 Giving college debt, the Biden administration today announced that they will forgive about $5 billion of college debt from students who were students at Corinthian College. Only students from Corinthian College will see their debt forgiven by the US government, which is bizarre. Corinthian College was a school shut down by the US government with all kinds of claims. But at the end of the day, Corinthian College was shut down because the government didn't like Corinthian College. Corinthian College was shut down because it's a private college. But it's worse than just being a private college. It's the ultimate sin for the left. It's a for-profit college. Richard, thank you. Wow, $100. Really appreciate that. It's good to have you back. So they shut the college down, which basically prevented the students from getting an education, which basically threw the students out into the streets. And now to compensate for that, they're going to forgive all those students their debt, the students who were thrown out of college, but also students who got a degree at the college and now might have jobs, might have decent jobs, might have good jobs. Why just Corinthian College? What about the millions of other students who have student debt? There's over a trillion dollars of student debts out there. Why some? Why not everybody? Why, you know, what's cherry picking? Does somebody in the Biden administration have a kid who went to Corinthian? Did somebody in the Biden administration have friends who have kids who have went to Corinthian? Did somebody in the Biden administration get a job offer from when they leave government from somebody who has kids? I don't know. One school? I mean, I think they feel guilty because they shut the school down, but a lot of people who have debt graduated well before they did that. What about all the other schools they shut down? They've shut down a bunch of private schools because they're private for-profit schools. They shut down a bunch of private for-profit schools. Are they going to forgive all their debt? But why just them? I'll tell you why. I'll tell you why, because I know exactly why. Because the perception is, and this is reality, not just perception, the reality is that the students who went to Corinthian College, but the students who go to most private for-profit colleges, are students who are generally from a poor background, from a background in a lower socioeconomic stratum, whereas the students who went to Harvard and Yale and Princeton are middle-class and up for the most part. And what the Democrats are really afraid of, if they forget all debt, is that they'll be accused of benefiting rich and middle-class kids at the expense of the US economy, which will be true. But if they only forgive the debt of poor kids and they can't, they don't know how to measure that because all students are poor. That's part of being a student. How do they measure by their parents? How do they figure out who's poor and who's rich? Well, one way to do it is to say, well, if you went to a crappy, or it's perceived as crappy, private school, then you must be poor and therefore will forgive your debt. But if you went to Harvard, for now at least, we're not gonna forgive your debt. Now, ultimately, ultimately, before an important election, they'll have to forgive the debt of the middle-class kids because that's where the votes are. They were your votes in the middle-class. And if you want people to vote for you as Democrats are desperate to have, then you've gotta throw some goodies towards the people who actually vote and towards the big numbers. And they are the middle-class. So, you know, every time they forgive this debt, it's a gift that we are all paying for. It is basically raising our taxes. It is basically raising inflation, which is a tax. It is basically shifting the costs, right? The university still has the money. It's shifting the cost from the student who is supposed to pay back the debt to the government, which then has to tax me less and not to fund its expenditures. It's shifting it to all of us. So it's not just a gift to the student. It's a gift paid for by you. So take this personally. It's a gift paid by you through inflation or through taxes directly. There is no free gift. Every time the government forgives that, it's raising the deficit. It has to get that money from somewhere. Guess who it's gonna get it from? You. So, I mean, debt forgiveness. I mean, what the government should do, I've said this many times, is get out of the student loan business. Remember, all student loans in the United States today, since Obama administration, have been granted by the government. And I don't know a single Republican who is advocating for doing away with that system. I don't think Trump advocated for doing away with that. Nobody advocates for doing away with that system, but that is the system in which we live, which is a system where the government gives all the student debt. And it gives you a loan, no matter what degree you're pursuing, no matter what university you're going to, no matter what your prospects for returning that loan are in the future, that is, no matter what your job prospects are, they're willing to give a loan to anybody who's accepted to any university. Now, that's not how private markets function. In a private market, private lenders would ask