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Comment by xhkkffbf | Hacker News Reader

The debts are huge, but forgiving them is not the answer. If the debt is so toxic, why is the US government still creating new loans that are just as big or even larger? And why are the colleges still forcing their students into the same debt?

The right solution would be to halt the lending entirely.

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Why not both? Damage has already been done and hurt a bunch of people, but student loan reform is also needed.

Although not sure about halting it entirely. Imposing price limits on tuition and/or loans should be sufficient.

We should do both. However, the Dem leadership are not interested in doing both, they only want the quick and easy win (which turned out to be neither).

I don't think stopping lending is the answer. Stopping government guaranteed loans and undischargable debt is a better answer. I have no issue with private lending.

The guaranteed loans skew the market. They are a big banner to schools saying the government will pay you with tax dollars if you can get the loan qualifying kids to register. And, that is exactly what they did.

Schools should have some skin in the game. If one of their former students defaults (regardless of whether they graduated or not) then the school should have to eat part of the cost. This would help to hold down tuition, and force them to be more responsible about admitting students who are unlikely to succeed.

That doesn't help the people who are already hurting by this though.

It's the same idea as the PPP loans -- for people who are struggling to make payments, this would have been incredibly helpful.

It's two separate issues.

Helping the people who are hurting is profoundly unfair to the people who spent within their means. I know plenty of people who didn't go to a fancy college because they couldn't afford them. Mercy to the free spending debtors is also an insult to the careful ones who kept within their budget.

The right solution in my opinion would be to nationalize the universities and end this predatory nonsense.

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