Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

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Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, we have a major crisis in our country today in terms of the high cost of a college education, and in addition to that the incredible debt burden college students and their families are facing. This is a major problem in Vermont, and it is a major problem for every State in our country.

The job of the Senate is to understand that crisis, improve the situation, lessen the burden on students and their families, and not to make the situation worse than it is today. At a time when we need the best educated workforce in the world, hundreds of thousands of bright, young Americans who are qualified to pursue a higher education--who want to pursue a higher education--do not go to college, and they do not go to college for one very simple reason: They cannot afford to go to college.

According to a Pew study of 18- to 34-year-olds who have not completed college, 48 percent say they cannot afford to do so. Higher education for middle-class families and working-class families is simply too expensive, and this is an issue we must address.

What does it say about our country when hundreds and hundreds of thousands of young people who want to contribute and do more with their lives cannot get the education they need? In many cases it deprives them from making it into the middle class, and it denies this Nation the intellectual capabilities they have.

Further, millions of young people who graduate college are saddled with an incredible debt burden which radically impacts their lives. In America today, the average debt for a college graduate is over $27,000 in my State of Vermont. It is about $28,000. That is the average. That means there are many young people who have more debt. For those who go to graduate school or medical school or dental school, the debt can be many times higher. Last year I talked to two young dentists in the State of Vermont. They are in debt to the tune of over $200,000 for the crime of having gone to dental school.

This horrendous debt burden impacts the lives of young people in many ways. It can determine--and this is a hugely important issue--the profession they choose to enter. How can a person become a teacher, a childcare worker, a legal aid attorney or even a primary care physician if the salary a person earns will not enable them to pay off their debt and take care of the obligations they face? In other words, this debt is forcing many young people into professions which are not necessarily their love. It is not what they wanted to do; it is what they have to do in order to earn money to pay off their debts. This crushing debt burden determines where many young people will live and whether they can even afford to buy a home. How does a person go out and buy a home if they are spending 20 or 25 percent of their income paying off their student debt? This debt burden on our young people even determines, in some cases, whether they get married and have kids.

The higher education debt burden the American people are now carrying at $1.1 trillion is now higher than our credit card debt and is having a significant impact upon our economy. In fact, the Federal Reserve and the Department of Treasury have both issued warnings that high levels of student loan debt could drive down consumer demand and have a negative impact on economic growth. In other words, if a person is spending all their money paying off debt, they are not buying goods or services. So this high level of student loan debt is having a negative impact on our overall economy.

According to a report released by the New York Fed--and this is important for people to hear--student loan debt has nearly tripled since 2004. In less than 10 years it has nearly tripled. Total student loan debt in the United States now exceeds $1.1 trillion. The average student loan balance has increased 70 percent since 2004.

If we do not act immediately, the subsidized Stafford Loan Program will see a doubling of interest rates on July 1, a few days from now. Let me repeat: If Congress does not act immediately, within the next few days, the subsidized Stafford Loan Program will see a doubling of interest rates on July 1. The rates will rise from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent for subsidized Stafford loans. This would be a disaster for millions of students and their families all over our Nation. We must not allow that to happen. At the very least, we must immediately pass legislation that extends interest rates at 3.4 percent for several more years on the Stafford Loan Program. Meanwhile, as part of higher education legislation, we must begin work on a long-term solution that guarantees the students of this country will be able to attend college and graduate school and not be burdened with suffocating debts.

As we contemplate long-term new policy on student loans, one thing we should be very clear about: The Federal Government should not be making a huge profit off the needs of low-income and working families who utilize the Stafford Loan Program. That is simply wrong. In fact, that is what we are doing today.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the Federal Government makes a substantial profit from student loans. For loans made this year, in 2013 alone, that profit is expected to exceed $50 billion, and this is higher than the profits made by ExxonMobil, the most profitable company on Earth. As I hear every day on the floor of the Senate, we are reminded we live in a competitive global economy. I hear every day from my colleagues that the United States is not doing all we can do in terms of educating our young people in such areas as science, engineering, technology, and math. In fact, in the immigration bill we are debating, there is an effort to bring hundreds of thousands of workers from abroad, presumably because we do not have enough workers who are knowledgeable in terms of engineering, science, math, and other technologies. What sense does it make if we are doing a bad job now in educating our young people in general, and specifically in the STEM areas, that we make it harder for kids to get a college education? What sense does that make?

I should mention that countries all over the world understand this point, and they are doing a much better job than we are of investing in their young people in general and specifically in higher education. According to a report released just yesterday by the OECD, the United States was one of the few advanced countries in the world that did not increase its public investment in education. In fact, the vast majority of advanced nations do everything possible, and a lot better job than we do, to make higher education more affordable for all of their students.

A couple weeks ago I had the Ambassador from Denmark coming to the State of Vermont to talk about what goes on in Denmark. People asked him: How much does it cost to go to college in Denmark? The answer was: Nothing, not a penny out of your pocket. It is paid for out of the tax base. In fact, students there get a stipend.

But Denmark is not the only country which makes sure all of their kids can get a higher education, a graduate school education, a medical school education, while not having to pay for it out of their own pocket. Austria, Finland, Norway, Scotland, and Sweden also do the same. In Canada, which is an hour away from where I live, average annual tuition fees were $4,288 in 2010, roughly half of what they were in the United States. Yet the OECD says Canada is one of the most expensive countries for a student to go to college--half the cost of where we are. Germany is in the process of phasing out all tuition fees. Even when German universities did charge tuition, it was roughly $1,300 per student.

Here is the bottom line: All over this country, students and their families are facing crushing debt, radically impacting their lives and the choices they make. There are some in the Senate who say: Yes, that is pretty bad. How can we make it even worse? How can we raise interest rates for our kids and make it harder for them to go to college and make sure when they get out of college they are deeply in debt?

I say: No, I think that is absurd.

I remind my colleagues that when Wall Street banks borrow money--do my colleagues know what they are getting it for today? They are getting it for less than 1 percent--three-quarters of 1 percent. We are talking about families having to spend 6 percent, 7 percent, 8 percent, 9 percent in order to send their kids to college, to help our country, to make it into the middle class. That is absurd. We have to understand that a well-educated population is perhaps the most important thing we need as a nation if we are going to survive in a highly competitive global economy.

Let me conclude by saying this: This Congress has to act and act immediately to prevent the disaster we are looking at from happening; that is, the doubling of interest rates on the Stafford Loan Program, which will go from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent on July 1. Short term, we have to extend the 3.4-percent interest rate. Long term, we need to make certain every kid in this country, regardless of income, can go to college and leave school without a crushing financial debt.

I thank the Chair.

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Mr. SANDERS. I thank the Senator.

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