HECS/HELP debts incurred before 2014 to suffer interest after 2020 - fair?

[Redalert]

2002 was the first year Andersen accepted anyone from Notre Dam and that was because of one of the partners joined notre dam as he was banned from "corporate" work after the Bond litigation.

No one was accepted from Murdoch or Edith Cowan.

Not sure what its like in WA but the Victorian landscape's definitely transitioned to place a greater emphasis on universities outside of Monash/Melbourne. The majority of the graduate pool (at least at the firm I was at) was still taken from those two universities, but there were definitely grads from Deakin, La Trobe and RMIT. It also depends on the service line you're considering, areas like audit/tax tend to attract lower quality graduates and there's a greater prevalence of the grads from the other unis.

 

[sabre_ac]

Why does it matter? Why should students here be paying interest on their government student loans in the first place?

It is, quite simply, a way to allow financiers to make money off of our young people seeking an education.

This is fundamentally sick, but we live in such a sick world that people think that this is normal or okay.

It isn't.

As I said, what matters is the size of the debt, not the interest rate. However in order to address your point

Students are buying capital on credit provided by dwinderling tax payer base with little incentive to pay it back.

The current arrangement is unsustainable and charging what is still a token rate of interest is still a good deal for a product that will see a return for well over 40 years.

I dont see what is sick about charging interest, it is a little sick the number of Law schools that have opened in Western Australia, I wonder how many Edith Cowan law graduates go on to have meaningful careers in law or gain employment. Its time to hold the Universities themselves accountable and not the government who provides the subsidy.

I am curious how your conspiriacy world view ties in with the conspirators paying for your education.

 

[sabre_ac]

2002 was the first year Andersen accepted anyone from Notre Dam and that was because of one of the partners joined notre dam as he was banned from "corporate" work after the Bond litigation.

No one was accepted from Murdoch or Edith Cowan.

2006/7 I know for a fact there was a large amount of Murdoch graudates hired by the big 4 and large corporations.

You certainly have to work harder if you end up at the lesser Universities, but the opportunities remain the same.

 

[Smiling Buddha]

sabre_ac

You are so far gone that I am not sure there is any bringing you back.

If I didn't know better I would think you must have studied commerce or economics at university.

And achieved good marks.

 

[Power Raid]

2006/7 I know for a fact there was a large amount of Murdoch graudates hired by the big 4 and large corporations.

You certainly have to work harder if you end up at the lesser Universities, but the opportunities remain the same.

I think the mining boom may have put an end to the recruitment snobbery of the big 4. They truly struggled to staff up and retain their workers.

Hopefully they have learned that good workers are available regardless of which school, which suburb and which university they came from.

 

[Power Raid]

Not sure what its like in WA but the Victorian landscape's definitely transitioned to place a greater emphasis on universities outside of Monash/Melbourne. The majority of the graduate pool (at least at the firm I was at) was still taken from those two universities, but there were definitely grads from Deakin, La Trobe and RMIT. It also depends on the service line you're considering, areas like audit/tax tend to attract lower quality graduates and there's a greater prevalence of the grads from the other unis.

I think over east would have been ahead of the curve as perth is a smaller market meaning everyone knows everyone. the grads tended to have last names that were synonymous with leading WA businesses. They tended to live in the same suburbs, go to the same high schools, went on to the same university and ended up in the top legal, accounting or finance firms.

Perth is a little bigger now and as a result the nepotism is not as prevalent.

 

[sabre_ac]

sabre_ac

You are so far gone that I am not sure there is any bringing you back.

If I didn't know better I would think you must have studied commerce or economics at university.

And achieved good marks.

Common you can do better than that, we may sit on opposite ends of this debate but I know for a fact you can provide a well thought at response.

Correct on one count and incorrect on the other.

Neither of which has anything to do with my opinion on the subject as a commerce degree merely proves you can work when the pressure is on, beyond that all training comes from whatever career path you fall into.

