By Jim Namiotka/The Star-Ledger
Americans’ student loan debt now tops an unimaginable $1 trillion. In New Jersey, nearly two-thirds of college grads leave school with some measure of debt, averaging nearly $30,000 apiece. Those are the ones who graduate.
Millions of low-income students will never apply to four-year colleges at all — scared away by the cost of a college degree.
In a weak attempt to do something about student loan debt, federal lawmakers capped loan rates last month. That’s hardly enough. New Jersey is considering a concept to offer tuition at a state university or college in exchange for a percentage of grads’ income for 20 years or more. That’s still a shockingly high price tag.
Why can’t college be free?
That’s the question being asked by Robert Samuels, a California college professor who says the billions being spent on college aid could be pooled and redirected to the nation’s public universities. At $130 billion a year, that’s enough to pay for a four-year bachelor’s degree for anyone who wants one — covering tuition, room and board.
Samuels is president of the University Council-American Federation of Teachers and teaches writing at the University of California, Santa Barbara. His latest book, “Why Public Higher Education Should Be Free,” was published by Rutgers University Press.
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