The HuffPost has a very good piece entitled Ending the Student Debt Crisis and Expanding Social Security: We Will Win Together. It clearly lays out how Social Security needs to be expanded, why the student debt crisis needs to be addressed, and how young and old are getting fucked because of decisions made in the 1990s and 2000s.
These issues are personal for me. I care about a lot of issues that are not as close to home as these two. However, in that I am on Social Security Disability and have student loan debt I am acutely aware of the impact that many people face with these issues.
Even though cost of living in areas like food and housing are sky-rocketing the COLA for SS benefits are not keeping up. I live in the "worst" part of Portland. Gentrification is sweeping the city and pushing more and more poor people into East Portland. Even without gentrification in my part of town, my rent has gone up 32% in 3 years! SSDI COLA has been about 1.5% each year over the same period. That is not sustainable.
On top of this, as I said, I owe student loan debt that will never be paid off. Hell, I can't even afford to pay the interest payment. So, each month, I have over $200 of my SSDI benefits garnished by the Dept. of Treasury. This is very painful.
From the article:
Social Security's benefits are extremely modest by virtually any standard. They often provide people on fixed incomes with barely enough to survive. Those benefits, unlike most other assets, are beyond the reach of creditors -- unless the creditor is the United States. Garnishing Social Security benefits for student loan debt was beyond even the reach of the federal government prior to legislation enacted in 1996.
But that legislation removed this important protection. The number of retirees and people with disabilities who have a part of their modest Social Security checks taken to pay off student loans, often decades old, has tripled since the Great Recession. In 2013 alone, 156,000 Social Security beneficiaries had their benefits garnished to the tune of $150 million to pay off student loans. And that is the fate awaiting many young people if the law is not changed. Their unpaid student debt can literally follow them to the grave.
Once upon a time, I could have filed bankruptcy and started anew, but in 2005 that all changed because in that year student loans were prohibited from restructure or discharge in bankruptcy.
Read the whole thing. It is very educational. It talks about how children are affected by the inability to get out from under student loans by their parents or grandparents. It also talks about how people like me who worked but are on SSDI now are affected (btw I have two children that are also affected by this). It connects a lot of dots that many who should know better would like to ignore.
As you all know, one William Jefferson Clinton was the President in 1996 and he signed the law that allowed Social Security to be garnished for student loans. At his side was Hillary Clinton, his most trusted advisor. In 1996 I was working and this issue was not on my radar, but Bill and Hill should have known what kind of hell this would play on poor and middle income people. To think now that will we could get "two for the price of one" again, looking back and seeing how bad this dynamic dual was the first time, NO FUCKING THANKS!.
As mentioned above, in 2005 student loans were blocked from being restructured or discharged in bankruptcy. Leading the fight for this was no other than the current Vice President, Joe Biden, man of the people. This is the same Joe Biden, "man of the People of Color" that we hear about. The one who helped push through 20 years of tough on crime legislation that disproportionally affected POC.
If HRC or Biden were to become the nominee, I would vote for them. Not a damn bit more. No money (even on SSDI I give at least $20 to Bernie each month) and no volunteering. I will hold my nose and sigh that we didn't choose a better person. But thankfully I have a better person to vote for in the primary. The one I give money to each month. And even though Oregon's primary is in May, I will vote for Bernie, even if it doesn't look like he will win (I actually think he will) just so that I can show whoever is leading that there is still strong support for the better candidate.
One last thing, I have learned my lesson about paying attention to issues that only affect me directly. This has been made easier with the internet, but also due to what I wrote above. Maybe I am not going to be in the streets on every issue, but I sure as hell am more willing to write an email or call a politician or two.
Thanks for reading.