Wednesday, April 24, 2019

Jeff Spross — Why canceling student debt could be good for everyone

It's difficult to project precisely what the overall economic impact of this would be. Student debt is distributed all up and down the income ladder, and people at different income levels will spend or save the freed up money in varying proportions — it's the spending that will juice job growth and economic activity. But a Levy Institute paper from early 2018 — written by economists Scott Fullwiler, Stephanie Kelton, Catherine Ruetschlin, and Marshall Steinbaum — took a crack at figuring it out.
The Week
Why canceling student debt could be good for everyone
Jeff Spross

2 comments:

Ralph Musgrave said...

Moronic article. It’s blindingly obvious that if student debt is cancelled, relevant debtors will go on a spending spree, which raises demand.

The flaw in that idea is that if demand is deficient, it can be increased at no real cost via standard stimulatory measures, monetary and/or fiscal. Ergo the fact that debt cancellation boosts demand is irrelevant. On the subject of stimulus costing nothing in real terms, Milton Friedman rightly said, "It need cost society essentially nothing in real resources to provide the individual with the current services of an additional dollar in cash balances."

Ryan Harris said...

Giving a debt jubilee to privileged kids who already will go onto earn millions and be rich is just dumb. Why not cancel medical debt for poor or FHA premiums or give regressive property tax rebates to renters who pay the highest rates on their commerical apartments. Give refundable sales tax credits on Federal returns. All sorts of ways to help the poor. Just another Democratic party ploy to help rich at the expense of the poor. It's like Harvard grads complain about their oppression. My ears can't hear it.