 

[sabre_ac]

I think the mining boom may have put an end to the recruitment snobbery of the big 4. They truly struggled to staff up and retain their workers.

Hopefully they have learned that good workers are available regardless of which school, which suburb and which university they came from.

Agreed.

I am still relative green career wise, I have noticed however success comes from hard work, hitting your mark and networking without actually networking.

The other major factor is that a career starting in commerce/industry is far more appealing than it was a decade ago.

 

[Juddism]

Bernardi reiterating Pyne's suggestion that HECS debt should be recouped from deceased estates.

 

[Dixie Flatline]

Bernardi reiterating Pyne's suggestion that HECS debt should be recouped from deceased estates.

South Australian Liberals sticking together?

 

[cartwright]

Well, as expected HECS debts are like a chain on those who studied after Tony Abbott’s changes

Another brilliant move by the Libs.

Here’s a petition. It might get them talking about how they broke our education system

Sign the Petition

Make our HECS debts easier to pay off!

chng.it

Last financial year, the ATO collected $4.9 billion from students paying back HELP-SFSS (Student Financial Supplement Scheme) loans, which includes HECS (Higher Education Contribution Scheme).
In contrast, the petroleum resource rent tax generated $2.2 billion. In January, Richard Denniss, executive director of progressive think tank the Australia Institute, called on the government to reform the nation's "third world tax system".

Your student loan debt could be about to increase by hundreds of dollars

Many people have student loan debts of between $20,000 to $60,000, but for several people it's more than $400,000.

www.sbs.com.au

 

[Taylor]

What is unfair about indexing an unsecured debt that should lead you to making a better income? If you need to resort to "education should be free" then you have already surrendered the point.

Students owe $78,000,000,000 that the government is only ticking along at CPI. And you aren't required to pay anything until you're earning nearly $1000 a week. That money could be really helpful for battling families but it's been directed at those who want to earn better salaries with their degree - and now they want to have that forgiven or devalued?? You're asking the people who didn't get to go to uni to pay for your privilege. Your degree made you more employable, it made you higher earning - it's good for Australia to fund that but it's not a mortgage, you're not paying interest, the value of the debt is barely keeping up with the inflation.

Meanwhile the unis are importing hundreds of thousands of students on full price degrees who need someone to rent. The universities are the reason why your rent is going up. Maybe they could contribute some of their tens of billions in assets to resolving that issue instead of being subsidised by the Australian community?

 

[cartwright]

What is unfair about indexing an unsecured debt that should lead you to making a better income? If you need to resort to "education should be free" then you have already surrendered the point.

Students owe $78,000,000,000 that the government is only ticking along at CPI. And you aren't required to pay anything until you're earning nearly $1000 a week. That money could be really helpful for battling families but it's been directed at those who want to earn better salaries with their degree - and now they want to have that forgiven or devalued?? You're asking the people who didn't get to go to uni to pay for your privilege. Your degree made you more employable, it made you higher earning - it's good for Australia to fund that but it's not a mortgage, you're not paying interest, the value of the debt is barely keeping up with the inflation.

Meanwhile the unis are importing hundreds of thousands of students on full price degrees who need someone to rent. The universities are the reason why your rent is going up. Maybe they could contribute some of their tens of billions in assets to resolving that issue instead of being subsidised by the Australian community?

The govt is making more off Australians educating themselves than taxing gas exports

Yay ‘straya

 

[Taylor]

The govt is making more off Australians educating themselves than taxing gas exports

Yay ‘straya

The government hasn't made any money on the nearly $80 billion dollars it has loaned people without interest. Indexing just means the value of the debt remains the same, relatively speaking.

Could we find something more productive than spending nearly $800,000 on one person's HECS loans to study their entire adult life?

Far out, you'll never get a better cost for an unsecured debt in your whole life, you'll never get better terms than not having to pay it back until you're making nearly $1000 a week.

