The CARES Act delayed student loan payments as a form of stimulus, raising an important question: if forgiving student loan debt is good policy and broadly popular with Americans, should we just cancel student debt altogether? University of Wisconsin Madison Associate Professor Fenaba Addo, who researches debt and wealth inequality, helps us explore the merits and shortcomings of student debt cancellation.

Fenaba Addo is the Lorna Jorgensen Wendt Associate Professor of Money, Relationships, and Equality at the University of Wisconsin Madison. Her research examines the role of debt and increasing wealth inequality over the past forty years within communities of color and among economically vulnerable populations in the U.S.

Twitter: @FenabaAddo

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Six stupid arguments against forgiving student loan debt: https://prospect.org/day-one-agenda/six-stupid-arguments-against-forgiving-student-loan-debt/

The Racialization of the Student Debt Crisis: http://1xfsu31b52d33idlp13twtos-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Student-Debt_essay_individual.pdf

I paid off all my student loans. I still support student loan forgiveness: https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/first-person/2019/5/2/18527036/biden-millennials-cancel-student-debt-forgiveness

Forgiving student debt would boost economy, economists say: https://www.npr.org/2019/11/25/782070151/forgiving-student-debt-would-boost-economy

Writing off student debt is one way biden can build black wealth: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-12/writing-off-student-debt-is-one-way-biden-can-build-black-wealth

Student debt is hitting African Americans the hardest. These experts have a plan to fix it: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/student-debt-is-hitting-african-americans-the-hardest-these-experts-have-a-plan-to-fix-it/2019/09/20/5f786e48-d0fb-11e9-b29b-a528dc82154a_story.html

Constrained after College: Student Loans and Early Career Occupational Choices: https://www.nber.org/papers/w13117

Is student debt cancellation regressive? No. https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/06/is-student-debt-cancellation-regressive-no

Who owes all that student debt? And who’d benefit if it were forgiven? https://www.brookings.edu/policy2020/votervital/who-owes-all-that-student-debt-and-whod-benefit-if-it-were-forgiven/

Website: https://pitchforkeconomics.com/

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Nick Hanauer:

Today, we get to talk about this student debt crisis and the 1.7 trillion in college loans, 45 million Americans are carrying.

Fenaba Addo:

They say go big or go home. I think we need to cancel all of it.

Speaker 3:

If my student loans were canceled, I would be able to teach in a school district that needs really effective teachers. But unfortunately does not have the salary schedules in place to actually pay a livable wage.

Speaker 4:

From the home offices of Civic Ventures in downtown Seattle, this is Pitchfork Economics with Nick Hanauer, the best place to get the truth about who gets what and why.

Nick Hanauer:

I’m Nick Hanauer, Founder of Civic Ventures.

David Goldstein:

I’m David Goldstein, Senior Fellow at Civic Ventures. So in this episode, Nick, we’re going to talk about debt. And speaking of debt, I think that our listeners owe a debt to us because we provide, you provide, I should say, this podcasts for free. No subscription. No ads. Just us talking straight through the half-hour, 45 minutes.

Nick Hanauer:

Right.

David Goldstein:

And in return, all we ask is that you go to iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts, and rate and review us.

Nick Hanauer:

It would be awesome if you all did it.

David Goldstein:

And we’ll provide links in the show notes in case you don’t know how to do it. And thank you for that five star review.

Nick Hanauer:

Thank you. Today, we get to talk about this student debt crisis that neoliberalism has wrought on the country. And the 1.7 trillion in college loans approximately 45 million Americans are currently carrying.

David Goldstein:

And to be clear, it’s not just students who owe that debt, but also their parents through, sometimes, some very high interest loans.

Nick Hanauer:

Right. And now, couldn’t be more excited about the conversations that are taking place around helping people get out from under that debt, which is a thing that the incoming Biden administration could do without the permission of a Republican Senate. And as a strategy for stimulating an economy in recession, there probably aren’t very many better opportunities.

David Goldstein:

Right. And to be clear, a lot of people talk about this as a fairness issue, and I agree. We pulled up the ladder behind us, Nick. Our generation had the opportunity that you did to go to a very affordable public university and graduate with no debt. And we pulled that up and we have just, we’ve put all this debt on the shoulders of the younger generations. And that is tremendously unfair. And we did it at the same time that we were stagnating wages. So that college premium, while it still exists, you’re earning less than your parents did.

Nick Hanauer:

That’s right.

