Should Student Debt Be Canceled?
What Next | Daily News and Analysis
Slate Podcasts
4.3 • 2.4K Ratings
🗓️ 23 February 2021
⏱️ 24 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Democrats are divided over student debt forgiveness. President Joe Biden is trying to get $10,000-per-borrower canceled, while more progressive members of the party want $50,000 wiped out. So whom would these proposals help? And what can be done to keep the student debt crisis from happening all over again?
Guest: Jordan Weissmann, Slate's senior business and economics correspondent.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, everyone. We are talking about college costs in this episode. So what do you know? We swore, just like a little. You've been warned. |
| 0:14.0 | Last week, when Joe Biden held a town hall in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, He got all kinds of questions. |
| 0:24.9 | A mom asked the president to calm her daughter's fears about COVID-19. |
| 0:30.8 | A pastor got up and asked how police departments could be reformed while keeping communities safe. |
| 0:31.9 | But I wanted to talk to Slate's Jordan Weissman about a different exchange. |
| 0:36.3 | I want you to meet Jocelyn Fish, a Democrat from Racine. |
| 0:41.2 | This moment with student debt, can we talk about it a little bit? |
| 0:45.7 | It was weird how it played out. |
| 0:48.3 | Hello, good evening, Mr. President. |
| 0:50.6 | Student loans are crushing my family, friends, and fellow Americans. |
| 0:54.4 | Me too. |
| 0:56.0 | She says, listen, we really need $50,000 worth of debt relief. |
| 1:02.0 | Like, this is what needs to happen. |
| 1:04.1 | And Joe Biden says, nope, not going to do that. |
| 1:08.0 | I will not make that happen. |
| 1:10.2 | But he says it in this way that he's like, you're welcome. |
| 1:13.4 | Like, it sounds like he won. |
| 1:15.1 | It's bizarre. |
| 1:16.5 | I will not make that happen. |
| 1:18.3 | I will not help that happen. |
| 1:20.7 | Yeah, it was quite a moment. |
| 1:22.4 | I was taken aback by the firmness with which he just rejected this town hall participants' plea for |
... |
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