In a recent poll that was directed toward university students and their parents, it was found that the candidate that would be receiving their vote was related to who could best lift the burden of college student loan debt.
A recently released survey by DirectTextbook.com, a handy website that a plethora of college students utilize for books, 83% of college students and 65% of parents expressed the same opinion; changes need to be made to reduce the burden of student debt, and keep it low in the future.
Seventy-eight percent of university students and 92% of parents of those students stand by their decision to vote in the early election in November, and 90% of voting students and 84% of voting parents indicated that the candidates’ positions on student debt would strongly influence for whom they cast their vote.
Considering the overwhelming amount of data on this subject, it seems that this group of people could have an impact on the upcoming election.
How seriously do parents and higher education students consider college debt?
How badly do they need this prominent issue to be solved?
Survey recipients held the opinion that the issue of college debt was equally or more important than the other matters that have been coming up in the various debates:
- Unemployment rates — students, 75%; parents 58%
- Immigration policies — students, 66%; parents, 60%
- Stricter gun control — students, 60%; parents, 60%
- Drastic climate change — students, 60%; parents, 68%
- Affordable health care — students, 54%; parents 43%
The above graph also helps people understand what issues are most prominent in this election.
Another indication of how serious the issue has become: Parents are so focused on their children’s receiving higher education that they are willing to assume debt and forgo saving for their retirement to pay for it — and not only in the U.S., a recent poll by HSBC found.
Dealing With Debt in Todays World
The media often refers to mounting college student loan debt as a “crisis.”
Few individuals would dispute this terminology.
DirectTextbook has cited several figures, in addition to their surveys, which put the student loan matter in perspective.
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At present, national student debt stands at more than $1 trillion, and the average college student loan burden is $35,000.
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Tuition costs are skyrocketing ahead at twice the rate of inflation.
Three million parents of university students across the country, and others, collectively carry the weight of $71 billion in student debt on their shoulders, and Americans 40 years of age and older are responsible for 35% of the national student loan debt.
Researchers asked survey participants which strategies for reducing the student debt burden they would favor.
Seventy percent of students and 51% of parents opted for income-based repayment.
Nearly as big a proportion of students favored increased government aid, but only 38% of parents agreed.
And twice as many students as parents said they would like student loan forgiveness.
Also, 18% of students and 27% of parents preferred total individual accountability, while just 5% of students and 8% of parents said no changes should be made to the current system.
The Presidential Election
Time will tell to what extent student debt affected the 2016 presidential election.
In the meantime, DirectTextbook looked at demographics and the last presidential election to infer what could happen and what issues could have the largest driving force behind them.
The collective student body in the U.S. numbers to 21 million students.
In the 2012 election, just 38% of 18- to 24-year-olds voted.
This was the lowest turnout of any demographic and a figure that had many analysts wringing their hands in frustration.
That turnout is down from 2008 when 44% of that age group voted.
However, young people showing up to vote has always had the same trend.
As indicated by the graph not many young people show up at the polls to cast their vote.
This is due to several reasons:
- They’re not yet old enough to understand the impact that voting can have on their lives
- They don’t have the time
- They don’t yet see the benefits to voting
Still, if the same 38% proportion of students vote in the upcoming election in November, that would be 8 million ballots cast.
DirectTextbook said its poll showed that 71% of those would be based on the student debt issue — 5.7 million voters demanding reduced student debt.
Parents similarly influenced would significantly increase that number. (Since college students have been shown to vote at higher rates than the general population, that number is likely even higher.)
Could those votes swing the election in one of the candidate’s favors?
DirectTextbook pointed out that Barack Obama won the 2012 popular vote count by a margin of only 4.9 million votes.
This scenario, of course, ignores the fact that many Americans who go to the polls are not single-issue voters.
As important as student loan debt is for many, other issues weigh at least as heavily in this election.
All in all, as the poll and various other research indicate, parents and students expect strong leadership on this issue by the next president.
Denise August says
My concern is that I have been deceived by a school in Florida name ATI college, now I am stocked with student loans and I am not graduated from the school because it was closed.
Coleen Brown says
There does need to be something done about student loan debt. I lost my job in 2008 haven’t used my degree since then yet am still stuck with 30000 in debt due to getting my masters degree so I could go up the ladder so to speak instead there were cuts made due to state funding. I’ve been trying to get this debt down good luck with that when you don’t make enough money to do so.