David Goldstein:

But this isn’t about fairness. This is about what’s good for the economy. And it just isn’t good for the economy to have people who should be starting families and starting businesses and buying homes, not doing any of that because they are burdened under $1.7 trillion of student debt.

Nick Hanauer:

That’s right. And who are likely to never get out from under it, for most of them. So, as a matter of stimulus, and as a matter of finding simple, direct, and profound ways to generate economic growth, nothing could be more efficient than effectively giving 45 million people a raise by eliminating their debt. What’s really exciting about this idea is that although only 45 million people would benefit directly from this, it would lift the economy generally for everyone. But also there are probably 90 million people who either depend on or love the 45 million people carrying this debt. And so the impact of this would be really profound and would affect a huge number of citizens both directly and indirectly in our country. I just have to say that I know it sounds like a lot of money, $1.7 trillion in debt, like just giving that away, but we routinely do that in our country.

David Goldstein:

Yeah. We usually give it away to people like [crosstalk 00:04:54].

Nick Hanauer:

Rich people. Right. Like we routinely give trillions of dollars away, but almost always in tax cuts or tax subsidies to wealthy people or owners of capital. And the thing that’s jarring about this is, this is giving money away to people who do not have a lot of wealth, but that’s not a reason not to do it.

David Goldstein:

But in addition to being progressive, I want to point out it’s also very centrist in the way that we talk about it.

Nick Hanauer:

Right.

David Goldstein:

This benefits the majority of Americans, and it is broadly popular. 53% of Republicans support a proposal to forgive $50,000 in debt for anyone earning under $125,000 a year, according to a poll from Data for Progress. So to argue that this is far left Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, socialist fantasy just is not true. This is majoritarian centrist as any policy could be.

Nick Hanauer:

Absolutely. And today we get to talk to Fenaba Addo, who is the Lorna Jorgenson Wendt Associate Professor of Money, Relationships, Inequality at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Fenaba researches the role of debt and increasing wealth inequality within communities of color, among economically vulnerable populations, and across the course of life, it should be a really interesting conversation.

Fenaba Addo:

I am Fenaba Addo. I am an Associate Professor of Consumer Science in the School of Human Ecology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where I teach both undergrad and grad students everything from research methods to family policy and economic policy. And I’m currently working on a book with a coauthor on racial disparities and student debt.

David Goldstein:

Hopefully by the time the book is out, we’ll have reduced some of that debt.

Fenaba Addo:

Here’s hoping.

David Goldstein:

So why don’t we start by just setting the table here, and if you could tell us first what the student debt cancellation proposals look like? And I guess also why we should be going there?

Fenaba Addo:

Okay. So there are quite a few proposals, right? And we saw quite of a different, especially during the election, several of the democratic nominees pushing different proposals on, I guess, different degrees of what their ideal student debt cancellation program would be. The Biden plan is proposing about a $10,000 debt cancellation for individuals with, obviously, with student loan debt that would phase out at an income of $125,000. And I believe his is only targeted towards public universities. But then we have something like the Warren and kind of similar to the Bernie Sanders plan, which is about, they’re proposing $50,000 across the board. And then everything else is kind of falls in between that. And then at the, I guess you would say, the other [inaudible 00:08:05] or the alternative offered up or people who are kind of anti student debt cancellation, who are proposing more along of the lines of kind of reforming the current system and in particular, the policies that are related to the income driven repayment plans, right?

So this drive to get people into plans that would allow them to pay a portion or a proportion of their disposable income or discretionary income towards paying off their debt. And then after if they consistently make these payments over a certain amount of time, then they would have the rest of the debt forgiven. And so they run the gamut of different types of policies that people are proposing, but really trying to address this student debt crisis that we all are experiencing or seeing right now, in which over a $1.6 trillion in aggregate student loan debt held by approximately 45 million borrowers. And really trying to address the fact that there are such high default and delinquency rates and the students that has increasingly, I should say, increasingly more evidence that it is having some negative consequences on people’s decision making in various areas of their life.

Nick Hanauer:

Let’s talk deeper into that. So who has student loans? In what way is it affecting different kinds of Americans?

Fenaba Addo:

Right. So these include students and their families who went to all types of institutions of higher education. So two-year, four-year for profit so a lot of borrowers attended for-profit universities. And then we also have individuals who tend to have a lot of debt. So we’re thinking six-figure debts are largely concentrated among people who have graduate school debt from professional schools, such as doctors, lawyers and so forth. But then we also have parents who took on loans for their children as well. So including the parent plus loan program. But now we can speak about like the different where it’s concentrated, right?

