In his State of the Union Address, President Obama promised that the US will “out-educate” the world. In his new budget, he is proposing $100B in cuts to Pell Grants and graduate loan aid. It will remove subsidies for federal graduate loans so that interest will accrue while the student is still in school.
I don’t think these cuts are totally insane, and may be smart in a different economic climate, but I don’t how see how even small cutbacks to opportunity to education or an increase in the burden of an education over the long-term are appropriate actions to make now.
I graduated from law school in May with a decent amount of loans (and a job, fortunately). I only have federal loans, but the interest rate is 6.8%. Direct PLUS loans are now 7.9%. All while mortgage rates are now about 4-5%. It’s frustrating and expensive. Many of my friends graduated with mostly private loans at 7%+ and a total debt load of $100-200K. And most don’t have jobs. Attending law school at this time was probably not the best move for many of them, but decisions always look different in hindsight.
There has been nothing to help these people, though. Student loans are still all but impossible to discharge in bankruptcy, there’s been no change in the interest rates (at least on federal loans), and no haircuts. There are tens of thousands of underemployed, over-educated, and seriously in debt people out there today – and they are the ones actually doing pretty well, comparatively.
Much more disturbing of the proposed budget cuts involve cuts to programs for the poor. Cuts to heating assistance and community block grants are downright offensive in the current climate.
All this while the President is promising to become friendlier with the business community. Ugh.
I still don’t understand where all the promised investment in the SOTU are going to come from, except possibly by harming other worthy programs. And even these proposals were pretty timid. What about real investments in education and infrastructure? Why not a huge expansion in Pell Grants? A real effort at high-speed rail?
I think the difference in the Two Americas is only to get worse over the years to come because of actions taken today.
What do others think? Will we fondly look back at the Obama administration as a time when wealth disparity and the disparity of opportunity shrank? Or will we look back with a deep sense of regret as a time full of many missed opportunities?
It sure is hard to imagine that the President couldn’t come up with something better to cut than such programs as home heating assistance. The Pentagon’s budget is getting a 4% INCREASE (although people are portraying it as some kind of noble sacrifice because it’s a smaller increase than usual). Some Tea Party allies have had enough integrity to admit that if we’re making cuts across the board we have to include defense spending. I would like to see Democrats make common cause with them on this rare point of agreement.
Paul Krugman tells a joke about the Obama budget, and his analysis, as usual, is so pungent and so on target I won’t add anything.
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p>Except to wonder and watch and try to track the hundreds email alerts that will be shortly cramming my mail box.
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p>Who will be our champions inside Congress and in the outside advocacy community? Who has the credibility and the energy and the capacity to mount a campaign to get some of these horrible proposals — from food stamps to fuel assistance to Pell grants to toxic waste cleanups — restored.
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p>In an earlier column,David Brooks argued(italics mine):
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p>I’m ready to pay more taxes myself, and have Medicare limit more of my health care, but Jeez, I just started getting my Social Security.
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Before you become too eager to sacrifice, follow this link (repeated from my comment below). Many of these people may pay taxes at a lower rate than you.
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p>Nine Pictures of the Extreme Income/Wealth Gap
is that Obama won’t win any votes from the people who are most “concerned” about cutting discretionary spending.
But it’s entirely consistent with Obama’s fixation on building some sort of consensus between those who want government to work and those who want to destroy it.
in Tahrir Square in Egypt to protest the growing divide between rich and poor in that country and the lack of concern about it by that country’s leaders? Maybe we need a similar protest here.
So we lower the deficit by giving back Federal funds back to the States only in the amount sent to Washington.
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p>If one peruses this list, it becomes clear those complaining the most are pols who come from States that benefit the most from the present exchange. Further in spite of this largesse they are among the least prosperous states and have the highest poverty rates. Taking a page out of the opposition’s playbook maybe they should fix their economic problems on their own and not depend on the Federal government for assistance.
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p>I am sure if this was proposed seriously we would see a lot of sputtering and foaming at the mouth from these folks. The lifestyle they so preciously want to cling to depends mightily on the more progressive states contribution to the Fed who enjoy better distribution of wealth and better lifestyle choices.
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p>Massachusetts itself gets 80 cents back for every dollar it sends to Washington. A 20% windfall would help mightily to solve some of our fiscal problems. I had to shut off Hayley Barbour’s ranting at the Conservative Conference and look up Mississippi’s miserable record.
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p>Massachusetts: Fed dollar return to state .82
Poverty level 9.2%
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p>Mississippi: Fed dollar return to state 2.02
Poverty level 21.6%
if the pundits and politicians paid attention to what the people really want. Here’s the recent Pew poll that shows that Americans don’t want cuts to many programs… but then we were ignored as well when we were asked about tax cuts for the very wealthiest.
