Government stuffing young people again, student loans

[Binjob118]

Great day to bury the news that from next year student loans will be repayed over 40 years instead of 30. This makes a massive difference. Hate this government and Tony bloody Blair for stopping free tuition. Of course, won't affect all the rich kids who never take out the loan. This on top of impossibility of young people ever being able to buy a home makes me want to scream. Totally screwed. Certainly don't think IABU!!

I also agree that far too many people go to university though.

But employers need to stop asking for degrees when they are not needed.

University education is not necessary other than for a few careers. Doctors, dentists etc will be unaffected by this. Those affected will probably be doing pointless courses which never result in a decent salary. Why should everyone else subsidise pointless degrees?

For most jobs you could just do school leavers with apprenticeship and training.

[quote downtonabbeyfan1234]@ParsleySageRosemary per person spending is most likely going to be less than the funding needed for a history degree.[/quote]
Well it will be yes because you are taking those away too aren’t you? History and libraries go together, that much is true. This abysmally stupid country and the fools running it are destroying both.

Problem is how do you define a "pointless degree". I'm a clinical psychologist which I'm sure most people would (probably) agree is an important job, but my first degree (BSc Psychology) is regularly touted as one of the "pointless" ones!

@TrueBuys

University education is not necessary other than for a few careers. Doctors, dentists etc will be unaffected by this. Those affected will probably be doing pointless courses which never result in a decent salary. Why should everyone else subsidise pointless degrees?

Maybe you can write to all those employers who deem a degree to be a requirement for jobs then?

It’s totally unfair - arts graduates pay more than the cost of their course. Why should young people be so blighted just to get an education. It’s to everyone’s benefit to have an educated population. If graduates earn more (they do on average) they pay more tax so they already pay for themselves.

We want an educated, productive workforce but without any investment

It’s to everyone’s benefit to have an educated population.

People just don't understand this concept.

@Binjob118

Great day to bury the news that from next year student loans will be repayed over 40 years instead of 30. This makes a massive difference. Hate this government and Tony bloody Blair for stopping free tuition. Of course, won't affect all the rich kids who never take out the loan. This on top of impossibility of young people ever being able to buy a home makes me want to scream. Totally screwed. Certainly don't think IABU!!

Boris and Rishi "12 homes" just can't raising taxes can they. And make no mistake this is a regressive tax.

Why should everyone else subsidise pointless degrees?

Why should people without kids subsidise schools? Why should net contributors pay for those on benefits? Why should people pay for a NHS they hardly use? Where do you draw the line?

@downtonabbeyfan1234

For most jobs you could just do school leavers with apprenticeship and training.

Exactly Too many people go to university who shouldn’t or don’t need to. We should value jobs that you don’t need a degree for and/or value work experience much more than we do.

For most jobs you could just do school leavers with apprenticeship and training.

Apprenticeships will need to pay more than £4.30 an hour then

I didn’t realise it had gone down to 30 years, I started uni in 2005 and my student loan won’t be written off till I’m 65, 43 years after I graduated. I think it’s fine, I borrowed it, I have to pay it back. I just treat it like extra tax. My sister earns just over the threshold and pays back about £15 a month, hardly onerous.

Why would you not expect to repay a loan?

I'm meant to be going to uni in September. I'm a mature student so I'll be taking my student loan debt to the grave with me, I'm not even doing a 'Mickey mouse' degree but it's certainly not one I'll walk into a job with so I'll still likely be on minimum wage and not earning over 25k anyway.

I'm ok with it but haven't studied it great detail. If you don't earn you don't pay it back. I don't think that the tax paying population should pay too much towards an individuals personal education. Why should some poor bugger who is grafting away at minimum wage be contributing to other people's education when they then go on to be high earners.

The thing people should be getting angry about is widening access to higher education. Through no fault of their own some kids go to schools which really struggle to get kids to universities. All state funded schools should provide the same standard of education and opportunities to their pupils. No state funded school should be exclude anyone

Why should some poor bugger who is grafting away at minimum wage be contributing to other people's education when they then go on to be high earners

Because those poor buggers will benefit from educated doctors, dentists and scientists. And their children will benefit from educated teachers in all disciplines

The majority of student debt is never paid back so I don't see why it should be written off after 30 years; 40 seems much fairer to me. Uni kids nowadays will probably be working into their early 70s so they have more time to pay
Do people want to go back to the days when only the academically gifted or rich kids could go to university? My parents certainly couldn't have afforded to send me when I was 18.
And why aren't we encouraging kids to stay at home and study locally, instead of moving to the other end of the country and paying mortgage numbers each month to live in one room? Universities should spread the courses evenly across the nation to help make this possible.

I feel that if the students have to bear the costs it gives them an incentive to actually work during the degree and also to find a well paying job after graduation. By all means give them the loan but they HAVE to pay it back.

@DottyHarmer

Frankly I think it should be backdated. I know someone who has a degree and MA and will intentionally never work. So nothing to pay back - ever. At least the fees should be collected from estates when people die in the distant future. Plenty of people earn just under the threshold for repayment too.

Sadly if you have near-on 50% of young people going to university, this is what happens. And, as usual, it will be the schmucks in the middle who suffer - the middle earners

I care less about “silly” degrees which are actually vocational; I object to people studying English at a place that until five minutes ago was a HE college. I can’t remember the place but it was in the news that at just such an establishment the students were studying Harry Potter and The Hunger Games. That is a disgrace; it is Year 6 level.

I completed all of my a levels in nine months (both parts) to get into uni before the fees tripled, and it was repayable over a longer period of time.

I made decisions about university based on the information at the time. So backdating changes is grossly unfair for the many people who undertook student loans under specific conditions.

I don’t have a Mickey Mouse degree. I’m due to have my loans repaid in the next 7 years including the interest. Many of my colleagues are the same. Not everyone saw university as an experience to be had, so unfair to generalise.

Education should always be free .
However, we have opened the floodgates to too many students, going to university, with no end result. Hence we have pubs , hotels, restaurants full of graduates with no job to go to and an
endless supply of students competing for jobs with non graduates.

My mum told me an old anecdote from the Eastern European country that she came from.

A man stands in front of a large crescent of doors at the foot of some stairs leading to a university.
A graduate walks down the stairs towards him.
The man says "Congratulations! What's your degree?"
The student says "History."
The man says "Hmmm.. let's see... how about this door?"

A while later , a student walks towards him and the man says "Congratulations! What's your degree? The student says 'engineering' then the man says " which door would you like to walk through?"

We need to start gearing higher education towards our needs.
There's nothing wrong with academia but we really need to focus on what our nation needs.
Higher level thinking will always be needed but I think we've allowed too many students in to higher level education where there will be no end result.

Perhaps if there was a reversal to the extreme erosion of wages in the last 20 yrs I wouldn't feel so strongly.

It's not in a vacuum, young people face

higher costs for education
higher taxes
less generous pensions
higher house prices
older state pension age despite life expectancy not increasing
wage depression
and the NHS won't be free for them in 30 yrs time with free prescriptions at 60.