GOP will bankrupt graduate students. This is Zach's story

[egbertowillies]

My daughter shared a Facebook post that should bring tears to one's eyes. We know we want an educated population to build the future. In order to pay off their wealthy benefactors, Republicans are willing to pilfer us all, Republicans, Democrats, and others alike with their tax cut scam. This students story should enrage everyone irrespective of ideology or political affiliation.

https://egbertowillies.com/2017/11/17/gop-will-bankrupt-graduate-students/

[Dave Starsky]

1. This is just fucked up beyond belief.

The rest of the world is going to turn their backs on us. They are waiting patiently to see if we snap out of this strange phase we seem to be in, but they're not going to wait very long. They are moving forward without us.

Over the last 40-plus years, I have watched this country go from aspiring to be a "shining city on a hill", leading the charge on creativity and innovation in all fields, to having no aspirations whatsoever. This fucked-up tax bill will be the final telling blow. We do not want to participate with the world in advancement to make lives better; we just want to make sure that our megabillionaires are comfortable in their richness.

[VMA131Marine]

2. There is another way this could go ....

Currently, I believe these these waivers are mostly paid for as overhead on each academic department rather than explicitly billed to sponsors of research and teaching assistantships. The externally funded research assistantships are concentrated in the engineering and science disciplines (nobody gets an RA to pay for an MBA or an MD). The university will have to withhold taxes and probably FICA on the value of the waiver which could eat up most of a graduate students pay (even at Ivy League schools these top out around $30K (which may sound like a lot, but is probably no more than half what the student could get in a 'real' job).

The only way this would be tenable is if the university increases the stipend to cover the imputed tax withholding. This will increase overhead rates causing university research to become much more expensive and likely resulting in increases in undergraduate tuition as well. Everybody will get hurt with this, except the international students, many of whom come here with funding from their own governments. It used to be that China was the main source of international students, but this has changed as their own universities have gained near parity with US institutions. The big influx now is from Iran and the Middle East.

[Initech]

3. Just once I want to see the billionaire criminals tighten their belts.

Every god damn year we're told the same bullshit - the economy is in the toilet and we're going to have to tighten our belts. Yet I see no mention of Verizon or GE or Boeing having to tighten their belts. Which means their CEOs get big fat pay days. And they just want more. So repeat the cycle again and again. So much of our problems can be tied to economic disparity. If we could break this cycle it would pay for itself a million times over. We need to stand up to the billionaires and say fuck you, enough is enough!