All you need to do is choose a degree that makes you more valuable to the workplace market and you'll earn enough to pay it all back.


----

But again, if the universities didn't have Australia subsiding the cost of them importing hundreds of thousands of new student renters it wouldn't be such a big problem.

 

[TRP1996]

What is unfair about indexing an unsecured debt that should lead you to making a better income?

Have no idea what the numbers are or how they work out, but doesn't people making better incomes also increase government revenue via taxation?

 

[burge13]

Have never understood complaints about repaying HELP. Actually worrying people who went through uni could be dumb enough to complain about it, says a bit about our education standards tbh

Comparing it to petrol taxes is a separate issue, not relevant at all.

 

[The King!]

You're asking the people who didn't get to go to uni to pay for your privilege. Your degree made you more employable, it made you higher earning

I had no problem with Hecs paid mine off a few years ago, I went to Uni and it was my choice , so agree no one else needs to pay it.

However what's the difference between the above and people who too lazy to get off their arse and get a job expecting others to pay for their living expenses? what's the repayment plan for that?

 

[Golden_6]

Have never understood complaints about repaying HELP. Actually worrying people who went through uni could be dumb enough to complain about it, says a bit about our education standards tbh

Comparing it to petrol taxes is a separate issue, not relevant at all.

It’s not the paying off of HELP that’s concerning people, it’s the rate of indexation in high inflationary environments. The argument is that indexation should be tied to the wages index rather than CPI which is a fair argument.

 

[barreness]

What is unfair about indexing an unsecured debt that should lead you to making a better income? If you need to resort to "education should be free" then you have already surrendered the point.

Debate pervert s**t

Students owe $78,000,000,000 that the government is only ticking along at CPI. And you aren't required to pay anything until you're earning nearly $1000 a week. That money could be really helpful for battling families but it's been directed at those who want to earn better salaries with their degree - and now they want to have that forgiven or devalued?? You're asking the people who didn't get to go to uni to pay for your privilege. Your degree made you more employable, it made you higher earning - it's good for Australia to fund that but it's not a mortgage, you're not paying interest, the value of the debt is barely keeping up with the inflation.

You're missing the entire point of tertiary education. Was an upper class privilege until Gough made it govt funded, leading to a far better educated populace that was more productive. The justification to reintroduce fees was that the individual earns more than the average income with a university education and can therefore afford to pay back more in tax, an individual who doesn't earn more than average shouldn't have to pay for their university education.

This has been slowly rolled back and now a full time woolies cashier will be paying back some per week, 55k a year shouldn't be the start of repayments, should be around 80-90k. An environmental science phd holder who earns 70k in a job that helps us understand the planet could well spend there entire working life paying back a debt that never finishes in a high inflation world

Meanwhile the unis are importing hundreds of thousands of students on full price degrees who need someone to rent. The universities are the reason why your rent is going up. Maybe they could contribute some of their tens of billions in assets to resolving that issue instead of being subsidised by the Australian community?

Just throwing poo at the wall in the hope that something sticks......rent,immigrants, corporate unis

Tertiary education is a cornerstone of all countries and should be govt funded

 

[barreness]

Have never understood complaints about repaying HELP. Actually worrying people who went through uni could be dumb enough to complain about it, says a bit about our education standards tbh

The argument is about where the payment kicks in really

Comparing it to petrol taxes is a separate issue, not relevant at all.

It's not petrol taxes you drongo, it's the royalties skimmed off of the resources of this land, yours and mine comrade.

The govt is willing to extract double the amount off students than it is off companies that are killing the biosphere per year

 

[Taylor]

What if the reason it's such a problem is because the courses being funded, and accruing the debt, aren't leading to better employment in the market?

So when I say that taking it back to "education should be free" is a cop out, that's why.

Every tertiary institution in the world has quickly followed government protected payments with a product that isn't worth what it costs - because the customer isn't really appreciating the cost when the sign up for it. The product needs to be worth what the nation or student is paying.

