Student loans

Today's post will be a ranting diatribe about the spiraling costs of higher education and student loans. Why? Just because it strikes my fancy at the moment and because I am one of those individuals saddled with a tremendous amount of student loans from my years of higher education. And because there is an article in the NYTimes about the rising costs of higher education.

Back in the 1990's, I remember going off to college and signing a lot of paperwork to finance my education. At the time, I did not give it much thought on how much I would need to pay for college. I did not care that I would be saddling future me with a huge debt that at times feel like the size of the national debt. The process was painless and easy. The loan paperwork was already pre-filled in with my information. All I had to do was sign them and promise my first born child. No sweat.

It was not until years later, when with my liberal arts education, I realized I had been screwed by my student loans. Now don't get me wrong. The education was valuable. It just wasn't that valuable. Having you ever done the math on how much the student loans are costing you? Let's start with the basics. I took out the max every year in stafford loans as a dependent child. That comes out to 2625 + 3500 + 5500 + 5500 in stafford loans, or 17125 for those of you who are mathematically challenged like this liberal arts educated blogger. And another 6000 over 4 years for my Perkins loan. That comes out to 23125 in loans for my 4 year college education. Thank goodness I did not need another year because that would have made me poorer.

Of course, that did not stop me from getting another degree. Or the one after that. Nope, I'm all for getting more education. Suffice it to say, that mentality brought my student loans total to over 100,000 dollars. That would have bought me a decent sized apartment in NYC a number of years ago. Of course, now it doesn't even buy me a parking spot in Manhattan. But that's neither here nor there. Back to the topic at hand. I had over 100,000 dollars in student loans. You know what that means? It means I'm in debt up to my eyeballs. (Or I was a few years ago, but I've put a big dent into that amount.)

Getting back to the topic at hand. Lenders should not hand out loan money like candy. They need to educate students, actually kids, about the ramafications of their actions. It would have been nice to see a little graph or chart that says for every 10,000 I took out, I would have to pay 60 or 80 dollars a month depending on the interest. There should be a lot of BOLD FACED WRITING IN ALL CAPS to show the borrower of what they will be getting themselves into. So a 100,000 loan at 8% would come out to something like 800 dollars a month for the next 30 years. Yeah, you read that right, 30 freaking years. Kind of puts a damper on my plans for early retirement.

And schools should also do more to keep costs down. Why does tuition only go in one direction? Haven't schools heard the old cliche that what goes up must come down? I realize schools like to have shiny new facilities or world famous professors or gold plated toilets. But not at the cost of putting their students in the poor house. I mean, come on, how can we donate any money to you if we are buried in debt. All I can say is that I will not be in a charitable mood with a big student loan hanging around my neck. Lastly, schools need to do a better job of teaching their students about fiscal responsibility. If the schools cannot do it, at least teach their students how to do it.