So the actual number of people who have over $80,000 worth of debt is actually only a hope by about 10% of borrowers. And a lot of people with student loan debt actually have, are concentrated towards the lower end of the student debt distribution so below $20,000. A lot of the research that I had done has looked at racial disparities in student debt. Their refined black borrowers, in particular, have higher average loan balances. They tend to have accumulate more debt and then have higher problems with default and delinquency with repayment in particular. So we see a difficult number of black borrowers with student loan debt.

David Goldstein:

This is exacerbated of course by the huge racial disparity, not just in income, but even larger in household wealth, so that the high amounts of debts in black families leaves you with a much larger debt to wealth ratio.

Fenaba Addo:

Yes, absolutely. So a bunch of the work that I have been doing has been exploring the linkages between the racial wealth gap in our society and debt accumulation. So students’ accumulation in particular, as well as the next phase, which should be recreating or replicating the wealth gap because of high debt balances. So this is exactly what you’re speaking to here. If parents don’t have, or if families don’t have the money to pay directly for pay college costs, they take on debt. And because black households is proportioned to have lower wealth levels so I can say, based on data from the Survey of Consumer Finances in 2016, blacks had about 10% of median wealth levels. So about $10,000 to about $171,000 at the median white household of average wealth.

But yes, so less resources to draw upon in order to help themselves and their children to pay for college and so forth, turning to credit markets to make up the difference. And then after they leave school and they have these large loan balances, and we know that, assistance from family and friends and your networks doesn’t end once you’ve finished. So really seeing the inability to pay it off as quickly, relative to their white counterparts who have student loan debt as well.

Nick Hanauer:

And I think that the student debt crisis is yet another manifestation of a 45-year wage suppression crisis. Because for the bottom nine deciles of Americans wages really haven’t budged in 45 years while both the necessity and the pressure and the cost of a college education, which theoretically was going to get you higher wages exploded. Right? So you’ve got this insane discontinuity between what college costs, and for most people, what the benefits are of getting that college degree. So this whole thing is in this awful feedback loop, this death spiral of increasing college costs and increasing debt costs and flat wages.

Fenaba Addo:

Yeah, absolutely. Very early on when people started to get alarmed about the rising aggregate debt… We saw a lot of public figures, policy makers, and politicians saying, “Oh, I went to school 10 years ago. And I only paid [crosstalk 00:13:32]-“

Nick Hanauer:

It’s fine.

Fenaba Addo:

It’s fine. It’s not going to pay it off. It’s going to be okay. But the magnitude, like we were just speaking to is very different in the economic circumstances and the economies that students are leading into or have been entering are very different in circumstances that they are facing are very different than they were 20, 30 years ago. So just trying to raise that awareness, and I think that the attention that this topic has received both media and as well within policy circles is speaking to that realization finally seeping in, that you can’t compare the magnitude of the debt burden.

Nick Hanauer:

Yeah.

David Goldstein:

Right. We’ve talked about this before, Nick, when you entered the University of Washington adjusted for inflation, tuition and fees were about $2,500 a year. Today, they’re $12,000 a year.

Fenaba Addo:

Right.

Nick Hanauer:

I can’t do the inflation math, but what I can tell you is what it really costs, and it costs $750 a year to go to the University of Washington. You can do your divided bys and see pretty quickly the job at McDonald’s for the summer would pay for that. Right?

David Goldstein:

And it did.

Nick Hanauer:

It did. So let’s back up a little bit. And if you were in charge, what would you do?

Fenaba Addo:

What would I do?

Nick Hanauer:

Yeah. What would your proposal be?

Fenaba Addo:

So I think one of the things that I have been really trying to underscore is that we need more than one policy, right? There are many issues with the whole system, and I tend to say maybe a two-pronged or at least two phases. One, that would address the accumulation of the debt. And then another, that is going to address the repayment. A lot of the focus has been most recently on the repayment phase, just because we see the outstanding balances and the huge, the high default rates in particular. But just fixing the repayment phase is without fixing or addressing the accumulation phase is going to mean that this is just going to replicate itself with the next set of students.

And thinking really about how we think about how we finance higher education. And if we’re not going to address the rising costs associated with going, then how do we turn that loan aid and said grants that people who cannot afford don’t have to turn to credit markets in order to finance their education, I think is really what we want to start thinking about. There’s a lot of debate… I think that is rightfully so about who should bear the cost of higher education and I can see the merits of those arguments as well. But where do we get to the point in which the costs are distorting decision making, distorting behavior, distorting long-term planning for individuals. And I think that’s really where we are now. We’re living in the world of unintended consequences and worst case scenarios of a policy and that really needs to be addressed.

