Something I wrote yesterday.
www.studentloanjustice.org/pac.htm
In a recent piece by David Landis(Kiplinger), Sallie Mae CEO Tim Fitzpatrick was quoted as saying that no matter who controls Congress "We will work both sides of the Aisle".
This promises to be an expensive effort for Sallie, but absolutely a wise investment on their part.
Consider that since the mid-nineties, Sallie has invested millions lobbying Congress. For these millions, they got back:
- Nearly 100% guarantees for student loans (higher than any other government backed loan)
- Removal of bankruptcy protection for public Loans.
- Huge penalties and fees legally allowed to be attached to delinquent debt.
- Removal of Bankruptcy protections for PRIVATE loans made retroactive, by the way, so students that had that right when they signed for their loans prior to October, 2005, had that right taken away.
- Outlawing of refinancing of student loan debt with other lenders willing to accept less profit.
- Draconian collection tools too numerous to mention here.
- Exemption from Fair Debt Collection Practices statutes.
These and other Congressional gifts to Sallie Mae has added billions to their balance sheet, and allowed their executives to afford personal luxury golf courses,major league baseball teams, and other niceties.
There have been some legal theories put forth for why this legislation is unconstitutional. To date, however, there have been no successful constitutional challenges to these laws.
justice@studentloanjustice.org