Iven Schmidt

Guest Writer

May 16, 2023

One of the most discussed initiatives of the Biden Administration has been his proposed loan forgiveness program. If the program goes into effect, it would aid up to 43 million federal loan borrowers around the country.[i]  The program itself has faced staunch opposition on multiple fronts, be it previous borrowers, fiscal conservatives, or those debating its constitutionality. Meanwhile, there are some who say the program doesn’t go far enough. Senator Bernie Sanders supports this view, and he has advocated for the dismissal of all student debt, and to make higher education institutions free for all.[ii] The question over this program and education policy in general — whether education deserves to be a right or if it should be controlled by the federal government at all — is one which has slowed very much-needed progress in our schools. The implementation of a universal (free-for-all) education system is not only the best step toward solving this question, but also toward bettering our nation, as well as benefiting our people.

Despite being known as the premier country on Earth and having the largest economy, the USA ranks consistently under the international average of Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries in Mathematics; meanwhile it also hasn’t been in the top 10 in any category since the study started collecting data in 1997.[iii] Currently, the U.S. ranks from those same measures as 38^th in Mathematics, 19^th in Science, and its best category being Reading at 13^th. Meanwhile, in the rest of the western world, some of the top performing countries are those of Estonia, Finland, Germany, and Poland. Each of these countries have tuition-free higher education for their citizens, and of the remaining countries that outperform the average score, most have large access to funding for education and a much-reduced tuition cost compared to that of the United States.

This also extends to the number of citations and research contribution countries have overall per capita. With the exception of the U.K. (in which they cap tuition at roughly 11,552 USD)[iv], many of the countries at the forefront have free access to higher education.[v] The performance of these countries far exceeds that of other countries, such as the U.S., that spend far more than they do towards education, shows that it is not just how much money but also how it is used that causes research and development. While our vastly larger population helps us maintain a high rate of citations overall, in due time we risk being outpaced by others around the world, as there are countries with more citations and documents per capita than that of the U.S. already (U.S. documents per capita are at 0.0021, whilst U.K. documents per capita are .0036.[vi])

Separate from the global scale, we can already see the effects of spending money on our students here in the U.S. As a whole, the nation has had an increased amount of people attaining degrees.[vii] This shows that despite the large increases in tuition over the decades, people still want to go to college and get degrees in the fields that they enjoy, with the percentage of people over 25 having obtained a bachelor’s increasing from 30.4% to 37.9% between 2011 and 2021.[viii] The government has the ability to step in for its average citizen and cover this cost, without forcing those that want to obtain degrees to pay increasingly exorbitant prices.[ix]

If we examine this more closely, we can see the differences in the cost per student that states provide versus the educational attainment of its population to measure how government assistance affects degree attainment. Along with D.C., the top 10 states that spend the most per pupil are New York, Connecticut, Vermont, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Oregon, Hawaii, Alaska, Washington, and Massachusetts.[x] Each of those states outperforms the national average for people completing high school or higher by age 25.[xi] If the government can’t guarantee the completion of high school at the minimum, then it is failing the children of our nation by not being willing – but able to provide them with an education to build their life off of. The Federal Government receives $6.27 trillion dollars annually, and a tuition-free program for all would cost just $28 billion, less than half a percent of the trillions available in the budget, and a program where tuition is covered and students still get and keep grant money and federal aid would just be $58 billion dollars.[xii]

One of the other points of criticism is that it betrays those that have already gone to college and paid their loans. This argument is faulty, as it raises the argument that just because one injustice was done to a people, we can no longer hope to help people experiencing misfortune or lack of opportunity both now and in the future. Should we not have passed social security for all those that raked together money and paid for their elderly family before it was passed? Should we not have government assistance for those in poverty, as there have been those that suffered without help for longer or managed to be one of the lucky ones who escaped? No, it is the duty of the government to provide a better life for its citizens in the present and future, for it cannot change the past, but only learn and grow from it.

Education is one of the most important services that a society needs to be able to provide for its citizens in order to help the advancement of society.  The Enlightenment and its ideals, which founded our very public, was based on reason and education, with John Locke stating that it is education which decides a person’s usefulness, goodness, and what they are.[xiii] Mary Wollstonecraft fought for education and saw it as a path towards liberation in her book A Vindications of the Rights of Woman.[xiv] Even with that, getting a degree already gives an individual a better starting salary than high-school graduates. College graduates also experience much better salary growth over time as well, leading to a happier life.[xv] The nation and the people need affordable access to education, so that they can live a happier life, which will in turn help the country grow as well.

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[i] White House. “FACT SHEET: President Biden Announces Student Loan Relief for Borrowers Who Need It Most.” August 24, 2022. Accessed March 15, 2023. https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/08/24/fact-sheet-president-biden-announces-student-loan-relief-for-borrowers-who-need-it-most/.

[ii]Sanders, Bernie. “College for All and Cancel All Student Debt.” last modified March 29, 2022. Accessed March 15, 2023. https://berniesanders.com/issues/free-college-cancel-debt/.

[iii] Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. “PISA 2018 Results.” PISA, 2019. Accessed March 15, 2023. https://www.oecd.org/pisa/publications/pisa-2018-results.htm.

[iv] Lewis, Joe., Bolton, Paul., Lewis, Anastasia. “Lifelong Learning (Higher Education Fee Limits) Bill 2022-23,” Commons Library Briefing. February 24, 2023. Accessed March 16, 2023. https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9717/.

[v] RePEc. “Top Countries by Number of Citations.” IDEA. Accessed March 16, 2023. https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.country.nbcites.html.

[vi] Scimago Journal & Country Rank. “Country Rankings,” April 2022. Accessed March 16, 2023. https://www.scimagojr.com/.

[vii] U.S. Census Bureau. “Current Population Survey Historical Time Series.” February 9, 2023. Accessed March 15, 2023. https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/educational-attainment/cps-historical-time-series.html.

[viii] U.S. Census Bureau. “Educational Attainment in the United States: 2021.” Press Release. February 24, 2022. Accessed March 15, 2023. https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2022/educational-attainment.html.

[ix] Hanson, Melanie. “College Tuition Inflation Rate.” EducationData.org, August 10, 2022. Accessed March 25, 2023.
https://educationdata.org/college-tuition-inflation-rate.

[x] Hanson, Melanie. “U.S. Public Education Spending Statistics.” EducationData.org, June 15, 2022. Accessed March 25, 2023. https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statistics.

[xi] U.S. Census Bureau. “Educational Attainment in the United States: 2021.” American Community Survey Table S1501. Accessed March 24, 2023. https://data.census.gov/table?q=S1501&g=010XX00US$0400000&tid=ACSST1Y2021.S1501&moe=false&tp=false.

[xii] Hanson, Melanie. “How Much Would Free College Cost?” EducationData.org, November 13, 2022. Accessed March 25, 2023. https://educationdata.org/how-much-would-free-college-cost.

[xiii] Locke, John. “Some Thoughts Concerning Education.” 1693. https://canvas.brown.edu/files/5449962/download?download_frd=1.

[xiv] Wollstonecraft, Mary. “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.” Project Gutenberg, 1792. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3420.

[xv] National Center for Education Statistics. “American Community Survey – Education Tabulation (ACS-ED).” U.S. Department of Education. Accessed March 25, 2023. https://nces.ed.gov/programs/edge/demographic/acs.