But now this thought occurred to me: how can a 20-something person go out and start a company (as I often read on stories here on HN), leaving on zero or little income for a while (until you find investors, I guess), when I'd expect people to need a steady income to at least go even with the monthly loan payments?
Short answer: they never had personal financial hardship to begin with.
There's always exceptions, but the most frequent trait among young startup founders is that they have a great financial situation with their family and can always fall back on that if they fail.
If you want to enable the free market, you have to remove the barriers.
Since when is that a right-wing thing? Employer-provided healthcare started as a result of (left-wing) price controls. And Obama and a Democratic congress purposely avoided that issue when they "reformed" healthcare.
Second, left-wing price controls did not start the current healthcare model, empty hospitals beds, profit-based medicine, the great depression and WWII created employer-based healthcare [0].
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1140451...
You described special interests, not right-wing capitalists. Special interests including people who would be confused then upset about losing their employer-provided healthcare.
> left-wing price controls did not start the current healthcare model
Sure it did, at least as the employer involvement is concerned. FDR froze wages, so employers provided other benefits, like company cars and free healthcare.
I'm not saying there's a clean way to get there (keeping employers and healthcare separate) from here (the current mess). But it's not a right-wing conspiracy or something.
Also, I fail to see the difference between special interests and capitalists. They may not be right-wing capitalists, but the folks who run Blue Cross, Anthem and Harvard Pilgrim sure as hell didn't want a public option anywhere close to the finished ADA legislation, and they paid big money to make sure that happened.
But either way, something has to give, because health insurance and for-profit corporations are an oxymoron. When you're for-profit and offer insurance, that makes your primary operating procedure to charge as much as you can for the least amount of service.
We love to praise those who take risks, but it's probably not that much of a risk for most job creators.
I'm certain that there are thousands in a similar situation. People are starting to recognize that the crippling debt is having a negative impact. See first-time home buyers average age.
(recent college grad)
It's not just starting a company, it's living life.
How can they travel for a year or to understand more about the world as-is so common with 20-somethings from other parts of the world (Aust, NZ, UK, South Africa, Isreal etc.)?
How can they pursue their passion of painting or learning the guitar?
How can they volunteer in the local community to help others?
How can they do anything other than put their nose to the grindstone?
They can't. They're trapped.
Before they've paid off their student loans it's likely they'll have a car loan, a house loan and eventually even have some kids, meaning they'll miss out on all of the above because of their crippling student debt that took away their options.
I wish that were so. The thing about defaulting on student loans means you don't get car loans, home loans, or interest from members of the opposite sex.
Late GenX. Defaulted. It's paid in full now. So is the only car I've ever owned. I won't own a home unless I can pay for it in full. (Probably never at current prices) I'll never have kids. Too old. It's biological.
After wage garnishment, having my tax returns seized, calls at all hours in all places from debt collectors... I'm too debt averse to loan money for anything else. I have no debt now and I will stay that way.
They always have options.
They choose not to take them, but they have the options.
Not accepting responsibility for those choices is the 100% guaranteed way to make sure it keeps happening.
Entrepreneurs in my social circles generally had personal expense floors in the $1k to $2k region when they started inclusive of student loans; most handled it with either freelancing or working while beginning their companies.
If one borrowed $100k and desires to work for a long period of time without receiving income, I would observe that "income-contingent repayment plans" are a thing and would ask, in trade for this advice, that one take opportunities to tell younger people to make good life choices with regards to fields of study and career paths given one's hard-won experience on the matter.
I always look at my massive student loan debt and think, "what would it have been like if I had just taught myself programming for four years instead of paying people to teach it to me?"
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-21/if-your-pa...
"If Your Parents Are Still Paying Your Bills, You're Not Alone"
I hope you learned theory and underlying principles, as well as experienced the life that is pretty unique to college.
As for the life that was pretty unique to college, it wasn't really for me. I enjoy having a job and working much more than I did studying, taking tests, and going to parties.
It's made worse by the fact that you are dependent on your employer for health care.
Worst case scenario: your wages are garnished due to student loans that cannot be forgiven (bankruptcy not allowed), while your health issues are going unaddressed (with varying levels of long-term consequence).
Interestingly enough, they can't garnish my contractor work because I don't have an employer (and you also don't pay you SE taxes ahead of time).
It's a terrible idea to pursue that too far (or at all), of course; you really can't discharge these debts by any means other than paying them. So while it's possible to put off paying these loans and I've done it for periods of time, I still pay off my loans, not out of a love of banks but out of a sense of self preservation :D
http://qz.com/455109/entrepreneurs-dont-have-a-special-gene-...
Alternatively, one can spend a few decades saving money and then try something on one's own. Very far from optimal, but it's all some people can do.
Comments like this may be well-intended but do not provide advice which is useful for people without certain forms of economic privilege and may be perceived as insulting to people without certain forms of economic privilege who did, indeed, go out and start companies.
Are you one of these people?
If not, you shouldn't be speaking for them.
For some reason, Americans don't seem to realize when they are being taken advantage of?
I see these guys gallantly paying off the hospital bills. When I tell them the prices they pay are literally 10x more than an entity with collective bargaining power pays; I get this Amercan pride bs. "I--always pay off my debts!". Companies/government counts on this mindset, and exploit it when the opportunity arrives.
Most Americans are in dead end jobs, unemployed, or working a part time, below minimum wage, sharing economy job. You wouldn't know it looking at these posts.
Americans are also prone to making a bad situation look good. See in America, a lot of our sexual self-worth is tied to how much money, and power we have, especially after the beauty wears off. Some of us--pretty up the picture--in order to find a suitable mate. It works differently for females, but that's changing too. And people wonder why Americans take so many drugs?
As to starting a company. Well let's just say a wealthy dad, on one side of the family, is one of the biggest secrets to success in the United States. Of course, no one like to admit just how much dad helps, but almost every success story I have seen involves a sympathetic family member. It's usually dad. He knows just how hard it was to get started in your twenties, if you come from that family?
If I knew what I know now, I would have high tailed it to Europe right out of high school. I was told to give France a shot, but didn't believe anyone in my twenties.
You are not missing anything, on any level by living in Europe! Including your social life. These are just my opinions. I'm sure you will hear a litany of Horatio Alger's who "made it" on their own in opposition to my post.