From a panoramic view, the conglomerate of student loans is enormous. Think of how many academic, financial, and governmental institutions are involved in such a gigantic amount as $1 Trillion. Think of how many families are involved, how many generations have contributed their funds to get someone through school, how many hours were used to search for grants, loans, etc. etc.
The amount of money for student loans now exceeds America's credit card debt. Some believe student loans may be the next bubble to burst. I have no idea about that. But I am concerned about how much debt these young people have when starting a new job after graduation.
I think this sets our economy back. This generation will not be able to buy homes, create a savings account of any serious amount, or think of retirement or long term future when they really should because they have a huge burden to carry for a quite some time.
Solutions? Well, this has been discussed before in this blog in terms of businesses contribution. But academia need to step up too. They have got to think outside of the box, quit thinking they are a monopoly, and look for value added, cost cutting measures.
Aside of what I have written before, one of the ways businesses can "encourage" post secondary institutions would be to look at 2 year colleges and other institutions that really concentrate on exactly the skills companies are looking for to fill their needs. Sometimes they can work with a company to design a curriculum to meet the perfect criteria.
We have a free market system. Business owners can use it to meet their workforce needs with educational institutions. You tell them what you want, not the other way around.
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