I think Bob’s question is a good one, and others’ references to Egypt are apt. Apt! And while the energy for democracy in Egypt is soaring, the energy for it in the US of A is dwindling. I think it peaked with the jubilant celebrations in the streets of Obama’s inauguration. Strangers hugged and greeted each other, sharing an understanding of a great victory for people power over corporate rule, for government that reflects the values and desires of the people, for political discourse that is both meaningful and uplifting. Sadly Obama’s rhetoric and theater gave way to meaningless and dispiriting governance. Americans of ALL political stripes — and I am Green and not Blue — have been utterly exhausted from 10 years of fear mongering, war, and economic unraveling, and their accompanying bipartisan policy of corporate power and economic growth… for the very wealthy.
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p>And while I voted for Cynthia McKinney for President (0.12% of the vote), and Jill Stein for Governor (1.4% of the vote), it brings me no joy to point to Obama or Patrick’s transgressions, which seem to grow by the day. For opposition candidates refusing corporate money, these results do not instill confidence that my approach is the way to go. But Bob’s comment raises two critical questions:
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p>1) Do we simply accept the chains of a two-party system, voluntarily keeping ourselves shackled, even though we hold the key to unlock them?
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p>2) Do the people of Egypt have more guts, more resilience, and more dignity than us, in order to demand control of their own destiny?
You ask:
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p>Yes, to all of the above. Not because of some intrinsic difference, but because we are spoiled, coddled and infantilized at every turn. When it gets seasonably cold, our meteorologist-mommies warn us to keep our mittens on. When our highways and railroads fail from decades of neglect, our keepers lie to us rather than tell us truths that they decide we “can’t handle.”
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p>We see the torture that our government ordered (much of it in Egyptian torture-chambers), and we change the channel to some ballgame when news breaks that our “new” administration won’t pursue charges against the perpetrators. We pay somebody else’s children to go kill to support our petroleum habit, we fund their combat pay with debt backed by a wall-street operated Ponzi-scheme, and when the truth about it emerges, we shrug our shoulders and go back to our x-boxes. We are so caught up in sports metaphors that we act as though global warming will be solved by cheering loud and outlawing the consequences.
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p>Most American’s are more aware of Lada Gaga’s Grammy egg than about the spread of the Egyptian revolution.
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p>I think it’s because the bulk of the death, destruction, maiming, torture, and heartbreak caused by our collective addiction to petroleum happens on the other side of the world.
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p>Those who think things are tough now might want to speculate about what happens when China decides they’ve loaned us enough money. What happens when the Renminbi or the Euro is the currency of international exchange, instead of the dollar. What happens when American workers are forced to disassemble and attempt to reverse-engineer Chinese technology, because they are so far ahead of our own defunded education system. What happens when gasoline costs $10-20/gallon, and we’ve done nothing to wean ourselves from it.
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p>Most Americans spend our lives carefully protected inside a hideously-expensive cocoon woven from out-of-control military expenditures, out-of-control subsidies to the already-wealthy, and warped values that lead us to pay more attention to vicarious and voyeuristic Superbowl parties than to the world around us.
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p>Sooner or later, it will be American cities that are in turmoil. When millions of Americans are dying of hunger, thirst, and disease, we may start to watch more closely.
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p>Our current culture is unsustainable. It will either change or collapse. Our choice is to courageously face the ugly reality now, the way our ancestors have always faced enormous challenges, or wait for the consequences of our passivity to destroy our children and grandchildren.
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p>We are in denial. Denial always has consequences.
I’ll bet $100 that whenever Obama’s re-election campaign begins, 95% of the people on this website will support him 100% because he will be the least of two evils and because a third party candidate can never win. We are in denial, and we are facilitating our own demise.
I’ll bet $1.00
I doubt that most Americans realize the extent of our wealth and income inequality.
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p>I’m sick of hearing the phrase “in these tough economic times”. They’re not tough on everyone. The wealthiest 1% are doing just fine. This article “Nine Pictures of the Extreme Income/Wealth Gap” puts it in perspective. In addition to illustrating the extent of the inequality, it offers arguments as to why this is bad and some links to organizations that focus on this problem.
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p>A related article We’re Better off than the Egyptians – Right? makes some interesting comparisons. We’re not as different as we think. I wonder if Al Jazeera could cover this? Our news outlets won’t!
I was watching CNN the other day and they were talking about the uprising in Egypt and how lucky American’s are that they only spend 11% of their income on food. I would say that that figure is completely relative to income and way too averaged to be taken as fact. There are plenty of people in America who spend too much of their income just on the grocery budget. Our family spends 18% of our after tax income on our grocery budget. And it just keep getting higher. I do try to buy healthy foods but I will often cut back just to save because if you ask me 18% of after tax income on food is a bit much when there are so many other household budget busters to deal with like utilities, health care, mortgage and insurance, student loans and so much more.
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p>I can’t even tell you how fed up I am and while I was ready to give Obama a second chance to make things right during these next two years, it appears to me that he is finding his presidency to be an opportunity to continue to mess things up and remain completely out of touch with what is going on. I will not be supporting him in 2012.