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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think that mums should get some sort of concession for student loan repayments?

323 replies

bubbleymummy · 29/05/2009 10:19

I just got my student loan statement and yet another big whack of interest has gone on. I haven't been able to make any payments since I went on maternity leave 3 years ago because I only worked PT after ds. Now I have ds2 and who knows when I'll be back to ft work. dh on the other hand has paid back over half of his. It just seems a bit discrimatory to me...most women will have to take a salary drop at some stage to have a family and won't hit the threshold for repayments while the interest just piles on...shouldn't we get a bit of a break?

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Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 11:11

I think we could get a few threads out of that VH!

I can understand where you are coming from in relation to choices - DH could stay at home if I went back to work. (Although that would murder us financially - he earns A LOT more than I ever could) but if even if we looked at the maternity leave aspect of it (because only women can have babies)- perhaps a maternity gap in student loan tax - just a few months... I'm not totally unreasonable...

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Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 11:12

QC - it is a gender issue when only women can have babies - take time out to do so and pay more because of it.

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Quattrocento · 31/05/2009 11:17

It is not predetermined that women have to take time out. If we are talking a few months of maternity leave then the difference is negligible, if years then it is a matter of choice and I really don't see why I (as a taxpayer) should subsidise your childcare choices.

Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 11:23

QC, I think it's 9 months now (6 when I had DS1). Depending on how many children you have, this does add up. I have had an extra couple of thousand tacked on already. Nice for you if you consider that negligible but I don't.

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violethill · 31/05/2009 11:26

I have to agree with Quattro on this one.
It's a choice to take anything over and above statutory ML. You can choose which parent stays home (if you want to have one parent home full time) or you can choose which parent tries to reduce or flex their hours, or you can choose to both continue to work as well as be a parent.

It's also a choice about how many children you have/how you space your family etc.

I am a mother, and I don't see why I should subsidise other mothers who choose not to work. It's not a gender issue - it's about choices.

lulu25 · 31/05/2009 11:31

you only end up paying more if you don't pay your loans off before you have children. i would have thought there was more of an argument for longer term loans/financial planning that are more likely to coincide with time out to have children - if you're going to pick anything, make it pensions.

lockets · 31/05/2009 11:32

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Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 11:33

Statistically though more women will be working below that 15k threshold because of children - whether they're SAHM or working PT or whatever. That IS a gender thing. Yes, to a degree it is about choices, but let's face it, women do more of the child raising than men. In some cases we may be only talking about a couple of years of interest tacked on, in others it could be a lot more but I find it strange that people are happy to sit back and not worry about paying extra interest because they have children. If any other loan based the amount of interest charged on what gender you were - it wouldn't be v popular! (Except with the men! )

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Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 11:35

Lulu, It depends on how much your loan is. Mine was post-98 when all the fees came in and my course was 5 years so my loan is pretty big. It is going to take a looooooooong time to pay it back and I can't wait until my late 40s to have kids!

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MummyDragon · 31/05/2009 11:48

Hi bubbley - am curious, do you have kids already, or are you thinking about all this in advance? (just coz your last post suggests that maybe you haven't had kids yet, or perhaps I've read that wrongly ...)

I agree with violethill on most of this. Plus it IS a real shock, when you're factoring in childcare costs etc, to realise exactly how expensive children can be!! Hard to imagine it before they're born. But that's the way it is ... and no, I still don't think that your student loan interest should be deferred while you have children, UNLESS you are prepared to not accept any statutory maternity pay / maternity allowance ... otherwise you'd be receiving 2 lots of maternity benefits when others only received 1, and that would be discriminatory, wouldn't it?

Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 11:57

MD - I have 2 boys - ages 3 years and 11 weeks. I can see how my last post could have read like I haven't tho!

Not sure I agree that it's like receiving extra mat benefits - unless those mat benefits were just solely intended to pay back loans...

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expatinscotland · 31/05/2009 12:05

'Still not sure if people understand my point though. As women, we are at a disadvantage to men with this type of loan because we will have to pay back more. It's not really a fair system. I suppsoe technically, women will always be at a disadvantage because the majority will earn less than men anyway...regardless of whether they have children or not.'

People get your point! We're not all a bunch of idiots! It's just that others don't agree with you and think YABU and when you disagree with that you continually bang on about people not understanding your point or not minding that some people will pay more than others because they chose to have a family and stay home to bring them up.

I agree with Quattro 100%.

Mat leave is only 9 months if you can afford to live on SMP. If you can't then you go back when the full or 90% pay runs out.

