[pc86]

About 8 years post-graduated I have roughly $19k in student debt remaining. At my current payments, I won't pay it off in the next 12 years, but it's cheaper for me to pay it off quickly.

Even ignoring the often sizeable income tax bill, people whose debts are forgiven likely paid more back to the government than you did, on both a percentage and absolute scale.

Edit: And to the income tax point, if you've got tens of thousands in debt and have an already high income (not totally outside the realm of possibility since you're likely ~42 years old) that could easily be a 5-figure bill.

[yummyfajitas]

That's a completely nonsensical way to do accounting. $1 today != $1 with risk of non-payment 5 years from now.

The correct way to compare is to do time discounting at market interest rates (i.e. what interest rates would be if the feds did not act as backers for student loans).