Chicago Consumer Attorney and Atlas Consumer Law Associate Jim Haller recently authored an opinion piece on student loan debt published by The Hill. The article – Trump is right: Student loan debt an ‘albatross’ on families, young people – focuses on the nation’s tremendous student loan debt problem, which has ballooned to nearly $1.3 trillion dollars and far surpasses credit card debt held by Americans.
In his opinion piece, Attorney Haller begins with a statement made by President Donald Trump during his run on the campaign trail in which he told the nation that student loan debt is unfair and should not be an albatross, or a burden, that impedes the lives and growth of former students for the remainder of their lives, before going on to promise a way to fix or negotiate a solution to the crisis.
While President Trump and his administration may come under scrutiny for some of the statements they make, his comment on the student loan debt crisis, Attorney Haller points out, is entirely correct. As statistics on demographics and the younger generation of former college students and recent graduates makes clear, student loan debt has certainly created impediments to the types of milestones achieved by previous generations at younger ages. This includes delays in getting married and having children, as well as making big purchases for things such as homes or new cars, if they are ever made at all.
This “albatross,” which Attorney Haller explains is a metaphor gleaned from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s infamous poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” is an apt description for the burden that hangs around the necks of millions of Americans.
Attorney Haller goes on in the article to express his support for the new administration to capitalize on the President’s enthusiasm for student loan debt relief and create real policy changes that can not only ease the burden of rising tuition for future generations of students, but more importantly make a direct impact on easing the burden already carried by today’s millennials, recent graduates, and their families.
How could this be accomplished? In Attorney Haller’s opinion, by enacting legislation to restore bankruptcy protection.
In a detailed account of his experience working as a consumer and bankruptcy lawyer at Atlas Consumer Law Attorney Haller goes on to discuss how real the problem is, and how many clients our firm works with who are carrying around the weight of burdensome student loan debt that generally cannot be discharged in bankruptcy. In his impassioned account of seeing first-hand how devastating the financial consequences can be, he makes a credible and compassionate argument for much-needed change.
You can read Attorney Haller’s full opinion piece here.