Recently, President Joe Biden made good on his promise to forgive student loan debt. In an official statement addressing the student loan relief plan released on Aug. 24, Biden said it will allow people to “finally crawl out from under that mountain of debt to get on top of their rent and utilities, to finally think about buying a home or starting a family or starting a business.”
Citizens with annual adjusted gross salaries less than $125,000 (or $250,000 per household) will receive $10,000 off their student loan debt. Citizens with qualifying salaries who are also eligible for a Pell Grant will receive an additional $10,000 off their student loans.
In order to qualify, the loans must be federal, not privately issued. Some current students are also eligible for student loan cancellation, based on free application for federal student aid and whether or not they filed as independent or dependent. Student loan forgiveness for independent students will be based on their own incomes, whereas parent incomes will be taken into account for those who filed as dependents.
Like citizens across the country, UM students have mixed feelings about the plan.
“I think it’s dumb because it’s not fixing the underlying problem of higher education being too expensive in the first place,” Mary-Patt Robben, a sophomore public policy major, said.
Robben believes that student loan forgiveness is not the correct way to combat the increasing cost of a college education and only provides a temporary solution for the issue.
But that isn’t how everyone feels about the topic of student loan forgiveness. UM senior Jared Holly, a psychology and nursing major, wholeheartedly supports the new plan.
“I’m all for it. I’ll pay the taxes or whatever it takes. I’m not even necessarily one of those students in debt — I’m grateful to have parents who pay for my education, but I think we should cancel out more,” Holly said.
Preston Kennedy, a sophomore international studies major also supports the plan, but he thinks that the plan does not go far enough.
“I feel like, if we’re going to spend this much, we should just forgive it all,” Kennedy said. “It’s a step in the right direction, but if we’re willing to spend billions of dollars on this, we should just go all the way.”
It is estimated that around 8 million citizens will get their expected debt forgiveness without needing to take any additional action because their current income information is on file with the U.S. Department of Education. For those without up to date income information on file, there will be an online form released where they can claim the debt forgiveness if they qualify for it. This application is expected to be released within the coming months.
