[grecy]

> I also have difficulty seeing the first benefit you list as being a benefit. I don't have a problem with people pursuing degrees in fields that aren't big money makers, but I also don't know that the government should be in the business of incentivising people to study in these fields.

It's actually one of the best things about the system. Maybe you want to be a social worker who will never earn much but will make a meaningful difference in peoples lives, or a lawyer that only works for non-profits, or a doctor that only works for doctors without borders, or any one of ten thousand other examples where a person can make an extremely valuable contribution to society, but doesn't earn a ton of money.

You made the mistake of assuming that only people earning a ton of money make valuable contributions to a society.

[why_only_15]

You make the mistake that the relationship between income and value to society is inverse. Delivery people, for example, or store clerks or the like are all not paid well, but their impact on society isn't particularly profound either. The loan payment structure gives people an incentive to have a lower paying job as opposed to a higher paying one, which isn't the right way to go about it.

[jdeibele]

Option #1: low-paid job. Probably routine job where you're not expected (or allowed!) to contribute anything that the last person who had the job could do. Live with roommates, rent your whole life, insecurity due to lack of savings, poor (if any) health insurance (US applicable).

Option #2: higher-paid job. Have to pay back loan, which might be a problem if you're just at the bottom of the "you have to pay it back" scale. May have your own apartment or possibly a house, savings, hopefully good health insurance, etc.

I've worked with people who would choose option #1 permanently. Their life was outside their work. They started thinking about the job when they clocked in and stopped when they clocked out. Most of them didn't go to college.

Others did go to college and graduated but didn't know what they wanted to do with their lives. Having the equivalent of a gap year or two (or ten!) after college without worrying about loan payments doesn't seem like the worst thing in the world.