Uk replace student grants with loans

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but as I understand it, you only pay back a set proportion of your wages and only after you've earned a certain amount.

Obviously, if you're having to borrow more money then you're going to have to pay more back over the course of the loan, but the rate at which you pay it back won't change.

Why should people be entitled to a free third level education?
You can make an economic argument one way or the other, but how on earth is it a moral issue? How is it an entitlement?
The state is putting up the up front costs you need and allowing you to get an education you otherwise couldn't. Why should giving you free money be part of the deal?

It's an investment in your future and you should have to bear the burden of it.
If you get an education out of it, giving you an otherwise unreachable earning potential, then what's the problem?

That others had a better deal growing up is utterly irrelevant, but typical of the kind of begrudging attitude towards any effort to reign in these kinds of schemes.
Just because other people were able to get away with taking advantage of an incorrect policy, doesn't mean you automatically should too.
Or perhaps it was a perfectly good policy, but is no longer desirable or viable. Whether that puts your nose out of joint is irrelevant. It wasn't being done for the recipients' benefit but for society as a whole.

Whether it actually is an incorrect policy is a seperate debate, but begrudgery isn't an argument.

Regardless of all of that, we should be trying to decouple higher level education from the standard university and college system.
There's no longer any need to funnel everyone through 3 and 4 year degree courses. The internet and the hitherto unheard of capacity to acquire knowledge, research and teach yourself new skills needs to change the way we think about education.

It should be easier and cheaper to get educated and one route to that is understanding that education can be more focused and more granular than a half a decade slog costing you or the state 100k+.

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

At entry, sure, because the prospect of tenure and better salaries down the line.

Look at it this way, if you want quality you have to pay for it. Pay out peanuts and you get monkies teaching the country's future leaders. That's why we need student loans.

it's not. we don't need student loans. they are a waste of space.

FrStone wrote: »

Ridiculous.. Pay back the grant when you are qualified and earning above a certain threshold. Therefore, you can afford to pay it back. You can't now, but you will be able to in the future. Why should those with who come from a low income background get an easy ride in college, while the rest of us had to work to pay our fees never mind getting cash handed to us.

because they have to for the greater good of insuring those from a poor background can access third level. they can't pay back the grant when they are qualified as it's to expensive. they will have to default and go abroad, or not go in the first place. just because you had to do something doesn't mean everyone else has to, the world doesn't work like that.

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Even welfare class parents tend to have cars or savings. That's enough to act as guarantor.

not really, they could sell the car before going abroad. that is of course if the car is even worth anything in the first place.

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Oh you'd be surprised.

Still even for those who have no assets at all ( a very small number) a payment schedule could be put in place.

Remember this is only in the case of little Jimmy dodging his loan by fecking off to America. I think a few sharp phone calls would be sent to little Jimmy to tell him to cop the **** on before it got to this stage.

that's not even going to help.

The problem with the rose-tinted view of free third level education as a 'right' is that in practice, what really happens is that the overwhelming majority of students come from middle-class or higher families that can afford to pay (or save for) fees but instead have them paid by the taxpayer, ironically including those taxpayers that will never go to university.

andekwarhola wrote: »

The problem with the rose-tinted view of free third level education as a 'right' is that in practice, what really happens is that the overwhelming majority of students come from middle-class or higher families that can afford to pay (or save for) fees but instead have them paid by the taxpayer, ironically including those taxpayers that will never go to university.

Sorry, are you joking? IT'S MEANS TESTED You don't just roll up and get handed money because you ask for it??

You are only given help based on what you earn. Everyone who earns under €50,000 a year is entitled to some help, to varying degrees. It's up to you whether you claim it or not.

MagicHumanDoll wrote: »

There are two families; one who have no savings, live paycheck to paycheck. The other, earns enough to be considered ineligible to a grant.

The first family has their children graduate and earn a respectable income each. They tried to better themselves in life and have, but each pay back a hefty sum that got them there.
The second family, like the first, have their children graduate and earn an equally respectable income each. They pay back a smaller sum then the first, and manage to do it quicker than the first family's children due to the size of the loan.

Why are you talking about families taking out loans? The person attending college is getting the loan, not the family.

I know there is a parental guarantee required with student loans at the moment, however, even with those loans, there is no loan repayment required until the student graduates, at which point the loan is re-structured, and the parent will not be required, as the student will then be working.

F.Grimes wrote: »

Why are you talking about families taking out loans? The person attending college is getting the loan, not the family.

I know there is a parental guarantee required with student loans at the moment, however, even with those loans, there is no loan repayment required until the student graduates, at which point the loan is re-structured, and the parent will not be required, as the student will then be working.

Poor wording, apologies. My point is that children who come from poorer families pay back more due to taking out bigger loans. Thus, they are poorer then their graduate companions, and will find it harder to escape being poor.

Essentially punished for being poor, which isn't the child's fault.

