And then there are the future borrowers. I have a niece who will be entering college next year, and if current trends continue, she and her classmates will borrow an average of $ 50,000 each to finance their education.

Will they receive $ 10,000 in student loan forgiveness? Curious minds want to know. And I mean it very seriously. People who are planning to go to college make big decisions and they need to know if there will be any debt forgiveness in the future.

In summary, Biden’s proposal to write off $ 10,000 in federal student loan debt would primarily benefit recent college graduates, most of whom have midsize loans that are still outstanding. It does nothing (or too little) for most long-time graduates, and it does nothing at all for future graduates. And most importantly, it does absolutely nothing to combat the relentless rise in tuition fees, which is one of the main drivers of this mess in the first place. In short, even though a one-time $ 10,000 debt forgiveness is legal, it is bad policy. And that would certainly make a lot of people miserable.

Pelosi may be worried that all of this will come back to haunt Democrats. I can just see the 2024 stage of debate now, with a Republican telling a Democratic opponent, “Wait a second … Joe Biden forgave billions of dollars in student loans in 2021, and now you’re saying it didn’t. not really solved the problem. the problem and we have to do it again? Can’t fix anything? “