odds were not in his favor. He resorted to quitting his job in hopes of finding one with higher pay, while his debt is only increasing due to high interest rates. All this spiraled into, what he describes, “a web of debt, the amount of which was now so far above what [he] had initially borrowed that it meant, in effect, a lifetime of indentured servitude.” This encapsulates why debt relief and forgiveness is so essential. No mistake makes someone deserve such a low quality of life, especially not if said mistake is pursuing a deeper education. Because of this, it simply does not matter if student loan forgiveness is exactly the best solution, or if it potentially fuels government overspending. The situation is dire, and people like Collinge desperately need