F.Grimes wrote: »

That is a very strange argument you are trying to make. Are you trying to completely negate the economic status of these families? Of course rich people will never have any problems affording 3rd level. However, the purpose of these loans is to afford people the same opportunity as those who can afford it, without taking out a loan.

If a rich and a "poor" person, both get into the same course, and both end up in the same job, earning the same amount, that is an equal society. If the "poor" person, has to use a larger portion of their income to pay back a loan, which has afforded them the opportunity to achieve something that was previously out of their reach, I would say that is avery successful outcome.

I would say the same to you. What you described in the first paragraph was the current system. Then in the second you describe exactly why a change becomes a punishment of the child's background.

There's a reason why these systems exist, why scholarships exist. It's to allow every child the same opportunities, and have them hampered in as little a way as possible by their socio-economic background.

F.Grimes wrote: »

However, the purpose of these loans is to afford people the same opportunity as those who can afford it, without taking out a loan.

A grant essentially does this. Bare in mind my parents pay tax that funds these grants, and have for the 30+ years they've worked, just like anyone else.

F.Grimes wrote: »

That is a very strange argument you are trying to make. Are you trying to completely negate the economic status of these families? Of course rich people will never have any problems affording 3rd level. However, the purpose of these loans is to afford people the same opportunity as those who can afford it, without taking out a loan.

If a rich and a "poor" person, both get into the same course, and both end up in the same job, earning the same amount, that is an equal society. If the "poor" person, has to use a larger portion of their income to pay back a loan, which has afforded them the opportunity to achieve something that was previously out of their reach, I would say that is avery successful outcome.

and that is the problem, people seeing a mountain of debt they won't be able to pay back as a success. that is another thing that got ireland into it's mess in the first place.

MagicHumanDoll wrote: »

Ah, what a lovely, easy ride I have relying on the state to pay for me to go to college. I love it. I waste all the money away on parties and drink.

Do you honestly think I wouldn't pay for college if I could? The reason I am entitled to it is because we have no excess money. The reason you have to work to pay your fees is because you do. It's not really fair is it? Well considering the grant threshold is close to €45,000 p/a for any sort of financial help, if you truly earn above that amount and believe it's unfair I get help and you don't; try live on half that per year and you'd soon understand why.

Well actually I earned no where near 45K, my parents did. That's not my money though it's theirs. Hence I had to earn the 3K registration fee each year and enough to cover all other expenses.

While I had many classmates getting money handed to them based on their parents income.

If would be a lot fairer if everyone was entitled to the same thing. I.e a loan to cover these costs paid back when you reach a certain earnings threshold.

[Deleted User] wrote: »

What sort of thinking is it that makes you compare two systems at the extreme right and left? There are many types of economic systems between those so why bother making strawmen comparisons as a means to portray the current unrestrained, free-market capitalist model where super-rich corporations are avoiding tax while the ordinary guy must pay his fair share as the only option? It isn't and it never was the only option.

If this current abomination of capitalism is your only understanding of a "capitalist" system it is, with all due respect, deeply flawed.

And the moment those super rich are told what to do, they'll simply bugger off to somewhere where they're not, while "donating" to political causes there to ensure it stays that way. Leaving us where?

Like it or not, the only way the rich are going to get less well off is if the poorer get much less well off, relatively. It's a nice idea to hold, that that's not in fact the case, but one I personally gave up on long ago.

I don't want to call free market capitalism a necessary evil, because there are less evil necessities out there, like the one I touched on in the previous post, removing some of the legislations and regulations protectionism killing manufacturing and other production (making it easier for businesses to operate without sustained and large debts) and introducing a little more regulation on the moneymen (the reaction to which - basically attemting to crash everything by sitting on funds - would hopefully be absorbed by the reduced regulation of businesses) but it is capitalism that's forged the modern parts of our world, for better or worse.

Now if we could transfer full ownership, of the right to print/issue money, to the public, we'd be flying. Most of the taxation these days is to repay the interest private central banks demand after loaning to sovereign governments, with not a lot going on public/infrastructure/everything else spending..

F.Grimes wrote: »

please explain what is wrong with my plan. How exactly do you find it inequitable! Bare in mind I am saying inequitable, not unequal.

Look, the current system is means tested. The current system gives those, like myself, the money we are deemed to need to be able to go to college. At the end of it, both myself and all my classmates start on relatively level start. That is equal, that is equitable.

If you make me pay a loan when I graduate because my parents couldn't afford the costs, well then that is unequal and inequitable.

There is a reason there are scholarships for those who are considered intelligent and are from a lesser background. It allows everyone equal opportunity and the chance to better themselves if they want to.

Deleted User wrote: »

There will always be the "haves" and the "have nots". That's life.

Let those with money keep it, and those without it stay without it. Is that what you're saying?

I assume you're lucky enough to be a "have" and have never been a "havenot" so of course the idea of giving a "havenot" every chance at becoming a "have" is ludicrous in your eyes.