In response to Myshele Goldberg’s article The Real Tragedy of Student Debt, I cannot help but shake my head. The author complains of an education debt totalling a whopping $70,000. She points out, reasonably, that this is no way to start a working life. No shit, Myshele. I quote:
Yet I made my choices based on the values I had been taught — that helping others is more important than making money for yourself, meaningful career is more important than net worth, and brains, determination, and charisma are the key ingredients of success. I realize now that I subscribed to the fantasy of an equal society, when in fact everyone’s options arise from class, race, gender, and a thousand other subtle differences in our experiences, assumptions, and privileges.
Unfortunately, she failed to take a very basic fact into account: you can only pay back what you earn. Taking out tens of thousands in education loans in order to secure an MA and a low-paying job is bad business no matter how you slice it. The fact of the matter is the vast majority of ‘meaningful’ jobs pay such low wages that they are only open to the independently wealthy. This may be inconvenient, but it is the truth.
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