you, what degree are you getting? Well, if you're getting a degree in feminist studies, transgender feminist studies, then how are you gonna make a living? And if you don't expect to make a living, how are you gonna pay back the debt? Oh, we're not gonna give you a loan. Oh, we're gonna give you a loan at such a high interest rate, you don't want a loan. Oh, you're getting a degree at MIT in engineering. Yeah, we'll give you all the loans you want. That's how markets work. They assess the risk of the loan and they adjust. Get the government out of loan guarantees for mortgages, for businesses, for students, for everything. And what will happen? You privatize it. Maybe fewer students will go to college. Maybe that's not a bad thing. Maybe some crazy departments will shut down where students are, quote, learning, supposedly learning something that is not useful. They'll never be able to make any money from it, never be able to return the loan. Some of those departments might shut down for lack of funding. Maybe, maybe students will be steered towards more life-enhancing careers. And finally, in a shocking turn of events, it might be the tuition will come down because universities will actually have to compete. It won't be so easy to get the money to go to school. So universities will have to lower their amount they charge. If you look at tuition, it's gone through the roof, much higher rate than inflation, much higher rate than any other good. Why? Because it's completely 100% subsidized by the government. If Harvard wants to charge an extra $10,000 a year, that's fine, because the government will lend me an extra $10,000 a year if I can get it to Harvard. There's no price constraint. And students think, oh, I go to Harvard, I'll be easily to pay whatever amount of money I'm gonna owe them, owe the government. And hey, maybe by the time I get there, there'll be a president who forgives all the debt. We live in a crazy world where the problems, specific actions of government make the problems. And they're easy to solve. And nobody cares. Nobody cares. Nobody, no, not on the right, not on the left, not on the middle, nobody cares. They continue to advocate the same stupid policies. They put band-aids and band-aids and band-aids and band-aids and band-aids on them to cover them up, but they actually do the things that would solve the problem. No, you actually want to get rid of poverty? No, they don't. They actually want to make school affordable for people? No, they don't. They want to cover their asses. And they want to keep power. And they want to keep control. And they want to keep growing. And they don't want to shake the boat. And they don't want to do anything radical. They don't want to do anything too crazy. And they don't want to lose their elections. God forbid they lose an election. And they've got this tool, altruism, to constantly pound away at the American people and to put those band-aids on all the time, all in the name of altruism. The evil of self-interest, the evil of profit, the evil of private. And we solve it by layering on government solutions that are always altruistic. Oh, it's poor kids. Oh, it's these kids who, you know, they paid a lot of money for that education, those greedy universities, and now we're saving them. How can you not want to save them? And of course, none of us as an individual bear a lot of the cost. We bear a little bit of the cost and we bear it every year for a long period of time. So it's a little bit of a year, so we don't feel it. So we don't get excited. Nobody out there is getting, you know, there are no riots in the streets over the fact that our money is being stolen from us and given to college students so they don't have to pay back their debts. Because we don't really feel it. It's two bucks here, two bucks in a few more days, two bucks in a few days after that. We'll never see it. There's no bill that arrives. Okay, this is the cost to you of the college debt repayment. Write a check. If we actually literally had to write a check, we wouldn't agree to these policies, but we don't. It just goes. It's just a little bit more, a little bit of great taxes, goods that are priced at a little higher price, which is what price inflation is, and we never feel it. So we don't get up in arms. I mean, we didn't get up in arms when we locked down. Never went get up in arms in about a slight increase in our cost of living so that we can do good for those debt burdened students out there. Well, they're not students anymore. They're employed, but they're debt burdened young people. That's horrible. Thank you for listening or watching the Iran Book Show. If you'd like to support the show, we make it as easy as possible for you to trade with me. You get value from listening. You get value from watching. Show your appreciation. You can do that by going to iranbrookshow.com slash support by going to Patreon, subscribe star locals, and just making a appropriate contribution on any one of those channels. Also, if you'd like to see the Iran Book Show grow, please consider sharing our content and of course, subscribe, press that little bell button right down there on YouTube so that you get an announcement when we go live. And for those of you who are ready subscribers and those of you who are ready supporters of the show, thank you. I very much appreciate it.