Nick Hanauer:

So there’s $1.7 trillion worth of student debt. If you were president Biden, what proportion of that debt do you think we should forgive?

Fenaba Addo:

They say go big or go home. I think we need to cancel all of it. We admit that the current system isn’t working and that has failed many people, and this is a reflection back on us, both policy makers and as a society that we need to fix something. And one of those fixes should be removing this debt.

Nick Hanauer:

Yeah. I would say that Goldie and I are probably largely with you. I think that the student debt crisis is a macro economic policy crisis related not to the cost of higher ed, mostly, but to the… The society basically made a promise to people about the value of taking down this debt and getting a college degree and then let people take on the debt, but didn’t provide the income that would allow you to amortize that debt in a reasonable way.

David Goldstein:

Right. So, as people have talked about the technical term, this credentialization of our economy where you now need a college degree to earn exactly what you used to earn without one.

Nick Hanauer:

Yes.

David Goldstein:

And That is forcing people into debt, basically to get the same income that their parents had without all this debt.

Nick Hanauer:

I think that, from our perspective, the first order of business for governance in this moment of crisis and the inequality is finding scalable ways to make a material impact on the lived experience and welfare of a huge number of people. And I fully acknowledge that there are Harvard MBAs out there who took down a bunch of debt and are now earning a million dollars a year on Wall Street, who in fairness don’t need debt forgiveness. So maybe there’s a way to get to 90% of the debt or something, but-

David Goldstein:

Let’s address that directly. If you could explain why even forgiving their debt, if we just forgave everybody’s debt… Let’s shoot down that critique that this would be a regressive policy that largely helps high income people. Well, why is that not true?

Fenaba Addo:

The majority of the debt is held by, is like 10% of the borrowers, right? So they have enormous amount and they tend to be the people who had gone to graduate school. I think a lot of the times when you hear that argument about the policy being regressive with the largest benefits going to the highest earners, then it completely kind of does away with the people want to move on and not talk about debts cancellation at all. But there are a lot of people who would be benefited by such a policy. So I think once people group in that group of people, then they say we can’t do it, but it fails to recognize that you would be helping a whole lot more people who are struggling with the little bit amounts of debts. So I don’t think it frustrated with that argument because it makes people want to shift away from the debt cancellation conversation.

When in fact we know that so many more people, yes, the people, they have a little bit of loan balances, but the magnitude or the multiplier effects would be greater for the people who are at the lower ends of the debt distribution. I will also say, the higher earners, if you want to go towards a public finance argument are going to pay higher taxes based on… Or going to pay taxes towards this and so it comes back to the economy in many different ways. And that relief, I think, is something that would benefit all households.

Nick Hanauer:

Right. No, no. For sure.

Fenaba Addo:

Even if you have $100,000, you make $100,000, or if you make $10,000 a year, just having that money free up. And I do a lot in some of my other research that looks at debt in the families and households, how just receiving that relief allows additional choice about the doubt allows for longer-term planning and so forth. I think there are lots of factors that need to be focused on that are a part of this picture as to why individuals are struggling to pay their debts. And you just can’t look at a number, right?

Nick Hanauer:

Yeah.

Fenaba Addo:

And you have to look at their overall income to pay into it. You have to think of their wealth, their wealth profiles. What is going on with their household balance sheet that is really contributing to the inability to pay that? And how do people, individuals or households prioritize debts, right? Because you may have others that’s not in your portfolio that you need to prioritize. A large one, a lot of people look at medical debt, for example, or credit card debt that which [crosstalk 00:21:13]-

Nick Hanauer:

Or a car.

Fenaba Addo:

Car, exactly.

Nick Hanauer:

Or whatever.

Fenaba Addo:

Exactly.

David Goldstein:

You have said that canceling debt once isn’t going to make the problem disappear. Do you have a high level perspective on how we should avoid this catastrophe in the future?

Fenaba Addo:

Yeah. So I think we really need to think about how do we get resources, resources broadly defined, but money to families and individuals so that they can make choices that will allow them not to turn to credit markets if they want to invest in their education, invest in their future. Right? So really thinking about how do we increase individual’s income? How do we help people? They want to purchase a home. Really just thinking broader, beyond, quick, simple, short-term fixes and longer term, how do we invest in our society and our community to really build wealth? More generally, how do we raise up the wealth of communities within our society. So that turning to credit markets, turning to taking on debt in order to improve one’s individual lot or your family’s lot is no longer an option.

