(Jacob Bruns, Headline USA) Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., expressed her dissatisfaction with the federal government for not immediately forgiving all student loans, Just the News reported.
In her opinion, it is the government’s duty to forgive the loans of the millions of college attendees. She was asked recently to address those who oppose student loan forgiveness on the grounds that it is unfair to those who have already paid them back.
In response, AOC suggested that she and her party have decided to favor their particular constituents at the expense of the whole.
“Did they support the forgiveness of small business loans during COVID?” she said.
“Is this just a matter of certain classes of people having their debt forgiveness being okay, but other classes of people not? I think that’s kind of a central issue here that we should address.”
AOC has supported the cancellation of all student debt in the past, and it appears that she will continue to push the matter.
When asked what she wished to see in President Joe Biden‘s upcoming student loan proposal, she declined to comment specifically.
“I haven’t heard any of the latest updates. You know, we saw some of those developments a couple weeks ago, but I have to read on the updated situation,” she said.
Economists are largely torn on the issue, though they seem to agree that the current state of affairs is perhaps the worse possible arrangement.
Diana Furchtgott-Roth, adjunct professor of economics at George Washington University and former chief economist for the Department of Labor, suggested that forgiveness was unfair to those who exercised financial responsibility.
“Forgiving student loans is unfair to students who have paid off their loans; unfair to students who have chosen less expensive community college options; unfair to taxpayers whose dollars are paying off the loans and who have no college education; and it will not rescue students from large amounts of debt,” she said.
Jason Furman, a Harvard economist and top economic adviser in the Obama administration, called our current system of deferring interest “just about the worst policy” which has contributed heavily to inflation.
