President Pivot has hit the road to push some sort of making college affordable plan, which, let’s face it, isn’t about making college more affordable, it’s about Obama’s flagging approval numbers and Obama doing what Obama does best: giving speeches and Blaming Others, creating strawmen, and ginning up conflict
(Bloomberg) Colleges’ exploitation of young Americans through rapidly rising and increasingly exorbitant fees is a national scandal that can no longer be ignored. In his college tour this week, President Barack Obama is speaking at length about what he intends to do about it, after promising “tough love†on higher education for the last two years.
Some of what he proposes is good in principle; some is very bad. (snip)
The president’s proposal has one very bad idea: a forgiveness boon for those paying off loans right now. The proposal, limiting loan payments to 10 percent of income, potentially relieves millions of students from repaying part of their obligation. So why not major in fields the economy values least — anthropology or drama instead of engineering or math — if you don’t have to worry about earning enough to pay off your student loans over a certain period? (snip)
Obama proposes to ignore or worsen the root cause of much of the explosion in student costs: the federal financial assistance programs that encourage schools to raise costs and that haven’t achieved their goals of providing college access to low-income Americans.
Two recent studies highlight the problem. First, the National Center for Education Statistics released data suggesting that federal college financing is growing rapidly. Now 84 percent of full-time undergraduate students get some aid. Average grant assistance for dependent full-time undergraduate students (unmarried, younger than 24) was $10,600 in 2011-12, up 34 percent in just four years — four times the inflation rate.
Let us not forget that Obamacare included what is essentially a federal takeover of all student loans, so much of the problem Obama is complaining about is due to….Obama and his signature legislation.
I do have to wonder, Team Obama says this is a good deal for the middle class. Apparently he doesn’t care about poor people wanting to go to college. Of course, there are issues with the rising cost of college which need to be addressed. Of course, what’s the point of a college education if there are no decent jobs out there?