"If only it were free" doesn't lead to universities or students making better choices with where they spend third party money. It just locks in the ability for people to sell useless qualifications.

That's on top of the universities requiring the general community to subsidise their student intake, they get all the money paid to them but let their students increase demand on rentals in the community so everyone else gets to pay for that.

I think the government should loan the universities billions, knowing they have a sure way to pay it back with international students, so they build the accommodation for their students to live in.

Reduces the cost of living for everyone and they wear the cost since they are making the money from it. Both the government and the universities win with bulk student migration, it's good for them both - but the cost is on the communities. If the federal government and the universities were responsible for funding, building and housing all their student migrants we have hundreds of thousands fewer people trying to win a rental.

 

[barreness]

cowardly non quote

What if the reason it's such a problem is because the courses being funded, and accruing the debt, aren't leading to better employment in the market?

what if that was never the point of education

So when I say that taking it back to "education should be free" is a cop out, that's why.

Corporate whore house, I mean we're all in it but you don't have to lick the boots

Every tertiary institution in the world has quickly followed government protected payments with a product that isn't worth what it costs - because the customer isn't really appreciating the cost when the sign up for it. The product needs to be worth what the nation or student is paying.

"If only it were free" doesn't lead to universities or students making better choices with where they spend third party money. It just locks in the ability for people to sell useless qualifications.

That's on top of the universities requiring the general community to subsidise their student intake, they get all the money paid to them but let their students increase demand on rentals in the community so everyone else gets to pay for that.

Type some more rubbish paragraphs, why shouldn't education be free?

?
I think the government should loan the universities billions, knowing they have a sure way to pay it back with international students, so they build the accommodation for their students to live in.

Reduces the cost of living for everyone and they wear the cost since they are making the money from it. Both the government and the universities win with bulk student migration, it's good for them both - but the cost is on the communities. If the federal government and the universities were responsible for funding, building and housing all their student migrants we have hundreds of thousands fewer people trying to win a rental.

Why not just tax our very productive workforce after we have educated them to a high degree?

 

[cartwright]

It's not petrol taxes you drongo, it's the royalties skimmed off of the resources of this land, yours and mine comrade.

The govt is willing to extract double the amount off students than it is off companies that are killing the biosphere per year

I suppose the idea of using CPI was accepted - when it was around 2-3%

If it’s at 7-8% that’s a huge jump

Maybe the answer is adding a maximum rate of 4 or 5% to avoid such massive increases

Separately we should be looking at the PPRT but I doubt that is going to happen.

 

[barreness]

I suppose the idea of using CPI was accepted - when it was around 2-3%

If it’s at 7-8% that’s a huge jump

Maybe the answer is adding a maximum rate of 4 or 5% to avoid such massive increases

Separately we should be looking at the PPRT but I doubt that is going to happen.

The answer is doing what it was indented to to do, people who earn over the median income should pay back some(I mean it'd be easier if they weren't so scared of income taxes)

The issue is people paying on low incomes and it's such an easy fix, no balls

All the mines and gas plants should be nationalised but that's a separate argument

 

[cartwright]

The answer is doing what it was indented to to do, people who earn over the median income should pay back some(I mean it'd be easier if they weren't so scared of income taxes)

The issue is people paying on low incomes and it's such an easy fix, no balls

All the mines and gas plants should be nationalised but that's a separate argument

Agree. This situation wasn’t the intention of HECS. if the intention is to ensure repayment, and not making money off students it should be addressed

Just found this article, also suggesting a maximum as a option rather than WPI

HELP debt indexation at the lower of CPI or a fixed maximum rate – giving HELP borrowers more certainty than the Universities Accord final report lower of CPI or WPI recommendation

Over the last two years high CPI-driven HELP debt indexation – 3.9% in 2022, 7.1% in 2023, probably in the vicinity of 5% this year – has been a major issue. It has brought to public at…

andrewnorton.net.au