....unless you're one of the poor kids who bought the dream but lived to feel the nightmare.
"There’s something both hilarious and tragic about this situation. Americans spent the last five years being told that loans were more like Netflix subscriptions—cancel anytime, and nobody gets hurt. But the basic laws of economics and reality both have a way of breaking through the socialistic cosplay. If you take out tens of thousands of dollars to send Junior to college or to “reinvent yourself” with a master’s in Nepalese yoga studies, someday, someone will expect repayment. Wild concept, right?Here’s the dirty little secret nobody wants to say out loud: if you can’t afford the loan, or if the education isn’t enough of an investment to return what you need to pay it back, you shouldn’t have taken it in the first place. If you chose to, you’re on the hook.
That’s how debt works. When you finance a car, the repo guy doesn’t care that you got laid off or that you thought the payments were “unfair.” He shows up with a tow truck. But somehow, when it’s student loans, we’ve decided that personal responsibility is a cruel and outdated idea.Which brings us to President Autopen. His administration spent years conditioning borrowers — many of whom majored in things like Non-Binary Origami Theory or Vegan Drum Circle Dynamics — to believe they live in a magical kingdom where loan balances dissolve if you close your eyes tight enough or hug enough people.
But illusions have consequences. Biden’s “freeze now, worry later” policy essentially told borrowers: don’t worry, you’ll never really have to pay these off. So of course, when collections resume, delinquency rates explode. It’s almost as if when you remove accountability, people stop acting responsibly. Shocker.This was par for the course during Biden’s broader economic fairy tale. Inflation? Just “transitory.” Gas prices? Nothing to see here. Student loans? They’re optional.Meanwhile, those who did the right thing—who sacrificed, budgeted, drove old cars, skipped trips, and chipped away at their balances—are left wondering: what was the point? Why be responsible if the government will swoop in to erase the balance sheets of those who weren’t?This is the fundamental injustice of it all: rewarding irresponsibility while punishing prudence. And people wonder why nobody saves anymore. Forgiving debt, or even just suspending the consequences indefinitely, teaches people that debt is basically fake money. Borrow as much as you want, because someone else—your neighbor, your taxpayer, your future self—will foot the bill."
