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Pik n Mix
just because you can dont make it right
Well worth getting a degree if you are still earning sod all after all thia time then
Do you have a degree?
I moved abroad and I paid off the rest of it...although I have to admit I didn't have a huge loan to start and had paid off most of it by the time I buggered off
Education should be free.
There is no such thing as free education. Seems more than fair that people who earn more and directly benefitted from the education should pay the most for it.
And I don't begrudge it going out either. I racked up the debt (and before people say anything, I was tea-total for 2 years at Uni) so I will pay it back. That is the AGREEMENT I made and the RESPONSIBILITY I have as a mature adult.
I would love to turn around and say 'you know what, things are a bit tight, so I'm not going to pay it off' but I won't.I guess I must have been brought up proper or something....
I finished paying off my loan last month, all 13k of it. I begrudge them every single penny.
Education should me free and the people that stopped it being so are a bunch of hypocritical liars.
It is fundamentally wrong that we send the youth of our country into the adult world with debts of over £40,000. It is inter-generational thievery pure and simple.
Moving from 10% to a goal of 50% of the population going to study in further education was always going to have a sting in the tail - got to be paid for somehow. England has gone big on fees, Scots paying for it some other way. Having said that what is the Scottish parliament not prioritising to pay for the lack of tuition fees? Never got that bit - or is it a barnett formula "luxury"?
The only benefit I can see to the students paying for their education in a very visible way is I think it is making for a far more discerning student. The sixth formers I help with UCAS applications are choosing courses with far more care and the ones that come back and tell us what they are up to have far more tails of students being proactive about keeping their universities to account to the value for money of their courses.
Have a look at an expat forum, much more use for this stuff.
Long and short of it. They can't issue a CCJ against a non resident.
As for paying it off tell them you don't earn any money and have left the country.
If education should be free who is going to pay for the lecturers?
About two years ago I got a letter asking me to provide details of my income or they would charge me the maximum rate each month to pay it back. I decided I wouldn't mind paying the maximum amount so I didn't bother replying and waited for the first repayment request.
Still waiting.
If education should be free who is going to pay for the lecturers?
That'd be everyone, wouldn't it? But only because the country as a whole benefits, innit?
When I graduated and started earning above the threshold I waited for about 3 months expecting payments to start coming out. Nothing, so I did the stupid thing and called them because I was young and needlessly worried that I could get in trouble.
I explained the situation and the pleb on the phone said " It's due to start coming out shortly, we have all you details, there might just be a backlog". Waited a further 12 months with still nothing coming out of my earnings for SL. So, contacted them again and got told exactly the same thing.
I was getting three-monthy statements and watching the interest accumulate on my loan with not a penny being paid off it and quickly decided to just forget about it. They know where I am, they know that I am earning above the threshold (because I told them).
10 years later still not a penny has been taken off me. So sod it. They can bury me with my last statement for all I care.
NZCol - Member
Best of luck when you grow up and join the real world with that attitude.
I was working for over a decade before I decided to go back to uni, in that decade I got promotion over promotion so it didn't hinder me too much 😉
Pawsy_Bear - MemberPik n Mix
just because you can dont make it right
Nope and I never claimed it did, I will however be about 40k better off, and out of this sh1te ridden country for good 🙂
now to go about my day, I think jezza is on in a min and then I [i]might[/i]think about getting dressed.
don simon - MemberIf education should be free who is going to pay for the lecturers?
That'd be everyone, wouldn't it? But only because the country as a whole benefits, innit?
Socialism - no thanks
If education should be free who is going to pay for the lecturers?
Socialism - no thanks
shall we scrap the NHS, the police, the schools, etc
If you need it you can pay for it.
Or maybe we have a society that decided that sometimes for the greater good it makes sense for things to be free at the point of delivery. That somethings aren't easily valued so are difficult to charge for.