David Goldstein:

There’s a question we ask all of our guests, which is, why do you do this work?

Fenaba Addo:

I do this work because this is who I am, right? This is what I saw. I saw both the returns to a college degree, both personally and within my family and in the neighborhoods around me, what a college degree could offer and the opportunities it could open up. I also have been on the receiving end of friends and partners for whom the debt collectors call every day, trying to pay when there is nothing to give. Right? So this is personal, but this is also very highly important to me because I can see how transformative both a college degree can be, but also how transformative receiving debt relief can also be [inaudible 00:23:17] their families.

David Goldstein:

And it’s interesting, you describe your experience with a laugh, but it’s incredibly stressful.

Fenaba Addo:

It’s incredibly stressful. It’s incredibly… Yes. Yes. I laugh because I’m on the other end. Honestly, there is no other reason for the laugh is that because I can look, reflect back on… And I’m not sitting still in that space. There’s nothing funny about it when you’re in it, when you’re dealing with that, absolutely.

David Goldstein:

Ah, just imagine how much better this country, how much better off this country would be if we relieved that stress on 45 million Americans.

Nick Hanauer:

Yeah. Particularly at this moment.

David Goldstein:

Yeah.

Fenaba Addo:

Absolutely. Particularly at this moment, I agree. Absolutely, in this moment. And I will say that, the fact that we saw during the CARES Act that it was included as something that needed to be stopped. The payments on those stopped added additional awareness of the severity of this problem. So I think it’s pretty telling what we see, how our government reacts in times of crisis, what they can, what they can and cannot do, what is possible. Right? And I think the fact that student debt was on the table raises awareness as to the importance of this issue.

David Goldstein:

Well, thanks for your time. Thanks for all your work on this. And I hope we end up ruining your book by eliminating the crisis before you get published. Sorry.

Fenaba Addo:

It’s all right. I love it. Thank you for having me. It’s been a pleasure.

Nick Hanauer:

Yeah. Thank you so much.

So Pitchfork Economics listeners, over 2,000 of you used our tool to send the RAND inequality report to your local representative, and you guys are so awesome for doing this. So we’d love to try it again for this, and it’s the same drill. Go to civicaction.com/debt or text debt to 67076. And just like with the RAND study, you’ll be taken through some simple steps that will send an email to your elected leaders, telling them why you want to support Biden’s efforts to cancel student debt in his first 100 days in office. And we promise we won’t sell your information to anyone. I hope a lot of you will do that because I know it means a lot to you. And the reason I know that is for the last couple of weeks, we’ve been asking you what it would mean to you if student debt was canceled. And so here’s what some of you said.

Bobby Blue:

Hi, my name is Bobby Blue. I live in Charlotte, North Carolina. My two oldest girls recently moved out on their own for the first time. And they’re struggling because of due to the hours and things being cut back because of COVID. If I didn’t have student loans, I could help them pay their rent.

Peter:

Hello. I’m Peter. I’m from Utah. I’ve just finished off paying the student loans. My wife and I both had undergraduate degree loans and one graduate degree loan between us. I feel a little bit of envy when I hear that we might be canceling student debt. I’m also much more optimistic when I hear that than any NBA feel.

Allie:

My name is Allie. I’m calling from Arlington Virginia. If my student loan debt were canceled, I might be able to take seriously the prospect of having children. I am 34, I’ve accrued about $250,000 in student loan debt. Comparatively, I’m very fortunate I’m on an income driven repayment plan and my loans are all federal. I went to law school, like a lot of other people with high debt loads. I do not have the six-figure paycheck that people think comes with that. And as a result, I find myself approaching the end of my fertile years to be quite honest. Never feeling like I really have the choice to sit down and think about whether to become a mom. I know that people with student loan payments successfully have children and families, but my husband and I just don’t see how that’s possible right now.

Speaker 3:

I’m an educator in Tacoma, Washington. And if my student loans were canceled, I would be able to teach in a school district that needs really effective teachers. But unfortunately does not have the pay structures in place, the salary schedules in place to actually pay a livable wage. Right now, my student loans are $80,000 that is due to going back to school to get a master’s in teaching. And that graduate degree has just made my student loan payments absolutely untenable. The only districts that actually provide decent salary schedules are in areas that frankly have a lot of very effective teachers. And I would really like to work in a more high needs school district. But unfortunately with my student loan payments, I’m not currently able to do that. I don’t think it’s a great model for our country, that you have to go into so much debt to serve future generations, but that’s where we are right now.

