For the record, kids . . .

Before filling out that FAFSA

President Joe Biden is promising to forgive or reduce student loan debt, having already canceled $8.1 billion of it for roughly 145,000 workers in the public service and nonprofit sectors.

Now President Biden wants to forgive $10,000 in debt for up to 45 million borrowers. Is this nothing more than a naked play for votes? Sure. But it got us to thinking about the cost of higher education—and the returns on investment. Before a kid signs up to take all those student loans, he or she really needs to put pen to paper. Just so the now-18 year old getting ready for the fall semester won’t be surprised in about five years.

Let’s start here: One point on which all sides—from MAGA to AOC—can agree: Higher education, on the whole, is expensive. According to the Education Data Initiative, Arkansas federal student-loan borrowers owe less than the national average, but $13 billion in debts are still attached to 390,000 state residents. That represents about 13 percent of the state’s population and an average student loan debt of $33,000.

A snippet of those Arkansas borrowers—1.5 percent—individually owe more than $200,000.

As in any service industry, prices go up. But research from Georgetown reveals that the average price of tuition and fees plus room and board for an undergraduate degree increased 169 percent between 1980 and 2020 in the United States. (A 2008 study published in The Journal for Higher Education concluded that overhead was responsible for much of the increase in higher education costs. Professors must be paid, too.)

The upward trend in tuition and fees slowed over the past two years though, as the very model on which the traditional college experience was founded has been threatened by the lingering economic impact of covid.

In general, earning a college degree remains an expensive proposition for the average student. Forbes says the average 2019-20 tuition at U.S. private (nonprofit) colleges was almost $49,000, compared to just more than $21,000 at public institutions.

Many graduates enter the workforce already saddled with debt before they can max out their first Discover card. Federal handouts aside (and we all know who ends up paying for federal handouts), when and where is the debt worthwhile? It’s important to remember that not every degree field will kick a young person into the same earnings trajectory over the course of their careers.

Yes, it definitely pays to study engineering, one of the most lucrative fields of study in the U.S., according to data from the federal College Scorecard and U.S. Census Bureau which was parsed and released by the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity (FREOPP).

The data found that “95 percent of engineering programs, weighted by the number of graduates, will produce median earnings above $80,000 per year by the time their graduates reach mid-career.”

One of the most lucrative programs in the country, the research found, was at the University of Pennsylvania. Penn’s finance program graduates can expect to attain median earnings of more than $126,000 by age 25, more than $288,000 by 35, and $346,000 by 45. Finance majors from the University of Arkansas, by comparison, can expect, on average, to make roughly $54,000 a year by 25, more than $93,000 by 35 and just shy of $102,000 by age 45. (Remember to consider those cost-of-living differences.)

By contrast, just 1 percent of psychology programs can expect to yield annual salaries of $80,000 by the time graduates reach 35. The non-lucrative fields include the usual suspects—arts, music, philosophy, religion, education, [cough, journalism, cough] . . .

A 2019 state economic report found that a steel-industry technology associate degree from a two-year college resulted in higher first-year wages than any bachelor’s degree program in Arkansas.

Bottom line: Smarts and hard work will take a body far. Most college degrees will afford graduates an ability to repay student loans—assuming graduates can find jobs in their chosen fields.

But for all those kids filling out the FAFSA today, with the help of mom and pop and their tax records from last year, remember what awaits when you graduate. As long as at least half of Congress believes that loans should be paid back—in other words, as long as half of Congress believes in the very definition of a “loan”—then you’ll have something like a car note to pay when you graduate, in the form of a student loan bill. Our considered editorial opinion, which in this case is more considered than most: Give it the proper amount of thought.

To be forewarned, etc.