Oh Mittens, if only we had our well-heeled parents to lean on or a business we could pull equity from like a glorified ATM. If anyone's bothering to watch, this serves as further proof of how astonishingly aloof and disconnected Mitt Romney is from the rest of America. Being the GOP's pre-ordained presidential candidate (and a rather well-funded one at that) with corporations for friends and scores of sycophants willing to carry his water for as far as it takes, he can afford to be out-of-touch with average Americans.
Student loan debt is a hell of an albatross over the necks of millions of college-going Americans, with total debt clocking in at over a cool $1 trillion. This mountain of debt was made possible thanks to a number of different factors that merged to create a perfect financial storm, including a bachelor's degree as a defacto requirement for most jobs and ever-increasing tuition costs. With state schools topping $20k a year for classes and books, even the most determined students can't just stay out of debt by taking on a part-time job, no matter what Virginia Foxx thinks. For many without a trust fund or wealthy parents to turn to, student loan debt is damn-near a prerequisite part of getting a college education.
Of course, you could do without college and get into a trade. A lot of people do that. But that takes money, too, and most people just aren't geared towards welding, plumbing, HVAC repairs and the like. And that's beside today's point.
Meanwhile, government-issued student loan rates were set to double from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent in July, until the House managed to pass a bill freezing those rates in place for the time being. House Republicans passed the measure on the condition of raiding the health care fund set aside by the 2010 Affordable Care Act for a cool $5.9 billion, something the president isn't too happy with. If this passes the Senate, he's promised to put his pimp hand veto pen on the bill, which will make him look like the bad guy to millions of indebted students across the country.
The Senate has other ideas on how to pay for the rates freeze. Too bad it involves making professional firms pay their fair share in taxes instead of cannibalizing a disliked program or two.
