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[Icky Thump]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Free community college, particularly for certifications for trades, is a great policy, and one we should follow.

But it doesn't aid the guy who's already put in the hard sweat equity, and perhaps paid for his schooling for his certification, and taken on the risk of bank loans to start his business. He's left to wonder, along with most of the rest of us, why a certain slice of kids who happened through the system at the right time (when college debt forgiveness became a hot button issue) get a discharge, while he does not.

And as one who supports college debt forgiveness in principle (not really principle, but more as an economic policy that will aid the economy by strengthening would-be consumers) I don't have a compelling answer to that critique.

The only way to do college debt forgiveness fairly would be to make it available to all graduates from now on going forward, and give a commensurate tax benefit to all individuals who did not go to college.

The real conversation IMO involves finding a way to compel academia to run itself like a real business. Currently, it has no skin in the game. However poorly it polices costs, however profligately it spends, a new pipeline of student loan money refills its coffers each fall. Clawbacks are necessary, as is taxation of endowments, at a minimum, but they're just a small fraction of a much broader necessary overhaul of higher education.

Or make it free school for people who take a job there's no candidates for.

But the problem with advertising free bailouts/school for on set of people, is the other set will just vote for leopards who eat faces out of spite.