Just wow at the student loan changes… eeek

[juliajo]

Students beginning university study this year upon completion of their studies will have to pay back 9% on earnings above £25,000 (aka, almost all full time wages now pay rises have been granted - national living wage is not far off that even if you decide to work in a supermarket after going to uni). It will now need to be paid over 40 years too so most of your working life, right through the expensive mortgage years and childcare years etc

I think this is catastrophic tbh and removes some of the incentive in education. I really hope schools spend time making sure cohorts fully understand the financial implications of university study, and think really carefully about what subject they choose. It’s a huge decision to make at 16/17 (when applying)

In Scotland so no fees and we pay rent and living expenses so no loans

Even if you earn 100k, the 9% loan repayment on the upper 75k is about £560pcm.

Given the take home pay on 100k is £5.5k per month, it seems manageable.

It would be fairer than the current model that discriminates on the basis of age and familial income, yes. I didn't say I wanted a graduate tax, btw, merely that an actual graduate tax would be fairer than one than in name only that you can get out of if you were born at the right time and/or to the right people. The current model is a shitshow, and it doesn't even fund universities properly so the subsidies you speak of are still happening.

I don't disagree about potential issues with discouraging people from upskilling, but clearly that's also a risk with our current model.

Fully agree. We wouldn't have had all the housing shortages in Uni towns either with so many "family" homes being converted into multiple occupancy student lets, as people would have generally been studying/working in their home towns if they were at colleges, Polys or workplaces.

I'm so glad I live in Scotland where my tax is higher but my dc are in a much better position with loans. They were all entitled to the minimum maintenance loan due to our income but pay no fees.

Dd1 is just graduating a fine art degree with minimum loan to pay back (her SAAS was £425 a month). She is job hunting. Luckily any hospitality job she'll get won't pay enough, but once she gets a design/illustration job she'll be over the threshold.

Ds is a nursing student. As well as paying no fees he gets a £10,000 bursary a year instead of a loan. Nothing to pay back!

Dd2 has just finished her HND and has 2 years worth of maintenance loan to pay back, same rate as dd1. Again, her fees were paid. She's not yet working enough hours to pay back but after the summer she's going full time in her spa (her HND is in beauty therapy) and will start paying back.

We couldn't afford to pay the full amount for all of them studying at once though we have helped as much as we could with rent, groceries etc. im very glad we're in the Scottish system. Dh pays 43% high rate tax but this kind of thing for our dc makes it worth it!

Minimum wage is OVER 20k for a 40 hour week - £21,700 in fact.

This☝️…they know what they’re doing!

@weegiemum Scotland sounds great. I wonder if they are more selective in the students they take i.e. they have less students so can afford for them not to pay fees? I don't understand how it works really, our unis in England are apparently broke, so I wonder how Scotland manages better.

It's not just starting this year I don't think? This affects my son and he is graduating this year.

Then society can pay them properly for it and if not and they chose to study something fun and more enjoyable than say working in a lab (and the lower pay) that's their choice.

Definitely very reasonable. I'm in Northern Ireland and originally from the Netherlands where I have my student loan still. Because they're antiquated and sexist, they take into account my husband's income as well. They also base their calculation on cost of living in the Netherlands, which is entirely different to here, as are the wages there (you make more on average in just about any job). Even though my husband had absolutely nothing to do with a student loan I had years before we met. I now have to pay them about €470 a month as they want it paid off after 15 years.

@Dorisbonson I agree society could pay more, but then again there's huge value in free museums, free libraries, concessions for cinemas, theatres and exhibitions. As for choosing to do something that makes them happy so they deserve poverty: what a very dystopian view! We are not here to work hard and miserably at something we hate until we drop dead.

Those things are already subsidised. Also yes generally (with other factors broadly equal) fun jobs pay less than ones which are not fun - if they didn't pay more then why would people do them? That's not dystopian that's simply realistic. Its the same principle why a Nightshift earns more than someone working daytime shifts.

its not that bad. My debt is around 90k with 2 degrees, i hardly notice the money going out each month.

Its like an extra tax really.

May just stop all these absolutely pointless degrees though and ensure people are studying decent career paths/vocations

You absolutely can work full-time alongside full-time study. I spent 5 years at university for my degree and post-grade and worked full-time for the first 4 years. I didn't work my final year because I wanted to concentrate fully, and I had built up enough funds that I didn't need to work in that final year.

It just takes organisation and focus, rather than going out on the piss all the time like the majority of students seem to do. I worked whilst my uni-mates partied. I was the first to be able to buy a car in cash outright and buy my first house soon after graduating. It's absolutely do-able with the right mindset.

I graduated 12 years ago and I've not paid back a penny.

I run my own business now but don't earn near the threshold due to working PT.

I think the best thing you can do is sit down with your child (they should be able to do this themselves tbh) and figure out how much it would be at different earnings levels. Look at their target career, how much they will earn and whether that looks reasonable.

Being completely honest if Dd said she wasn’t going to uni because of debt I’d roll my eyes at her and pass her a calculator. There are loads of really good reasons not to go to uni but the debt really isn’t one of them. Loads of people worked through uni when I was a kid. We are lucky we have a loan facility that only asks you to start paying back when you start earning. It seems reasonable that we contribute to our own education, I did, the starting point was 14k when I was paying mine back.

Hope you didn't do maths.

@DressQuery there are some amazing apprenticeships schemes in large companies who sponser them to get a degree while working. 100% the best way to go

I’m in my 30s and due to the interest rates my loan is going up not down, pay off £80 a month but the interest is £160 🤣😂

Advise your daughter to look at modern apprenticeships. The employer pays for the degree/professional qualification, gives you time off for study, gives you experience and pay well.

@ReadingSoManyThreads surley it depends on the course. My English flat mates most definitely could as they had 6-8hrs of contact time a week. But if you take a science between lectures and lab it’s quite difficult. I worked on weekends but couldn’t during the week as my course was very full on

I don't know if I'm just getting old and the lack of empathy on mumsnet in the last few years often astounds me. We've definitely become a more individualistic society.

An educated population benefits the country as a whole. We should make it easier and not harder. It shouldn't just be for the well off.

Its 9% of earnings over £25k
So of you earn £26k it's 9% of £1k
Which is £90 a year
£7.50 a month.

On £30k it's 9% of £5k which is £450 a year.
£37.50 a month.

Affordable, I would say?

You are correct.