Am I a fool? I have never thought to ask myself that question. You see, until now, I was under the delusion that personal responsibility, honoring commitments, and sacrifice were admirable traits, but in Joe Biden’s America, clearly, I am a fool!
Why? Because I took out student loans to pay for my education and (gasp) paid them back 18-months after graduation.
I remember the day my “paid in full” letter arrived in the mail. It was a great feeling of accomplishment. The letter confirmed I had paid off approximately $15,000 in student loans only 18 months after graduating from UNC Chapel Hill. It was truly a proud moment.
It certainly was not easy. After college, I moved back home with my parents to save money. I drove a 23-year-old Honda Accord with no air conditioning. In the summer, I left my house early every morning so I could change out of sweaty clothes before going into my job.
For the first 18-months after graduation, everything I earned went to paying off my loans, everything. My goal was to become debt free, buy a car, and then move into my own place. I took pride in achieving this goal, especially in such a short period of time.
What once made me proud, now makes me feel foolish. Apparently, I should have made the minimum payment on my student loans and enjoyed my life. I could have bought a car with working AC, traveled, and got my own place sooner instead of suffering the embarrassment of living with my parents. Those 18-months would have been a lot more fun if I had decided to wait and let my student loan be someone else’s problem, but that’s not me.
From an early age, I expected I would attend college and I knew I would be paying for it. While I graduated from one of the top universities in the country, my first two years were spent at a community college. Like many students, I worked all four years of college to pay my expenses. Since I was paying for school, I kept costs low so when I graduated, I didn’t have a mountain of debt starring me in the face.
Silly me. I should have charged everything and had fun.
Many people across this country sacrificed a lot more than I did to earn a college degree, while others skipped college and went straight to a job. Those who did get a student loan to attend college are doing quite well. According to the University of Pennsylvania Wharton Budget Model, sixty-nine percent of the beneficiaries under Biden’s debt cancelation plan are in the top 60% of income earners. This includes lawyers, doctors, and other high-income professions, which makes sense since more than 50% of student loan debt is held by individuals who earned a graduate level degree.
President Joe Biden’s “please vote for Democrats in November” plan is just another way we, the American people, whether you went to college or not, are being bribed with our own money to vote for the party of unicorns and fairies. Democrats seem to be living in a world where the law of economics don’t apply, and everything is free.
Alexis De Tocqueville said, “the American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that is can bribe the public with the public’s money.” This is not the first instance where Americans have been bribed with their own money and it won’t be the last. But the reality is the debt must be paid by someone. The Biden Administration is unwilling to tell Americans the truth — it’s you and me.
America really is the land of opportunity. A great country that will allow an individual to earn a college degree, get a high-paying career, and make other people pay for it. Sure the “rich” will be paying for it, but so will the minimum wage worker at McDonald’s, the garbage man down the street, and the store clerk who is living paycheck-to-paycheck.
Why are non-college educated workers being asked to pay off student loans for an individual earning $100,000 a year? That’s a great question and one we should be asking our President, Mr. Biden.