My H was a SAHD.

YABU.

If you don't like paying back loans or paying interest, then don't take out loans to go to university.

Don't have kids or don't chose to stay home with them.

If you don't like making £15K/year then chose to train for a profession where the pay is higher.

Life is full of choices and trade-offs, I don't see where others should pay for your having made choices different from their's.

'It is not predetermined that women have to take time out. If we are talking a few months of maternity leave then the difference is negligible, if years then it is a matter of choice and I really don't see why I (as a taxpayer) should subsidise your childcare choices.'

Exactly!

MummyDragon · 31/05/2009 12:10

2 boys, lovely . Well, I didn't have a student loan when I received maternity benefits. Maternity benefits aren't means-tested. Do you think they should be?? Coz if not, surely I should have received the equivalent to your non-loan-interest in my mat benefits, if you see what I mean? Otherwise, you've technically received more than me, haven't you?

I'm not trying to get arsey about this, I'm just trying to say that you do seem to be suggesting that women with debts should receive extra help when they have children (hence your original AIBU post) and I don't think that would be equitable.

Probably an overhaul of the entire system is needed, as it is indeed ludicrous that people should have to spend 20+ years paying off their student debts - but that is unfair regardless of gender. You can't ask for special circumstances because of a personal choice that you and your DH have made.

PistachioLemon · 31/05/2009 12:11

My problem with student loans is that the interest is compound interest which means that although it is quite small, we end up paying interest on interest (iyswim). And that means, as far as I can work out and please do correct me if I'm wrong, that the SLC is getting more than the rate of inflation.

Plus, it does disciminate against women for the reasons mentioned in previous posts, AND against those who are lower earners because it will take them longer to pay it off and will therefore cost them more than someone who is a higher earner.

Actually student loans are a real bug-bear of mine. The government actively encourages young people to go to university but the cost of the loans are not adequately explained and there is no real alternative.

sarah293 · 31/05/2009 12:13

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MummyDragon · 31/05/2009 12:13

Erm ... *Pistachio" ... surely if you're intelligent enough to go to university, you're intelligent enough to read the small print on the loan papers that you're signing, or to do some research online before you take out the loan?

violethill · 31/05/2009 12:15

Excellent post expat.

Life is all about trade-offs. There are jobs I could do where I could earn more money, but I wouldn't want to work the hours, or have the pressure, or maybe the ethics of the job wouldn't sit comfortably. There are jobs I could do which would pay considerably less than I get - but I wouldn't want the boredom.

We all need to weigh up the pros and cons and then make whatever decision seems best at the time.

MummyDragon · 31/05/2009 12:15

Riven you're not saying that you deliberately took out a loan with no intention of paying it back, are you? Please tell me I've misunderstood your post, please ...

violethill · 31/05/2009 12:19

I thought that too MD. Wouldn't sit comfortably with me.
(Specially having done my degrees without any loans)

sarah293 · 31/05/2009 12:20

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Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 12:23

yes they are MD I do see your point as well.

I agree with PL (glad someone else sees it my way as well ) the whole system needs an overhaul. It is v unbalanced. I've just mentioned mums which seems to have pissed a few people off but low-earners in general (which mums will often fall into) get a crap deal.

exp - I don't think you are stupid. There were just a lot of posts about my dh sharing the costs etc. I'm glad you understood my ramblings and of couse you are perfectly entitled to disagree

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MummyDragon · 31/05/2009 12:23

Oh God Riven I'm so sorry, what an awful struggle for you.

PistachioLemon · 31/05/2009 12:24

MD, you're right, but realistically how many 18 year olds will read the small print, and it's not as if there is an alternative. The SLC has an effective monopoly.

Also, students are fed a load of guff about how they will only pay inflation rates and so effectively the loan is free, which is blatantly not true.

I do agree that life is about trade-offs, but it's just not realistic to say that everyone can get higher paid jobs or can decide at 18 whether they want to at some point have one, two or more children so that they can calculate how much their cost of studying will actually be.

But really my main gripe is about the lack of information.

Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 12:25

sorry lots of x-ps

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Original poster
bubbleymummy · 31/05/2009 12:35

MD, as PL said, it's all very well reading the small print but when you are 18 of course you thinkyou'll have no prob earning over 15k with a degree and working your way up the corporate ladder - you'll have that money paid back in no time. You aren't thinking about kids, maternity leave and office politics, costs of childcare etc...these are things that you find out after you leave the nice student bubble and hit the real world. Too many things are unbalanced and I don't think it all just boils down to the choices we make.

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