Free college tuition for all! says presidential candidate Bernie Sanders

[cal04]

At least one presidential candidate would like to make college tuition-free.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont Independent, introduced legislation Tuesday that would get rid of tuition at four-year public colleges and universities. The presidential candidate’s proposal is the latest indication that the idea of minimizing the cost of college, which some progressive Democrats have been pushing for months, will at the very least become part of a mainstream political discussion.

Under Sanders’s proposal, the federal government would foot two-thirds of the bill for students and the states would pay for the rest. Sanders would cover the federal costs through what he calls a “Wall Street speculation fee,” essentially a tax imposed on investment houses, hedge funds and others, for transactions involving trades of stocks, bonds and derivatives. States would have to come up with their own sources of funding.

(snip)
Sanders’s bill also includes proposals to mitigate the cost of student loans, including allowing borrowers to refinance student loans to take advantage of lower interest rates. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, is leading a charge in Congress to allow student loan borrowers to refinance.




http://www.marketwatch.com/story/free-college-tuition-for-all-says-presidential-candidate-bernie-sanders-2015-05-19

[MineralMan]

1. I'm not sure how that could be implemented, really.

It's a great idea, though.

[Autumn]

3. Yes it is. Obama feels that community college should be as free as high school.

I imagine there are plenty of ways to do it. Our young people should not face crippling debt to get an education that will stand them in good stead through their life.

[MineralMan]

4. Yes. I remember Obama saying that.

The trouble is that Presidents can't make such things happen on their own. I would love to see free post-secondary education in this country. Someone, however, has to pay for it. If the federal government is going to subsidize part of that, legislation to that effect will have to be passed in Congress and signed by the President. If the states will be subsidizing part of it, each state will have to fund that.

It's not an Executive Order sort of initiative, because it will require billions in funding. As long as Republicans are in control of Congress and state legislatures, nothing of the sort will be legislated. That's always the problem. It's easy to say that such a thing should happen. Making it happen, though, is almost impossible.

That's the difficulty here. I pay little attention to statements like this, unless there is some plan for implementing it. I don't see any such plan, either from President Obama or from Senator Sanders. Such funding legislation is not possible at this point or in the foreseeable future.

I want to hear proposals that have some chance to be implemented, not fantasy stuff.

[Autumn]

5. Of course they can't, any idiot knows that. They are plenty of ways this could be paid for

one way that has been mentioned is taxing stock trades. I'm good with that.

[MineralMan]

6. Taxing stock trades would also require enabling legislation.

Not possible in any near future time I can imagine.

Bottom line: College is expensive. Someone is going to have to pay. Shifting the payer to the government is unlikely to be something that can happen, and taxing stock trades will be a very, very tough sell in Congress.

[Autumn]

8. Bottom line: Legislation can be passed. I have some things to do so you have a nice day.

[salimbag]

2. California colleges

They used to be free. How did they do it? There are many ways to fund this, but does the political will exist? Student loan interest rates should be the same as Fed loans to banks. Go Bernie!

[MineralMan]

7. I went to a California University in the 60s.

It wasn't exactly free, but the state paid most of it. There were fees, cost of room and board, textbooks, etc. The state stopped paying, so the burden got shifted to the students. Colleges were never free. It's just a matter of who's paying.