Nov. 30. A couple of years ago we started talked about the crushing burdens placed on students once they graduate because of the huge loans they have to take to get their college education. Some are calling this “debt bondage”. Now we hear on Democracy Now that there’s a fightback, a plan for a debt strike. The idea is that once one million debtors make a pledge, the one million would refuse to make their loan payments!
The spokesperson for the campaign is Pamela Brown, a Ph.D student in Sociology at The New School. They’re calling it the “Occupy Student Debt Campaign” Pledge of Refusal. Here’s the website.
Remember this all comes about because higher education isn’t free (as it is in many European countries.) Before anyone starts with explaining why college in the U.S.A. isn’t free remember at one time elementary and secondary education weren’t free either. It had to be fought for.
There is some effort to go after mortgage companies for fraud for suckering people into sub-prime loans. What about colleges? All kinds of glittering job and career promises are made by colleges in their catalogs and websites, but after four years you end up without a job and oweing a huge debt. Should we stick a few college presidents in jail for fraud?
BTW if you need to read student debt horror stories there’s a site called “Occupy Student Debt“. Don’t know if it has any relation to Pamela Brown’s effort.