Forward. It’s President Obama’s campaign slogan and for many it represents the belief that the future will be brighter than the economic situation we are still trying to dig ourselves out of today. But “forward” is the exact opposite direction most college students are going when they realize they’re saddled with rising tuition costs under president Obama, which contributes to an ever-growing pile of debt.
This relatively unknown crisis is devastating to a demographic that the president desperately needs to recapture if he has any shot of reelection in November, so college students must ask: Are we better off than we were four years ago?
College students are facing an ever-increasing amount of debt in order to obtain a degree and this of course leaves many college graduates going backwards after receiving their diploma and not “forward.” This administration may deny and deflect all they want on the issues, but the one thing they can’t do is run from the facts.
A recent study published by the Institute for College Access and Success found that graduates from 2011 are starting off their post-college lives in the hole: $26,600 dollars in the hole to be exact. To some, that number may seem low, but consider the fact that this number is a five percent increase over the previous year. It’s safe to say we are not moving “forward” in this department.
Some may also argue that this kind of debt is not that much of a burden on students considering the quality education that our nation’s youth receive at the collegiate level. Some argue that due to this high-quality education, these debts can be easily repaid once the individual starts to work after graduation, thanks in-part, to government’s subsidized loans which don’t accumulate interest during the college years.
This is all fine and dandy until one considers the college the unemployment rate among recent college graduates, which is higher than the national average at 8.8 percent. Add to that number that 38 percent of college graduates have jobs that don’t even require a college degree. With these types of depressing numbers, it almost seems pointless to spend four years attaining a degree that 38 percent of graduates won’t even use.
For college students, this is not the “change” they voted for when they went to the polls four years ago and elected a rock star instead of a policymaker. Due, in part, to their own actions, they are now paying for this lack of insight at the polling booth. The president may continue to claim that he has saved this country from economic collapse, but he has no answer other than to own up to the disastrous burden he has put on the younger generation… a burden so great that some experts believe that the total amount of student debt nationwide is more than $1 trillion.
The burden will affect not only the college generation; it will affect our whole country. If college students are faced with paying more in tuition and subsequently accumulating more debt because of it, then the millennial generation will be faced with paying off excessively high college loans instead of buying a house, or a new car, or a multitude of other things that will stimulate the economy. This will surely slow our already stagnant economy down, and perhaps propel us into an even bigger recession then the one we are trying to climb out of.
The president may talk a good game about a “race to the top” in which he would reward colleges and universities for keeping costs low. But with all the other broken promises Mr. Obama has failed to deliver on over the last four years, college students shouldn’t be holding their breath.