Pik n Mix - not convinced we are going to miss you tbh 🙂
What country has got the pleasure of your company next?
shall we scrap the NHS, the police, the schools, etc
Agreed, I wouldn't scrap the police.
walleater, is it the Student Loans Company who you are paying?
they are notoriously bad at administering their loans. I had no end of problems with them deferring my loan before I earned enough, then deferring it again when I was unemployed - they threatened me with debt collectors and everything. Idiots.
I think you have two options: follow their requests to the letter, or just ignore them forever.
at uni, I had a job, a loan, a big overdraft, parental help, sponsorship and a scholarship... and I royally pissed it all up the wall. 😀 but I paid my debt.
convert - MemberPik n Mix - not convinced we are going to miss you tbh
You don't even know me so why would I care if some plebs will miss me or not?
ooooooooo 9.35 think its time for a little nap.
While I also think higher education should be basically subsidized I also think if you get into a situation knowingly borrowing money then you are morally obligated to pay it back. Irrespective of the country you live in. You could apply your flawed argument to almost all public services. But then everybody wants more for less, even if they ave agreed to it.
You don't even know me so why would I care if some plebs will miss me or not?
The tragedy would be if no one else wanted you either and we were stuck with you AND you ended up having to pay it back - a lose, lose scenario I think you would agree!
Convert me old fruit a tragedy would be your whole family dying in a plane crash (which may I add I hope never happens), the situation you have described is just unfortunate, with the skill set im developing at university, the quality of the university I go to and the massive shortage of skilled workers in my industry, its a scenario that will never happen 😉
besides you wouldn't be stuck with me, you don't know me 😉
still wouldn't pay back my loan though 😉
If education should be free who is going to pay for the lecturers?That'd be everyone, wouldn't it? But only because the country as a whole benefits, innit?
Yes and no - there's a vast chunk of spending that is a subsidy to well-educated middle class kids who would have gone to uni anyway. That money would be better spent (would have greater social impact and reduce social costs) on targeting those who achieve least in education.
No problem subsidizing those who wouldn't be able to afford to go to Uni.
Yes and no - there's a vast chunk of spending that is a subsidy to well-educated middle class kids who would have gone to uni anyway.
Why should the background of a persons parents dictate whether or not they are funded through higher education?
Why should the background of a persons parents dictate whether or not they are funded through higher education?
Because money's tight and needs to be spent where it will have the most impact. Subsidising kids that would go anyway should be a low priority.
Because money's tight and needs to be spent where it will have the most impact. Subsidising kids that would go anyway should be a low priority.
Probably a good idea to stop spending on health care for the elderly then isn't it. Afterall they are going to die soon and it would have a much greater impact if it were focused on those of working age.
Probably a good idea to stop spending on health care for the elderly then isn't it. Afterall they are going to die soon and it would have a much greater impact if it were focused on those of working age.
Your analogy is the wrong way around: prioritising spending on middle class prospective uni students who have got decent secondary school results is like prioritising spending on middle-aged healthy people instead of the sick with expensive problems.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/29/magazine/what-can-mississippis-health-care-system-learn-from-iran.html?pagewanted=all
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/01/24/110124fa_fact_gawande
education should be free
It is from the age of 5 right up to your leaving school at 16-17. If an individual then decides they want to go to college/university presumably to enhance their own chances of getting a higher paid position then why should the rest of us finance that?
...their own chances of getting a higher paid position then why should the rest of us finance that?
Because the wealth that is generated by said graduate is of beneift to everyone, not just the graduates. It really bugged me when the tuition fees were being introduced. Economics was being (mis)used to highlight the cost of the education and the benefit to the individual but at no point was there the slightest recognition of the economic benefit to the country as a whole.
Education is free in Norway and Germany IIRC?
Doesn't seem to do them any harm...while we turn into mini-USA.
Because the wealth that is generated by said graduate is of beneift to everyone
Not in the OP's case though he's already stated that he has no intention of returning to the UK!
Not in the OP's case though he's already stated that he has no intention of returning to the UK!
No but I was refering to graduates in general, as I'm sure you were aware.
