That's fine and dandy if you're starting with all the information. Young people don't often have this and it's way to easy to say this in our 40s that they are stupid and should not have signed up for a student loan. Borrowing money is generally not the greatest way to go at something, yet we don't want to tell people that they can't achieve their dreams or be pilots, even though we know not everyone can. Lots of people "shield" the information from those that are getting these loans, the institution, the industry, etc. The "machine" is concerned with the flow of people through, not so much if they can pay their loans back. To this extent, these students and their parents are often lied to about their prospects and when told about how awesome it all will be, they happily sign up.

There is no "information out there" that exists that really tells anyone how it really is. Everyone likes to assume this exists, but it's experience that really provides this for us and one person telling a rosy story easily offsets one telling a stinky one. It's ridiculous to blame the person that didn't know better 100%, even they should be held responsible for paying back their loans as much as possible. My solution is to get the loan holders involved. Ensure they meet targets for job placement and pay. If the students don't meet these, take money from the loan holders. I bet they'd fix the problem real fast and not hand out money like candy. They'd probably have a battery of qualification criteria and they'd hold the institutions accountable to some extent by not handing out money for a poorly performing institution. This is what needs to happen if we don't want to constantly run around circles with this problem IMO. I don't think there should be any "free ride" for someone that can't pay back, every attempt should be made, but lets actually address the real problem, not try to solve the effects.

I looked at the public loan repayment (I'm in public service). When you look at the fact that you have to be in public service for 10 years, it's unlikely that you'll still have any debt left, so in a few cases that's a nice bonus of federal service, but it's unlikely to be utilized due to the requirements IMO. The other issue is that I don't think they're lessening the principle amount with the "pay based on income", so you aren't really getting "ahead", it's just allowing you some room to breathe. That's not necessarily going to be a great idea IMO, but if you have gotten yourself in a situation where it's the only option, it's nice to not have to go completely bankrupt.

I'd like to see us actually address the problem. Hold the lenders and institutions accountable for what they are putting out. Lending and borrowing isn't inherently bad, but it's money you don't have as the borrower and it is inherently risky. Due to this, just a little bit of lack of information can significantly skew decisions and unfairly punish people and there are those that will take advantage of people no matter what.

How many of those that are against letting someone reorganize their debt and take advantage of these programs (which generally are not having their loans dismissed) are against letting their airlines file bankruptcy and get bailed out? If it comes down to your job, would you rather the airline go out of business, or screw over some of it's lenders? I know there are plenty from the major-airline side working for airlines that would scream bloody murder if someone was trying to dismiss their loans and obligations, yet they work for companies that do just that.

I'm just not for "well, make them pay it back and throw them in jail and sooner or later everyone will figure it out and stop taking out these loans". No way, someone will always come along to take advantage of the situation and convince new uninformed people to take out the loans. Only if the lenders lose enough money would they be inclined to actually do something about it.