Joe Biden's efforts to cancel student debt for as many people as possible have hit many bumps in the road, as Beege recently pointed out. He's even been shut down in the courts in some cases, but that's not stopping him. Whether it's legal or even fair doesn't matter. He needs to find something to run on if he wants a second term, so he will continue to push forward. This week he was back at it, promoting a plan to be rolled out through the Department of Education targeting people who enrolled in the SAVE loan repayment plan. Starting this month, people who borrowed $12,000 or less will see their loans being "forgiven" if they have made ten years of payments toward them. But the government isn't calling it loan "forgiveness." This is being billed as a type of "repayment reform." (Business Insider)
More student-loan borrowers can expect debt relief starting this month through a new repayment reform.
In early January, the Education Department announced that borrowers enrolled in the SAVE income-driven repayment plan who originally borrowed $12,000 or less will begin to see their loans forgiven in February after making as few as 10 years of qualifying payments.
The department is rolling out this relief early — when SAVE was first announced over the summer, that provision of the plan wasn't set to be implemented until the summer of 2024.
This is a type of sleight of hand that the Biden administration loves to attempt. Since they got into trouble when they tried to simply cancel or "forgive" student debt, they are setting up a system where people will be enrolled in a different repayment plan. And under the right conditions, borrowers can wind up owing $0.00 payments. It sounds as if the theory here is that the loan isn't canceled. It's just not going to be repaid. That sounds like a distinction without a difference to me, but then I'm not a politician.
There are plenty of questions remaining about the rollout of this latest scheme. The Saving on a Valuable Education Plan is still being developed. So even if you took out a loan previously and have been paying it down (or in many cases, not paying it), the Biden Administration appears to be opening the door for anyone to somehow transfer over and become eligible for this non-payment option for qualifying borrowers. This just looks like yet another dodge to allow one specific set of borrowers to evade the obligations they took on while all other borrowers are out of luck.
This theory is part of a similar trick that politicians use all of the time, though not always with success. A "loan" that doesn't require any payments isn't really a loan at all. It's a gift. Look no further than Hunter Biden and his "sugar brother." And gifts carry certain financial obligations under existing law. This SAVE plan dodge is essentially looking to turn potentially millions of people who knowingly took out student loans into Hunter Biden clones.
Meanwhile, if you were forced to run up your credit cards to keep up with your bills at increasingly high interest rates under Bidenomics, there is no relief on the way for you. If you are making car payments, particularly on a hugely expensive electric vehicle that the government wants you to drive, you will have to pay that debt off. The same goes for your home mortgage and all of the other debts that people typically incur.
But the people who are walking around with college degrees that should open the door to some of the best-paying jobs in the country (typically 84% higher than those with only a high school diploma) will be geting a free pass while everyone else will still have to slave away and pay off those other loans. Why? It's not as if we needed yet another example of how the Biden administration cares more about the elite than working-class Americans, but this is another prime piece of proof.
