Yes, I kinda can blame kids for being mad. Honestly? By 18 I would really think the majority of kids can make a reasonable, sane, and rational thought process. Maybe it's just because I was the type that went to community college for my basics - and then transferred to a reasonable state university and got a reasonable MIS business degree that was in high demand. Is it really that complicated? We're talking about kids that are the age of 18. You would have to have some severely mental issues if you can't ask yourself questions like "What do I want to do for the rest of my life - AND - will anyone pay me a high salary to do that?"
I just want to be clear that I'm not attempting to absolve the students of their role in this mess. Ultimately, it was their choice, and in some cases, it was a bad choice. (I want to touch back on that again in a bit.) What I do want to stress is that I don't think we should ignore the role that their educators, administrators or lawmakers played in creating this mess. The blanket push for attending college after secondary education was a huge mistake, and it became even worse as post-secondary education became the norm and employers started looking for degrees for positions that don't necessarily require it. (The much used example being secretarial positions.) In other words, where a high school diploma was once the goalpost for some positions, that's now college because that's the new "norm".
I wanted to get back to the idea of choice, and ultimately, critical thinking. To some degree, I think it would be interesting to see if making some aspects of life easier has ultimately pushed some kids toward an adolescent life that lacks the need for hard choices involving critical thinking, or just experiences in general that require critical thinking. It isn't even just life, but also schooling where standardized tests are the norm, and to ensure proper funding, teachers are pushed to teach for the tests. This can mean that critical thinking is pushed aside and rote memorization is taught in its place. This is really just me musing on the subject as I'm far from an expert in this area.
Also, one question that has been on my mind is... whose job is it to help prepare the kids for certain aspects of life? One thing I've wondered is why we push to teach kids math concepts such as trigonometry or calculus, but we ignore teaching the application of math in daily life? Why don't we take time out to teach kids the math of (compound) interest, APR, etc.? For example, show them how much money it will take to pay back an Xbox One purchased on a 23.99% APR when paid back at certain amounts. Back when I was in school, they took a day or two out of seventh grade math to teach writing cheques and balancing a ledger. Do they even teach home economics anymore? I know some people don't really agree with this, and to some degree, who teaches what becomes a matter of opinion. It may be related to how I went to school when we had Home Economics as a course.
Honestly, I still think that some kids are setup to fail. Fortunately, some of them are smart enough to begin with that they can see this and avoid it. However, that doesn't apply to all of them.
You are right in the debt process at least - I've mentioned this previously, but student loans should have nothing to do with my parent's income. It's pretty hilarious considering the fact that people that do have money have a higher probability of being more responsible (higher chance of paying back the loans). But instead our stupid system says that they are unqualified and instead take the most riskiest loan possible.
I agree. Parents should not be expected to pay for college, and their income should not be taken into account in regard to loans. I know someone who will say "I have three kids that need to go to college!", and my response is usually, "And...?" That's sort of a double-whammy of "they need to go to college" and "I need to pay for it". I don't think there's anything wrong if a parent wants to help their kid with college tuition, but the expectation is wrong.
Maybe we can use things like a Letter of Intent where a parent can declare to the lender that they do not intend upon paying toward the student's tuition?
IIRC,
@PricklyPete posted an article a few years ago, admin costs had risen 70% over a 5 year period. Plus some look like club med.
Why? Some can't explain the rationale for the student loan "no bankruptcy" exception, but others say it grew from a concern that student loan borrowers could take advantage of bankruptcy laws, borrow a bunch of debt, earn a degree and then file for bankruptcy.
So a few bad apples.....
I've always assumed that it was done to push lenders to be willing to give out more loans. The problem is that student loans lack any sort of tangible collateral unlike mortgages and such. So, with bankruptcy in the cards, lenders would likely be far, far more strict in giving out loans (arguably a good thing), or require collateral to be put up by a second party (parents, etc.).
The only problem is that by removing a lot of the risk from the loans, they're going a little too "Oprah" on them.