10. Student Loan Debt Refinancing

From http://www.the99declaration.org/student_loan_debt_refinancing

"Our students and former students are more than $1 trillion in debt from education loans. These young people have far fewer employment prospects due to the financial collapse directly caused by the unbridled and unregulated greed of Wall Street.

Ensuring a higher education, particularly in the fields of science, engineering, technology, green energy and mathematics, is no longer a luxury for the few and must now be viewed as a national security issue.

Banks receive virtually interest free loans from the Federal Reserve Bank and then charge upwards of 6% interest to our students for profit. Because education is the only way to secure our future success as a nation, interest on student debts must be immediately reduced to 2% or less and repayments deferred for periods of unemployment. Subject to the provisions of grievance five, the tax code will be amended so that employers will receive a student loan repayment tax deduction for paying off the loans of their employees.

Outright federal grants should be provided to those students who pursue and obtain degrees in the sciences, green energy, sustainability, mathematics, technology and engineering.  Moreover, to reduce the principal on all outstanding student loans, a financial transaction surcharge, similar to those fees charged by banks on consumers, will be introduced to banks and securities firms.

The current economic crisis, the worst since the Great Depression, resulted in the $1.5 trillion dollar bail out of Wall Street, secret Federal Reserve loans, and unknown losses of trillions of dollars to the economy. Work study programs should be expanded to increase access to higher education; universities and colleges that do not reduce tuition to affordable levels shall lose federal funding; and non-citizens who obtain their education in the United States should be provided an accelerated path to citizenship so the investments made in these students remain in the United States."

I'm torn on this issue. On the one hand, I'm struggling to pay off student loans on a degree that I will most likely never use, due to inability to find a job in the field, loss of interest, and aging of the degree itself. On the other hand, I'm the one that made the commitment and took the risk, so now I'm the one dealing with the repercussions.

I believe that education is important. It doesn't matter what field you are in, an excellent grasp of the English language, at least some foreign language experience, a good understanding of mathematical and scientific concepts (including how our own bodies work), an appreciation for the arts (including philosophy), and a strong understanding of history are all useful and help make a well-rounded person.
I think that we really need to strengthen primary education. Extend the school year. Extend the number of years in public school. Teach children how to learn.
Everyone learns in a different way. If you can help children identify how they learn, you can engage them in learning from the start. The more you engage them, the more excited they will be about learning, and will be more successful at it.

I'd propose splitting education into two parts: primary and secondary. Primary education would encompass K-12 (or whatever ending point becomes necessary). Secondary school would be like college now, except that most of your prerequisite courses would already be covered. Think post-associate degree.

So, I'd strengthen primary education (K-12). Maybe you let students begin to drift off into degree paths after elementary school. Still provide a round education, but slowly incorporate more and more specialized learning. Let kids follow their interests.
But most of all, get them interested.

Make secondary school just that: secondary. If I followed a degree path during primary school that ends up preparing me for a career in medicine, for instance, maybe I could be a nurse right out of primary school. If I want to be a surgeon, a psychiatrist, an obstetrician, then I'd go on to secondary school, which I would pay for. Meanwhile, I could be starting my career with the knowledge that I already have.

It's unfortunate that a lot of us are saddled with student loan debt for degrees that we aren't using. I could maybe -- maybe -- see an amnesty for government loans. The rest, however, are our burden.

9. Jobs for All Americans

From http://www.the99declaration.org/jobs_for_all_americans

"Passage of a comprehensive jobs and job-training act like the American Jobs Act to employ our citizens in jobs that are available with specialized re-training through partnerships between companies seeking employees and community colleges and other educational institutions.

The American People must be put to work now by repairing America’s crumbling infrastructure and building other needed public works projects. These jobs should not be outsourced with cheap foreign labor or using foreign building materials. In conjunction with a new jobs act, re-institution of the Works Progress Administration, Civilian Conservation Corps and similar emergency governmental agencies tasked with creating new projects to provide jobs for the families of the 151 million People living in poverty and low income homes.

Astonishingly, one in four children are living in poverty in the United States while 8.3% of American adults are unemployed and 16% are underemployed. Many others have simply given up looking for work. Special tax incentives should be granted to companies who partner with educational institutions to re-train workers to work in green energy and new sources of American manufacturing to reduce reliance on imported goods and services. A democracy simply cannot survive with more than half of its population struggling to acquire basic needs such as food, shelter, education and health care, a shrinking middle class and a tiny fraction of the population controlling the media and the political process.  This is a dangerous convergence of circumstances."

First off, we will never have "jobs for all Americans." There will always be people who choose not to work or who are unable to work. Because of prejudices, it's incredibly difficult to take someone from the street and put them to work -- they don't look right, there are large gaps in their work history (if they have one), they may not even have the proper documentation (most jobs require a social security card at the bare minimum). So this isn't as simple as "just train people to work."
So, this really should say "significantly reduce actual unemployment numbers." That's fine. We can work with that.

I would agree that training programs can be a part of the plan, but I disagree with specifying what that training should be in. Green energy is nice, American manufacturing is nice, infrastructure repair is nice, but there are plenty of other things that people could -- and should -- be doing. Helping people train for any career is a good thing.

Giving companies incentives to hire could work, but how? If you hand them some cash and say "go hire some folks," there's no guarantee that they will use that money for hiring. They could, on paper, use that money to cover their HR budget, use the money saved there on whatever else they feel like, and say "well, we had to pay HR to find candidates," and technically they used the money for hiring.
We could hand companies cash for every new hire, but that could easily open the door for a revolving pool of do-nothing jobs. Hire ten people, sit them in a room for a week staring at each other, collect a thousand bucks per person, pay them 300, and send them on their way. Repeat forever.
The biggest tool in the government's arsenal here is taxation. Corporations love tax breaks. So we could hike their taxes, but give them tax breaks for new hires. Again, that could cause that revolving pool, so maybe we do tax breaks per employee instead. But then the bigger the corporation is, the less it pays in taxes. So now we've just killed small businesses.

I'm not sure that we really can cause job growth through a government mandate. It's a nice idea, but I'm not seeing anything that's actually going to work, other than direct employment. That's fine, but it means even more government expenditures. I don't see that being a very viable option at the moment.

I would say that we help people get training for their next career, but focus mainly on fixing the economy as a whole. A lot of the other points on the list will help with that. So, let's get the economy back on track, and the jobs will follow.