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Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

The U.S. Department of Education can garnish up to 15% of your disposable pay (your net wages after legally required deductions like taxes). However, they must leave you with at least 30 times the federal minimum wage, which is currently $7.25 per hour, or $217.50 per week.

So, 15% for the rest of your life or until you can leave the country and are beyond their reach (if an option) if you cannot afford to pay them off. The reality for many is they will never have enough income potential to pay off this debt, so the best course of action is to bail on it to optimize for quality of life if you’ll never be able to pay it back. The developed world is hungry for young, educated talent.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/25/they-fled-the-country-to-esc...

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Your advice makes no sense. The developed world is not hungry for young "talent" who are only educated in fields with no market value. It's not as if German companies are desperate to hire a bunch of Americans with Art History degrees.

Just FYI, I stumbled upon this discussion the other day. This [1] is not the same source that was going around but states the same thing.

"STEM graduates, often hailed as the golden ticket to career success, are facing unemployment rates that might make you double-take. For instance, computer engineering majors are grappling with a 7.5% unemployment rate, while art history majors—yes, the ones often mocked for their “impractical” degrees—are sitting pretty at just 3%. What’s going on here?"

[1] https://capwolf.com/why-stem-grads-struggle-to-find-jobs-in-...

Other country’s citizens leave to avoid military service, Americans leave to…avoid student loan repayments. That’s sad.

If people leave your country because it sucks, that’s a governance problem, not a citizen problem. People are mobile, if they have options and can do better, they should take them. Life is short and you only live once. Debt is just accounting, it is a shared delusion like a currency.

We set these citizens up to fail, and they’re the bad guys? Hardly. If you can escape the torment nexus, go, don’t look back. The torment nexus does not care about you. “The purpose of the system is what it does.”

We've got a lot of governance problems. Our system allows college prices to get really high, mostly because 18 year kids can sign up for these guaranteed loans. They don't know what they are signing up for, and colleges just want students in seats. People don't know if their major has good employment prospects, avg salary and how that will affect their loan repayment.

America chose to do this, banks make big money from the loans. Colleges make big money from students.

We have a similar system with medical care. We have regulatory capture of our medical system by the drug sellers, medical groups, etc. We pay way way way more than other countries with worse outcomes. And the reaction of half the country, the republicans, it is we'll fix this by eliminating a lot of coverage for poor people. Democrats try to control costs, cover more poor people, get on a better trajectory and it's demonzied as destroying democracy. Meanwhile, our recently passed BBB bill takes billions out of medicare, ie coverage for poor people, many of whom voted for Trump. This whole thing is disgusting. I'm angry because of the loss of potential here, just like for student debt.

My dad says colleges are corrupt because they "waste money on dei things" and that's why they have high costs (sadly not making this up). I try to explain college is not subsidized like it used to be when you went to college in the 60s. Similar thing with young people not affording housing, not having kids as much.

Oh boy it actually gets so much worse than you mention. If you have W2 income the cost of college is uniquely high to _you_. Very wealthy people who claim a business loss on their tax returns (through the massive spiderweb of itemized deductions) college, even ivy leagues, are free or almost free.

Bullshit. FAFSA covers assets as well as income so wealthy families with zero taxable income aren't getting need-based financial aid. Unless they lie on the application, which is criminal fraud.

Sorta. You exclude your primary residence, retirement funds, and any college savings accounts. I def know people with millions in the first two, retired, with their kids getting full rides and food stamps.

Not bullshit at all, there are loopholes riddled throughout the FAFSA system that allows assets to be tucked away out of scope. It’s not fraud, all completely legal and purpose-built to support the types of families who can afford a financial advisor on retainer.

I mean yeah, nothing about my statement disagrees with your point.

If people enter your country because it's the greatest country in the world, that's a governance success. The USA has it's share of problems and there are things we should do to reduce education costs. But overall the USA has a positive net migration rate with every other major country. People are coming here for a reason.

It's not sad, it's just a story. The number of Americans who actually emigrate to skip out on student debt is virtually zero.

like I'm sure it happens, but its trivial in terms of overall impact.

immigrating to another country, even as an American with an in-demand degree, is not easy.

Are you implying people are intentionally making less than $217 a week after taxes to avoid student debt payments?

That seems like a losing strategy, like shooting yourself in the face to save your foot.

I mean, there's millions of people with student debt - there's bound to be a few edge cases, but that really isn't relevant.

Are you also implying that it's non-edge case to say, oh, I'll just not pay my student loans and then leave my country?

Why would that be any more an option than people doing that for credit card debt?

I mean, sure, there's some very small percentage in some table factored into the interest rate.

Everyone else is either paying or getting their wages garnished (unless something in the future changes).

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