Opinion | Student loan forgiveness is a terrible Idea

Like so many issues, this one was unmoored from common sense early on, and has remained so.  Here is what I mean.  

Owning a home is something that many aspire to.  For good reasons — rooted in economics, wealth building, and emotional satisfaction. And at a price.  In money, and the months and years required to earn it.  For many, that investment in a better life is worth it.  But not for all. When the costs are too high or the mortgage payments too onerous the home — and the investment — are lost.  

Simple.  Basic.  Uncomplicated by the lens of race, gender, or ethnicity.  An adult decides to buy a home.  Knowing the costs and benefits in advance.  Which — good, bad, or indifferent — are then borne by that adult. 

There is an important underlying rationale here.  You are rewarded — or not — by the decisions that you make.  Not mine.  Not my neighbor’s.  Yours.  

People generally refer to it as individual responsibility.  But it is much more than that.  It is the foundation upon which our society — properly constituted — rests.  I don’t get arrested when you speed.  You don’t pay taxes on my income.  My child isn’t disciplined for your child’s misbehavior.  Your child doesn’t graduate from middle school based on my child’s study habits. 

So, too, with financing a college education.  An adult decides to invest in him or herself.  For good reasons — rooted in economics, wealth building, and emotional satisfaction.  The price is money and the months and years required to earn it.  For many, this is a good decision.  But not for all.  Some people who go to college are not suited for it and either drop out of get very little in return.  Others face unforeseen difficulties and have to delay or even end their effort at self-improvement.

Granting relief from a payment owed can be a good or a bad thing.  Like just about everything, it depends.  When it comes from the government, however, it is imposed upon, and comes, from us.  From you and me.  Which — as applied to student debt — is a circle that I cannot square.  

It is one thing to require me to subsidize a person’s healthcare, because illness is not a choice.  It is quite another, however, to require me to fund the decision of adults who decided to invest in themselves to increase their earning potential.  Unless, of course, we are prepared to say that you are only accountable for your decisions when they work out.  And unaccountable when they don’t.  

Put aside for a moment the notion that servicing $10,000, or $20,000 in student debt is “crushing” anyone in a world where you can’t buy a new car for less than $35,000.  Or how better served our society would be if the $400 billion to $500 billion wasted in this way were better used to help millions (or even tens of millions) of Americans actually better themselves.  Or that this windfall to some at the expense of others would fuel inflation and increase our $31 trillion debt. 

Instead, consider this.  There is a lot of student debt in the United States.  There is a lot of mortgage debt, too.  No progressive Democrat has identified a principled reason for distinguishing between them.  And yet, we hear the same familiar voices — of Elizabeth Warren, who leveraged the fiction of her Native American heritage into a career, and of Bernie Sanders, who at the age of 81 has yet to hold his first real job – baying for “justice” on this issue.  Joined now by President Biden, who is all-in on this.   

So, Elizabeth, Bernie and Joe, please explain to me why we shouldn’t also forgive mortgage debt?  

They have no rational answer.  Only empty platitudes unconnected to a defensible rationale.  Under the rubric of what has become that most tired of American phrases — “social justice” — we are told we must now treat responsible adults as irresponsible children.  While requiring us to (at least in part) deny our own children the fruits of our own labor. 

Yes, there is an argument that college tuition is unaffordable, making higher education unavailable to many. But that very difficult, and real, problem has no application here.  Students who owe debt now have already accessed higher education. It was not unavailable to them.  They just want us to pay for it.

The basic concept of individual responsibility is not a tag line.  It embodies the progress we have made as a society and is the core value that gives us agency over our own lives.  

Life is often hard, and rarely fair. Success does not always come to those who deserve it.  But it almost never comes to those who do not persevere. This is less about another unjustifiable handout, and more about who we are.  And what we should aspire to be. 

Forgiveness includes pardoning the transgressions of others.  So understood, President Biden’s all-in approach to student debt is not unforgivable.  He is still better than the alternative.  But this is not leadership. And he is not leading.  

Andrew Leven lives in Riverhead. He is a Democratic Party candidate for Riverhead Town Board this year.

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