Amy:

Hey, this is Amy [inaudible 00:29:00] and I’m calling from the Dallas, Texas area. I have a business management and an MBA degrees that are both paid off, fortunately, because my parents started early in saving. But I’m 40 and have wiser insight into the fields that I wish I could be in. So right now I’m working at an hourly part-time admin job. So I have time to volunteer on the fields that I actually want to do. Because if I went back to school now, any money that I’d be paying to student loans would be money that I wouldn’t be putting into my retirement. So I’m looking at cruising by just paying the bills for the next 20 years, at least. I’m not getting to do what I really love because of the student debt. My mom had four degrees and they work through college and I can’t afford to do that. So this is what I’m doing instead.

Speaker 9:

Hello. A big time fan of your guys’ work, been listening for a while. First time calling in, you really caught me with your question about what would it mean to have your student loan debt canceled? You see for me, like a lot of people, I graduated into the great recession. When I graduated, there were no jobs. I had to leave the country in order to find work. What it would mean to me to have my student loan debt canceled would be that I’m allowed to, would know that I can come to America and take part in what has been the traditional prosperity that my parents enjoyed.

Sunni:

My name is Sunni. I’m calling from New York. And my opinion regarding student debt as somebody who has been paying student loans for close to 20 years is that I don’t mind paying my loans, and I think it’s great. We should pay it. My deal is I want to pay it once. Nobody told me that over the years, due to negative compounding, my student loans will keep growing as I was paying it. And that eventually it will double even triple. I had to go in forbearance a few times. I have a family now and actually have two kids going to college. So I haven’t been able to pay as much as I thought I was.

In the meantime, due to the interest, which I consolidated at 6%, every eight years more or less my student loans double. So at this moment I have paid my loans maybe twice already because the original amount that I took out has doubled, maybe one and a half times already. So maybe if there’s a way that yes, we’ll pay back, I’ll pay the principal and maybe charge me one time the interest rate, they’ll be right. They’ll be okay. But in my case, I have already paid my loans a few times and I think my debt should be canceled.

James:

Hi guys, I’m James and I’m in the L.A. area. If my student loan debt were canceled tomorrow, I honestly wouldn’t change my life very much because I’m in my 50s. On the other hand, at any point in the past, if it had happened, that would have improved my credit standing and my purchasing ability quite significantly because I’ve been underemployed for a very long time. And this has affected my ability to whatever, buy a car that would get me to work or get a better apartment or anything like that. It’s not just a matter of how much does that money affect you today, but how much it affects you in general.

Nick Hanauer:

Fenaba made a really good point, which is that we’ve got two problems. We’ve got the existing student debt crisis and we’ve got the one waiting for us over the next 30 years, right? It will happen as a consequence of wages being low and-

David Goldstein:

Tuition being high.

Nick Hanauer:

College being high. And I acknowledge that there are two problems, but it doesn’t mean that because we don’t have a ready solution for the second one that we shouldn’t address the first one.

David Goldstein:

Right. And this is one of the things that’s so exciting about student debt forgiveness is that it’s something the Biden administration can do without the Congress.

Nick Hanauer:

Yes. That’s right.

David Goldstein:

And that means, regardless of whether we get control, we win those Georgia seats, there’s still some conservative Democrats who won’t support eliminating the filibuster. So it’s unlikely that anything big can get through Congress over the next couple of years, but in this case, it doesn’t have to. Biden can do this on his own, and of course he should.

Nick Hanauer:

Yes. Because it’s both good policy, would be great for the economy. And it’s great politics.

David Goldstein:

Yeah. It’s dependence politics.

Nick Hanauer:

That’s right.

David Goldstein:

Because as we said, this is a centrist policy. It is good for the majority of Americans, and it is popular with the majority of Americans.

Nick Hanauer:

Right.

David Goldstein:

So why wouldn’t you want to do that?

Nick Hanauer:

Exactly. And doing things like that is what good governance is, and doing more of that will lead not only more people to vote for Democrats, which would be a fine thing, but more particularly more people to vote, more people to participate, more people to believe that the democracy has some connection to their welfare. Which I think is super, super important because we have certainly taught people of last 40 years that no matter who they elect, nothing better will happen.

Next week. We’re revisiting an old favorite episode. Abigail Disney joins me to make the case on behalf of the rich, for taxing us rich people more, and tax expert, Chye-Ching Huang takes us through the policy details.

Speaker 4:

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