While the race for the Democratic and
Republican presidential nominations remains an early and crowded one, the
Student Loan Ranger thought it might be a good time to start getting an idea of
where some of the candidates stand on student debt.
We're glad to see that so many
candidates are making student debt a priority this early in the race, because
it is usually an issue that candidates don't take a public position on until
the general election. Since there are almost too many hopefuls to count right
now, we'll just focus on the current top two from each party.
Hillary Clinton
Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton
rolled out her higher education plan, called The New College Compact, this past
August. The plan can be summed up by a quote from a speech she gave in New
Hampshire the day it was officially released: "No family and no student
should have to borrow to pay tuition at a public college or university,"
Clinton said. "And everyone who has student debt should be able to finance
it at lower rates."
The plan isn't so much about new
ideas, but about picking and choosing from policy proposals currently being
batted around by both sides of the aisle. Therefore, it seems to hit some
liberal as well as conservative notes.
To reduce future student debt, Clinton
proposes offering grants to states that reinvest in and work with their public
colleges to allow students to attend with a minimal, wage-based contribution
and no debt. Community colleges would be completely tuition free.
Existing student loans would see a
significant decrease in interest rates and simplification of the current myriad
of income-driven repayment options. The plan would also encourage higher
college completion rates, require college accreditors to require more flexible
and robust education methods and require colleges whose students are unable to
reasonably repay their loans to contribute to a program that supports schools
that serve low-income students.
The $350 billion price tag may prove
to be one of the most controversial parts of the plan. Clinton proposes this be
paid for with tax adjustments for the wealthy.
Ben Carson
While Clinton's proposals focus on
increasing funds for higher education assistance, Republican candidate Dr. Ben
Carson has somewhat of an opposite view. His solution for paying for college
comes in the form of existing Pell Grant funding and, as he noted during a 2014
interview, "there is a four letter word that works extremely well, it's
called w-o-r-k, work."
In a more recent interview, he expands
his position to say that while student loans are OK, their interest rates are
not. He says that schools should carry part of the responsibility of student
loan debt by paying for the interest on the loans for the students they enroll.
In a more official statement on
education, Carson criticizes the federal Department of Education, but unlike
other Republican candidates who have called for it to be eliminated, Carson
would like to use the department to "monitor our institutions of higher
education for extreme political bias and deny federal funding if it
exists."
Bernie Sanders
Also currently at the top of the
Democratic hopeful list, Bernie Sanders's position on higher education debt
mirrors some of the issues that Clinton is pushing for, but goes a step
further. He too calls for free higher eduation by requiring public colleges and
universities to meet the financial need of the "lowest-income
students."
Under this plan, low-income students
would use state, federal and institutional aid to cover tuition, living and
other expenses. He would also like to see an increase in federal aid programs,
on his campaign website specifically calling to "more than triple the
federal work-study program to build valuable career experience that will help
them after they graduate."
Sanders's website doesn't expand on
this statement, but this could be interpreted to mean that more students would
have the ability to work for their aid money, rather than receive it in the
form of loans or straight grants. Sanders' position on these other programs
remains unclear, but he's also a proponent of lowering interest rates on both
future and existing student loans. He suggests paying for all of this with a
new tax on people he calls Wall Street speculators.
Donald Trump
While Republican hopeful Donald Trump
hasn't issued an official plan regarding student loans, he has made one of his
views pretty clear. In a July interview with The Hill, Trump said, "That's
probably one of the only things the government shouldn't make money off – I
think it's terrible that one of the only profit centers we have is student
loans."
While Trump has never outlined his
plans to change that, what's most surprising about this statement, one he
repeated in a Twitter chat last month, is that it's one espoused by arguably
one of the most liberal politicians out there – Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth
Warren.
TAGS: education student loans students
paying for college debt financial aid colleges Carson, Benjamin Clinton,
Hillary Sanders, Bernie Trump, Donald
+ More
Betsy Mayotte, director of regulatory
compliance for American Student Assistance, regularly advises consumers on
planning and paying for college. Mayotte, who received a B.S. in business
communications from Bentley College, is a frequent contributor to ASA's SALT
Blog; responds to public inquiries via the advice resource "Just
Ask;" and is frequently quoted in traditional and social media on the
topics of Educational loan
and financial aid.
No comments:
Post a Comment