Purely on the point of Parental Income:
It has always irritated me that this is one of the markers used to asses student funding. What if the parents choose not to help their kids out with funding for University? Those people have to self fund without the same help.
FWIW I was lucky enough to be at University just when they started to end the student grants, I received about £1K per year in grant and took student loans out of about £2500 per year.
I'm on the old system, and have never earned enough to pay back, de[pending on what sector you work in and which part of the country there's plenty of reasonably paid jobs that would mean that you'd never end up paying it back.
The Student Loan Company administer it, but the debt has now been sold onto some company in Wales who I hear from occasionally...
No it would be better if we were in a mini USA system as many better colleges charge little or no fees for disadvantaged students!
In some ways the US system is fairer as there's no minimum or maximum fee, but then they kind of understand how a freemarket works in education...
I can see wealthy parents paying for their own and some kind of scholarship system, for the less well off yet gifted child, as being a positive step forward.
I can see wealthy parents paying for their own and some kind of scholarship system, for the less well off yet gifted child, as being a positive step forward.
For the life of me I can't see why this is seen as "better" than letting everyone who has earned a place in further education from going there. Granted I'd probably mean fewer places but then that's not necessarily a bad thing either.
Who said anything about it being "better"?
Do you also raise your fingers to do "this" when you're talking? 😆
I had a student that did this and I kept threatening to cut his ruddy fingers off...
Well the "positive forward step" implies that you think that this would be an improvement. Another word for that is better. I included the quotation marks to reinforce the fact that I didn't agree with you.
Just noticed this on wikipedia
In January 2012, BBC Newsnight revealed that Ed Lester, the head of the SLC, was being paid his salary via a private firm, allowing him to reduce his payment of income tax and national insurance contributions. It was subsequently announced that he would be treated as a regular employee in the future.
So, if you're finding the decision to pay back the loans or not a moral conundrum, look to your elders for guidance.
That Wikipedia quote is pretty funny.
It's just a matter of bureaucracy for me as I am perfectly within my rights not to pay. In this particular year there is a long and boring issue surrounding payslips, obtaining paper copies of them and explaining to the SLC that the one high payslip does in fact have over a year of vacation pay on it, and is not a normal payslip (BC has a different way of dealing with vacation than the UK).
As for morals, well, here goes 😉
I've worked since I was 13. Never claimed benefits, yet paid a stupid amount of money into the welfare system which is exploited to hell. I've paid plenty of cash into the NHS so people can drink, smoke and be lazy, paid into a pension system that I'll never claim from and paid a shitload of wonga into the armed forces so politicians can blow people up for oil. So Great Britain, if I had the three grand lying about, I'd buy return flights to the UK with it and get a holiday out of it. With any remaining notes, I'd go to the nearest Government office, put the notes into a nice pile, and set it on fire.
I'm disgusted by the OP's attitude, as someone who had to live on a grant with extra money for being in London, who had no fees to pay and who also got housing benefit and has never had to pay anything back other than through normal taxation and ended 3 years with more money in my bank account than I started with I find this attitude objectionable.
It is from the age of 5 right up to your leaving school at 16-17. If an individual then decides they want to go to college/university presumably to enhance their own chances of getting a higher paid position then why should the rest of us finance that?
get a job in this day that doesn't need A levels at least, grade inflation for you.
Because the wealth that is generated by said graduate is of beneift to everyone
But seeing as so many graduates don't make much extra from having the degree do we really want to fund them? How many do we really need?
Because the wealth that is generated by said graduate is of beneift to everyone
I can only speak for myself, but the extra wealth that I generated as having gone to uni benefited me much more than it benefited everyone else! It seems only fair that I should pay much more than everyone else for the costs of my uni education.
(The very fact that education isn't VAT-rated is an effective 20% subsidy anyway).
hi there, i'm a journalist for a national British newspaper looking into the rising phenomenon of british graduates who head abroad and leave their student debts behind. would anyone (@walleater, @taff - the friends you mention) be willing to talk to me about it? anonymity ensured if you don't want to be named.
sure you are mr student loans debt collector 😀