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A comment on Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges. Parent comment

Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by tw04 on Tuesday March 20, 2018 @06:15PM (#16633256)
There are better ways to counteract that. Off the top of my head - if you declare bankruptcy to evict student loans, you are ineligible for retirement account contributions like IRA and 401ks for the 7-10 year window. Additionally you take a 5% tax increase for the duration of that window.
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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by woolvalley on Tuesday March 20, 2018 @06:49PM (#16633524)
Not allowing people to put money in retirement accounts just means the govt has to support those people that much more when they get to old age, instead of them supporting themselves and getting tax revenue from the withdrawal.

And a %5 tax increase sounds like a pretty good deal. For most people it's going to be $25-$50k total, and you have no bill due when your unemployed.

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by lovich on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @01:32AM (#16635726)
I don't know if it wouldn't work out better for everyone but the lender. People paying student onerous student loans, like myself, already aren't putting money into retirement accounts because the banks are taking it all.

If I could just cut out student loan payments the money would go towards paying down any outstanding debt or towards buying a house/condo which would help me not need support in retirement. The tax advantaged retirement funds are nice but many people with student loan debt it's like telling them they have won't have to pay taxes on any yachts they buy. Technically nice, but practically useless

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by scythe on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @03:24AM (#16636169)
Being on the government dole in the US is not an outcome anyone would plan for. You're lucky if you can heat your apartment (if you even have your own) and eat processed cheese on what you'd be getting.

Also, many (most?) student debts are less than $25k, and unpayable huge debts should never have been approved in the first place. The latter clause is the whole point of this anyway.

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by gdix on Tuesday March 20, 2018 @07:25PM (#16633782)
> if you declare bankruptcy to evict student loans, you are ineligible for retirement account contributions like IRA and 401ks for the 7-10 year window.

That's something that a large percentage of people do anyway. What a strange and poorly-thought-out suggestion.

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by lightbyte on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @09:36AM (#16637854)
It's also a sure fire way for the public to have to spend even MORE on social programs since you'll be even more likely to reach retirement with zero money.

What good could possibly come from intentionally banning someone from saving for retirement?

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by kirykl on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @12:53AM (#16635570)
This is somewhat the case in a chapter 13 bankruptcy. You generally can’t contribute to a retirement savings during the 5 years of the bankruptcy
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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by romwell on Tuesday March 20, 2018 @06:57PM (#16633578)
>Off the top of my head - if you declare bankruptcy to evict student loans, you are ineligible for retirement account contributions like IRA and 401ks for the 7-10 year window. Additionally you take a 5% tax increase for the duration of that window.

Why don't we just do that for everyone, and make higher education free. This works for the absolute majority of students. Provide an opt-out for the few that can pony up the cash up front.

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by charlesdm on Tuesday March 20, 2018 @08:01PM (#16633988)
You could probably turn education free by reducing the defence budget by a few percentage points.

One of the reasons I'm happy to be European. Education is free in most countries. It makes no sense to burden young people with a load of debt when starting out.

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by eadmund on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @06:05AM (#16636728)
> You could probably turn education free by reducing the defence budget by a few percentage points.

According to https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=75, in the 2014–2015 school year U.S. colleges & universities spent $536 billion; the 2014 defense budget was $526.6 billion[0]. We could spend our entire defense budget and still not cover our higher education bill.

[0] http://comptroller.defense.gov/Portals/45/Documents/defbudge...

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by zolthrowaway on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @09:16AM (#16637725)
>U.S. colleges & universities spent $536 billion

I'm not sure this is the best number to use. This is what is currently spent, it is not how much we would need to provide a free higher level education option. The entire department of education budget is 70 billion [0]. Using Pennsylvania as a baseline, they have approximately 185 million planned for public education[1]. Let's round that to 200mil and multiply it by 50. This gives us a ballpark spending of 100 billion at the state level. So let's approximate 170 billion spent on K-12 and higher education last year.

We were able to fund our entire K-12 system and give money to public universities for under half that 536 billion figure. So yes, we may not be able to cover our current higher education bill with the defense budget. However, what we are currently doing is not the best or cheapest system. Someone could definitely come up with a free higher education proposal for half of that 536 billion figure. The system needs reformed badly. Everyone knows the costs of higher education are out of control. Using it as the baseline isn't fair IMO.

[0] https://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/index.html [1] https://www.governor.pa.gov/governor-wolf-reaffirm-commitmen...

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by rdtsc on Tuesday March 20, 2018 @11:18PM (#16635090)
It's a double whammy as they say in US because, students that can't find a job are both liable for student debt and also have to pay for health insurance.
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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by cvwright on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @05:30PM (#16642607)
That's easy to do, when the US pays for your defense.
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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by beamatronic on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @01:30AM (#16635715)
Your ideas are intriguing and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by umanwizard on Tuesday March 20, 2018 @08:35PM (#16634193)
In countries where higher education is free, it’s either much cheaper per student, or a way lower fraction of the population goes, or both.

Europe can afford free education because it isn’t American-style education.

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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by romwell on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @08:19PM (#16644003)
My sentiment was that most students will probably gladly take this very stringent option over what we have now. I surely would have.
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Re:Chinese Companies Are Buying Up Cash-Strapped U.S. Colleges by umanwizard on Thursday March 22, 2018 @12:13AM (#16645670)
I would too! I just think it’s important to understand that “free college” is only half the story and to recognize maturely that you’re making tradeoffs.
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