GUEST: Ripoff “colleges”: Crushing debt and subprime education
- Politicians rain our money on ripoff schools
BY LINDA STAMATO
We have been using public money to prop up private, for-profit colleges, while their students acquire crushing debt and questionable credentials. And, more than half of the students default on their loans. So, why, why are we doing this? Our Congress, the one that doesn’t want to spend money (well, on certain things anyway), has no hesitation in letting the dollars flow to these outfits. After all, Congress does care a lot about creating wealth for shareholders of corporations, and these “education corporations” receive 80 percent of their revenues from us, yes, the nation’s taxpayers.
Wonder why privatization — of education — is so dependent upon public funds? Something about the profit potential, I guess. All those folks who rail against the use of government funds for private purposes, where are they? Where is the reduce-the-deficit crowd when we need them?
The for-profit sector has grown–tripling its enrollment—in less than a decade. At the same time, students enrolled in for-profit colleges have taken on high levels of debt in pursuit of credentials that have little chance of leading to careers that pay well; in fact, to the respected Education Trust, http://www.edtrust.org these students are on “a path into the sub-basement of the American economy.”
Nice.
All the while, lobbyists for these institutions run interference, and members of Congress, doing their bidding, continually press the U.S.Department of Education to keep the gravy train running—to the tune of some $30 billion a year.
The Obama administration did propose rules to curb the worst practices — rules GUEST: Ripoff “colleges”: Crushing debt and subprime education | Bob Braun's Ledger: