Sorry to revive a 6 week old thread, but I'd read something recently and wanted to share. I saw a blog posting from a woman who works in economics or financial planning I believe.
so far good credentials, economic or financial planning or something you believe...I'm with you so far.
Her take on whether or not PSLF will be around in 10 years or more is this: In order to revoke PSLF, congress would have to take action and agree to sign a new bill reversing the previous one. It's much more likely, especially with the way congress has be running recently, that they will do nothing and let the program continue, rather than have someone bring this issue up and have the majority agree on a new bill.
1. the way congress has been running recently may not be the way congress will be running a decade from now.
2. As we saw with stafford loans, clearly the current trend if you want to look at the "way congress has been running recently" is to bring these issues up, sneak them into a bill and pass them.
Even if for some reason, PSLF was taken away, the people who have already made qualifying payments would likely be grandfathered into the program.
Based on what? People will not have paid ANYTHING into PSLF. They paid into IBR or some other approved plan. I've heard this a lot with NO basis in reality. When I took out my loans, forbearance existed and stafford loans were subsidized, how'd that grandfathering process work out there? Listen you can say "grandfathered in, grandfathered in, grandfathered in" all you want but I've got two examples where that's complete BS and you've got? oh that's right, an optimistic attitude and not much else in the way of fact or historical precedence.
The government has been very pro-education and pro-borrower recently and that movement just continues to grow. I actually do believe this program is here to stay, at least for those who have made qualifying payments.
Pro-education? pro-borrower? I see the problem here, you must be living in another country.
Also, PSLF does NOT require funding. It simply requires that the balance be forgiven.
You loose all credibility here. That money owed in on a balance sheet somewhere and already spent somewhere else. You eliminate the income from those loans you increase the deficit or you cut funding to another program, period. That's how a budget works.
I mean damn, by your logic cutting taxes to 0 requires NO FUNDING, it simply requires you don't take in the money! WOW, we just eliminate taxes! it doesn't cost a thing! brilliant!
I actually read some where that the government will make a small percentage of money off of this program, in comparison to prior years, even with loans being forgiven. It didn't go into enough details to explain why, but I believe it's due to the fact that people are consolidating into the government's direct loan program, rather than a private company like Sallie Mae.
Although mathematically this may make sense, I have elucidated numerous ways this is not going to work out in prior posts. The simplest way to look at this is: if this was going to
make them money, private companies would be willing to get in on the system.
Even though this program seems to good to be true, it's actually beneficial to the government and they have no incentive to take it away. I think the biggest objection comes from those who graduated and paid off their loans before this program existed. I totally empathize with those people, but they're not going to get the program scrapped just because it's unfair. Life's unfair.
1. Its not. There is no magical system where a loan occurs, the terms are changed and BOTH the borrower AND the lender come out ahead as a result of that change unless the lender is simply cutting to less of a loss by avoiding default. (not a net positive just less of a negative)
2. Life is unfair. And that is exactly what the gov. is going to say when they scrap this program for doctors.
FWIW, the people who will benefit from PSLF will probably never receive social security benefits unless there's some drastic effort to change things.
Again, amazing grasp of reality here. Old people vote, old people have actually paid into SS. They will piss on the head of every single grad student in the country before they piss off this huge voting block. I have no doubt social security is in trouble but if you think SS benefits are going to get hit before a doctors loan forgiveness...well, good luck with that.