God doesn’t like student debt
God wants us to eliminate college debt, and I have scriptural backing for that.
We have told generations of young people that education is the way up and the way out. An October report from Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce said that over a lifetime, depending on a host of factors including gender, race and occupation, a high school graduate will earn on average $1.6 million, an associate degree holder $2 million and a bachelor’s degree holder $2.8 million. (Advanced degrees grow your income accordingly.)
We hold out that carrot even while college has become increasingly expensive and debt has accrued in pursuit of an advanced degree has become a millstone around the necks of young adults. And so, without a smidgen of authority to do so, I’d like to declare 2022 our Jubilee year for student debt.
The idea is not original with me. (We refer in the text to Ecclesiastes 1:9, the verse that says there is nothing new under the sun.) But in the Hebrew Scriptures (aka the Old Testament), Jubilee years came every half-century, during which time slaves were released, property was returned to its original owners and debt was eliminated — though there is some biblical scholarship that questions whether the biblical “debt forgiveness” would mirror what it means today. Still, I’m not asking for much; every 50 years isn’t that often. Deuteronomy 15:1 suggests that debt get canceled every seven years.
(Yes, that is in the Hebrew Scriptures, and if Christians feel squeamish about relying on those rules rather than law from Christian Scriptures, aka the New Testament — say, the Epistles or the four gospels – then those same Christians must turn loose of their love of clobber verses from the Hebrew Scriptures. All or nothing, sinners.)
From here, Jubilee looks like a glorious restructuring of an entire economy, which sounds particularly attractive when a never-ending pandemic and acute symptoms of late-stage capitalism are choking a significant number of the next generation’s workforce.
(I’ll leave the Jubilee arrangements for the release of people in bondage and the return of original property to someone else.)
According to the Education Data Initiative, student loan debt stands at $1.75 trillion (yes, trillion) with roughly 43.2 million U.S. residents owing an average of $39,351. From the same source, the average student loan debt in Connecticut is $35,448, and roughly a quarter of Connecticut residents owe between $20,000 to $40,000. Forgiveness is popular. According to a recent poll from Morning Consult, 62% of Americans support some level of forgiveness, though cranky old Boomers tend to be least in favor. Shame on you, Boomers.
I’m a Boomer. When I graduated from the University of Maryland in none-of-your-business, I owed what felt like the insurmountable sum of $9,000 and change. I got a decent job, and every month, I wrote a check for the equivalent of a car payment until the debt was retired. I will always be grateful I reached for that particular carrot. A college education made all the difference. Just a few months after I retired my debt, I bought my first house. Go, Terps.
But that was in the dark ages. I have a son in his late 30s still dragging around college debt, and recent attempts to make this easier on his generation have been spotty. In October, President Biden promised an overhaul of the country’s 15-yearold Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, and that has been slow going, at best. When he was running for office, Candidate Biden borrowed an idea from Sen. Elizabeth Warren and suggested forgiveness of $10,000 in debt per college loan borrower. He has since said he will ask the Department of Justice to review whether the administration can retire as much as $50,000 per borrower, but nothing has happened yet. Since Biden took office, his administration has approved billions in student loan relief, but implementation has been uneven. There’s a moratorium on student debt repayment, but that ends in May.
Financially, people who are free of debt have more money to pump into the economy. Burying students under debt means those graduates won’t buy a house or a decent car or take a vacation for a long time. I am not an economist, but I’m pretty sure I can see where this is heading.
A student I taught several years ago was one of those bright lights who could always be counted on to bring a spark to class discussions. I looked forward to seeing his grinning face (this was pre-pandemic, when we saw entire visages) at the back of the room.
But one semester he was there and then he wasn’t. A few weeks after I noticed he hadn’t shown up, I saw him jogging on a street through campus, and I pulled over. He said he had a hold on his account, and he was having trouble finding the money to finish his degree. We looked for scholarships, to no avail. He remains just a few credits short of a communication degree and deeply in debt.
I have more than a few stories like that of promising students — often the first in their families to attend college — who hit financial shoals and cannot complete what they started. I also know students who finish, but they graduate buried under a heavy financial obligation that moves future adult activities — such as leaving their childhood homes for places of their own — far down the road. In some cases, people nearing retirement are still dragging around student debt. Do we really want to sink so many people who bought into the dream?
Susan Campbell is the author of "Frog Hollow: Stories from an American Neighborhood," "Tempest-Tossed: The Spirit of Isabella Beecher Hooker" and "Dating Jesus: A Story of Fundamentalism, Feminism and the American Girl." She is a distinguished lecturer at University of New Haven, where she teaches journalism.