Student Loans                                                                                                  #237

By Hank Silverberg 

Have you paid off your student loan? More than 43 million Americans have outstanding loans which average just under $29,000 each.  

It adds up to $1.6 trillion. 

So, when President Biden announced this past week that as much as $10,000 of each loan would be forgiven, many young people, millennials and even Gen Xers, rejoiced. Some said it was not enough, while many who had already paid off their debt the hard way cried foul. 

No one was happy, and Republicans have been having a field day criticizing the plan, but as usual

they have no alternative ideas.   

There are two issues here. The obvious one is that this debt is preventing many people from getting a mortgage, saving enough for a down payment on a house, or keeping their credit score low. Many don't have money for a new car, furniture, or many other things.  

Forgiving some of the debt should put more money into the economy in the long run, and in the end help thousands of people lift up their economic positions. https://www.forbes.com/advisor/student-loans/average-student-loan-statistics/

But there is that other issue. Aren't you supposed to pay back money you borrowed? I borrowed money for my wife to get her degree early in our marriage. We paid it off after ten years. I took out a Parent's Plus loan to help one of my daughters through school (on top of her own loans). We paid that off in ten years also. 

Paying back what you borrow is what I was taught growing up. 

But neither of those loans had the high interest rate many recent students were charged.  

A better solution, as I wrote a few months ago, would have been to eliminate INTEREST on those government-backed student loans, and for those who have paid much of it back, apply the interest they already paid to their outstanding balance. That would vastly lower the overall debt or even wipe out what's left, depending on how much they have paid in.

The cost to the taxpayer and the benefit to the borrower might be similar to forgiving the $10,000 for everyone.  

I'm not an economist and I am not running for office, so there is no skin in this game for me.  But I think it deals with both issues--the crippling debt and the basic concept of paying back what you owe. 

Oh, and one more thing. A large number of those loans went to private trade schools, which have folded after taking millions from unsuspecting students. The government should go after any assets left from those schools and use any profits to lower debt for the students who borrowed money. (They can start with the defunct Trump University, but there are many others.)   

I doubt anybody in Washington would go for my idea, though. It's too practical for the party of "No," the GOP, which prefers rhetoric to progress, and it won't get the Democrats many votes.

My children won't like my suggestion either. They still have loans to pay off. 

The Heat is On! 

If you think it was hot across the country this week, just wait another 30 years or so. A new study says by 2053 heat indices could reach 125 degrees Fahrenheit at times, making the lower 48 states a very uncomfortable place to live. Extreme heat could be a threat to 107 million people in the United States, and that doesn't even include the danger from flooding an wildfires fueled by climate change. 

The First Street Foundation study says it will be the most dangerous in the West for extreme heat, but the Gulf Coast and the Southeast could also face "dangerous days" with a heat index over 100 degrees sooner than 30 years.  

That's just in the United States. Great Britain, at a longitude even with Canada, will face a similar threat. And places like India, China and parts of the Middle East could experience extreme heat more quickly.  

The study says parts of 50 countries, homes for 8.1 million people, could be facing what the Foundation calls the "extreme heat belt" (125F) as early as next year. 

The extreme heat will complicate illnesses in many countries which don't have much air conditioning and increase strain on already overburdened electric power grids in those that do. 

All of this could also put pressure on climate migration which is already causing political and social upheaval in parts of the world. 

https://www.axios.com/2022/08/15/extreme-heat-belt-global-warming

https://firststreet.org/press/press-release-2022-heat-model-launch/

All of this assumes there is no multinational political will to take action to combat climate change. Some countries have moved in that direction, but many scientists say it's not fast enough.  

Even different states in the U.S. can't agree. California and Washington state passed laws that will ban the sale of any new gasoline or diesel-powered vehicles after 2035, but that's more than a decade away. While in Virginia, the state's Republican governor is already trying to take a step backwards by working to repeal a similar law passed in his state last year.

Drought and Bones

Earlier this summer I wrote about the four bodies that had been uncovered in drought-stricken Lake Meade, now at record low water levels. A fifth was found this past week. 

But the drought has had one positive affect in the Southwest. Dinosaur tracks from around 113 million years ago have been uncovered at 

Acrocanthosaurus

Dinosaur Valley State Park in Texas. A park spokeswoman told CNN that most of the tracks come from an Acrocanthosaurus. The carnivore was 15 feet tall and weighed about seven tons and was almost the size of a T-Rex. They also found tracks from a Sauroposeidon, which was an herbivore, about 60 feet tall and weighing 44 tons as an adult. 

