Bernie Sanders on Student Debt Forgiveness | Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO)

Our college education system today is just another example of what happens when money becomes the driving force behind what used to be a practically nonprofit mentality. Colleges today are less about educating students and more about making money.

“‘Giveaway’ is your term, not my term.” Classic Bernie, right out of the gate.

Most American colleges in 2023 are football programs that run some classes as a side hustle.

I've worked for the same Fortune 500 company for 13 years. I've increased 4 pay grades. I bring home less this year than I did 2 years ago due to rising healthcare costs.

I graduated 10 years ago, owing $46,000. For the last ten years I have paid $400-$600 per month, never missed or had a late payment. I could have paid more, but life, kids, house, all the things. I have a great job at one of the Big 4, and due to my diligence and building great credit, I was able to refinance my govt. rate of 7% to 3.1%. 10 years of on-time payments equaling around $52,000. $6,000 more than I originally borrowed. I still owe $41,000. This is why the system is broken. If someone runs on a platform of putting a cap on the interest, they would have my vote.

In 1967 when I started college my cost for a semester, including dorm, meal ticket, tuition and books was $550 at Jacksonville State University in Alabama. Fours years of that would be $4,400. That was 56 years ago (your freshman year in college is going to 56 years ago before you know it and then you can relate...) but even if we multiply that by a factor of 10, it would be $44,000 for a bachelor's degree. Today, according to the Internet, it is $9840 for tuition, $3610 for double occupancy residence halls and $2135 for meal tickets for a total of $15,585 per year or $62,340 for four years. Your research may give somewhat different totals but that is 14.17 times the rate 56 years ago. When I graduated I started working as a contractor for NASA in Huntsville, AL at $125 per week - amazing, huh... and I was doing great as the two bedroom, furnished apartment I moved into was $125 per month. Life was great and went straight up for me. But even at $125 per week starting salary (I got raises quickly...) that would be $6500 in the first year with no raises. So, nowadays after a person graduates from a state run college, can their starting salary be 1.48 times their total cost of a bachelor's degree, which would be (with rounding) $92,263? (we could live and eat somewhere besides a dorm and meal ticket but there is still a cost there that might be greater...) but ask yourself, who is loaning you the money for student loans (and soaking you with interest ranging from 3.73% to 6.28% according to the Internet - does anyone know math - or care? Our government makes $175,000,000,000 in profit off student loans per year) so that you can attend college? Add that interest on top of those student loans and you have a problem. If student loans were interest free, or a nominal fee, it would (help...) work out as good as it did 56 years ago - not quiet - but it would be much better. Lastly, attending college is a good thing but getting out of college, maybe even after a master's degree and having no experience isn't going to be a good starting salary. Lots to think about how our society and government has changed over these last six decades.

50 years to attend U of CA was virtually free. Now about 40k a year. Says it all

My loans were forgiven after I made payments for 15 years but I still paid more than I borrowed. Basically, I got some of my interest forgiven. 6.6% is crazy high for student loans.

That look of disbelief in regard to the poll and who conducted it is golden, on both their faces.

Colleges and universities should loan their OWN money and be on the hook for their defaulting students.

“Socialism is the government.” For someone who occasionally interviews socialists with books, Maher seems to do a good job of avoiding ever reading them

The problem is that college has become obscenely expensive. Most Universities could cut their budgets in half without sacrificing any quality of education. But if government starts using more taxpayer dollars to pay for college and forgive student debt there’s no incentive for the colleges to lower costs and the problem just gets worse

2:55 "I couldn't agree more," says Bill. Not at all what it sounded like up until then.

The problem is not student debt. It's about overpriced education.

I think it was actually Bill Maher who said this years ago about healthcare but the same applies here. "everyone just keeps arguing about who has to pay the bill but why is no one trying to figure out why the bill is so damn high?"

I hear all of this talk about “canceling student debt” but no one talking about the government getting out of the loan business. In 10 years we will be right back in this same situation.

You finally got someone on there that left you speechless.

My mother went to Cornell in the early 70s and I found one of her recipes for her tuition. It was under $300 for a semester. Now it's 10s of thousands. She worked a part time summer job to save up, then worked through college. She met Janis Joplin and organized travel for Carl Sagan. The Dead & Co is playing at Cornell soon for $50,000 for 10 tickets, it was $7.50 in 1977. How is it that inflation is so low, but things cost multiple times what they used to cost? Unless it isn't based in logic, but pulling as much money as they can.

One of the things I never hear someone talk about is the data on what jobs are going to require for people to work there. Were already at a point where 66% of new jobs require college education. That’s the big problem to me. People keep saying that you don’t need college but market trends are showing a push towards automation and jobs requiring more schooling. Unless that changes college is becoming more of a requirement meaning this debt is becoming more of a requirement. Jobs are not unlimited and most jobs are requiring college

College costs are high because we lack alternative options for meeting the growing demand for higher education. More entry-level jobs require college degrees nowadays, but our education system has not changed much since the mid-1900s. Blaming government intervention for rising tuition fees is simplistic and ignores the real problem.