In normal conditions those tracks would have been under water in a riverbed, filled with sediment and undetectable. So, some progress for pre-historic facts as things get worse for human beings.    

More than 60% of Texas is suffering from extreme drought according to the US Drought Monitor. 

This is happening in other parts of the world as well. In Eastern Serbia, they found dozens of scuttled German warships from World War I still laden with explosives that had been submerged in the Danube. In rural Spain, a reservoir is so dry they found what looks like a Spanish Stonehenge, and in China, Buddhist statues that could be 600 years old have been found in the depleted Yangtze River.  

https://www.cbs58.com/news/dinosaur-tracks-from-113-million-years-ago-uncovered-due-to-severe-drought-conditions-at-dinosaur-valley-state-park

Asteroid Defense

The going theory on the end of dinosaurs on Earth centers on a likely strike by a major asteroid, changing the planet's atmosphere and climate dramatically. That is a possibility for us too. But there is some effort underway to defend humanity from a catastrophic event. NASA is getting ready   

for its Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission (DART) next month. NASA plans to live-stream the whole event on September 26th, at 7:14 p.m. when a missile will deliberately crash into an asteroid in an attempt to redirect it. The particular asteroid involved is NOT a threat to Earth. Basically, they want to see if the idea works should there be a direct threat from an asteroid in the future. 

It cost $330 million to launch a small probe last fall and send it seven million miles away. Inside that probe is a smaller spacecraft which will be released in an attempt to photograph the collision and what happens to the debris.

This is not just an expensive video game. Astronomers currently estimate that there are 25,000 near-Earth asteroids bigger than 500 feet that could do harm if they ever hit our planet.  

https://www.space.com/dart-asteroid-mission

It's all an effort to prevent human beings from suffering the same fate as the dinosaurs. 

Black Plastic 

Recycling has become a way of life for many people. We dutifully separate plastic, cardboard, paper, cans and glass from other refuse and put it at the curb in separate bins for the garbage truck. We know to look for that little marking on the plastic involved to tell us whether it's recyclable or not. The garbage companies then take it to a sorting station to be separated and placed in different bales. Mixed paper in one bale, glass in another, cardboard, aluminum and plastic resin in other bales. But now comes word that even those numbers in the little triangle can be deceiving and cause confusion. 

It seems black plastic, the kind you might get with

your takeout meal, should NOT be put in the recycling bin. Connecticut is telling residents to put it in with the trash because the optical scanners used to separate plastic, from paper, aluminum and so on, can't read black plastic as plastic and it ends up contaminating other bundles. That makes those bundles undesirable to companies that actually re-use the material. 

Most restaurants don't know about this and have switched to the black plastic when Styrofoam was banned in many places. 

https://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-news-connecticut-recycling-black-plastic-20220811-5ohs6j7pevdu5p463u2ks3zvsi-story.html

The recycling industry has been having difficulties lately because the market is over saturated. Even China has stopped taking the large tonnage they used to because they already have so much in their system.

Recycling is still a good idea because of dwindling resources. Petroleum, for example, is a major component of most plastics. Despite what the Oil industry and conservatives are saying, even with more drilling we are going to run out of oil deposits by 2052. It looks like some big changes have to be made in order for recycling to work for us as we go further into the impact of climate change and limited resources in the middle years of the 21st century. 

Dumbest Quote of The Week!

This was one of several dumb quotes this past week, but I put it here because I hope I never have to see a quote from this person again.  Laura Loomer is a far-right Republican who has run for Congress twice. She lost again last week in a Republican primary. Loomer is a white supremacist, and in her own words a "proud Islamophobe". In a speech after the results were obvious to everyone but her in Florida's 11th District, Loomer said: 

"I'm not conceding, because I'm a winner and the reality is our Republican Party is broken to its core," and went on to say, "We are losing our country to big-tech election interference."

Loomer is a dedicated follower of Donald Trump and readily contributes to Alex Jones far-right conspiracy theories. 

It appears there is some sanity among Florida's Republican voters after all. She lost the primary to incumbent Congressman Daniel Webster, 51%

to 44%. Oh. Wait. 44% voted for her? What's wrong with the folks in Florida? 

https://www.newsweek.com/far-right-activist-laura-loomer-refuses-concede-sobs-about-voter-fraud-1736325

 (Your suggestions and comments are welcome)

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