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This bill — the Student Loan Debt Relief Act of 2019 — would cancel $50,000 in student loan debt for every person with a household income under $100,000. For people with household incomes over $100,000 a year, this bill would use an income-based calculation to determine the amount of loan cancellation they’d receive (see below for more details), up to people with household incomes above $250,000 (who’d be ineligible for any student loan debt cancellation). This loan forgiveness would be eligible for student loan debt held by both student and parent borrowers. If enacted, this bill would offer student loan debt forgiveness for over 95% of borrowers and eliminate student loan debt altogether for over 75% of Americans with student loan debt.

Specifically, this legislation would:

Cancel $50,000 in student loan debt for every person with household income under $100,000 (with calculations based on households’ income from the most recent tax year).
Make private student loan debt eligible for cancellation through conversion to federal loans.
Streamline the student loan debt forgiveness process using data and income information already available to the federal government at the Treasury Dept., Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and Dept. of Education, so there wouldn’t be any paperwork involved in getting student loan debt cancellation.
Provide a year-long freeze on the collection of student loan payments and fees from borrowers through wage garnishment, tax return seizure, and Social Security garnishment by the federal government on troubled loans, as well as interest accrual on student loans, while this bill is being implemented.
Allow borrowers to discharge student loans in bankruptcy.
Not treat canceled debt as taxable income.
Repair the credit of defaulted borrowers who have their loans discharged.
Automatically refinance existing student loan rates to lower interest rates specified in the Bank on Students Emergency Loan Refinancing Act (S.768 / H.R.1707).

There are phase-outs to this bill’s loan forgiveness based on income:

Borrowers with a household income about $250,000 (the top 5% of earners) wouldn’t be eligible for any student loan debt cancellation; and
The $50,000 cancellation amount would phase out by $1 for every $3 in income above $100,000 (e.g., a person with a household income of $130,000 would get $40,000 on cancellation and a person with a household income of $160,000 would get $30,000 in cancellation).

For borrowers with multiple loans, the Dept. of Education would void the loan with the highest interest rate or outstanding balance. Parent PLUS loans would also be eligible for cancellation.

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And had to go to work instead. \nAnd what about future students, what happens to them ? \n","show_argument_for":false,"show_argument_against":true,"upvote_count":0,"upvotes_for_count":null,"upvotes_against_count":0,"has_upvoted":false,"endorsement_count":0,"links":{"self":"https://www.causes.com/positions/8177fa0f-f203-4b4e-ad9f-94d6bf849c83"},"body":"I don’t think the loan should be completely forgiven, but I’m all for a zero % interest loan. \nTo forgive the loan is not fair to the poor kids that didn’t even get a chance to go to college. And had to go to work instead. \nAnd what about future students, what happens to them ? \n","stance":"nay","created_at":"2019-09-30T18:40:03.296Z","shareable_image_url":"https://n.causes.com/share-images/positions/8177fa0f-f203-4b4e-ad9f-94d6bf849c83.png","note_color":null,"note_text":null,"bill_id":"s2235-116","user_id":"P9o8X3rW","endorser_ids":[]}}

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Maureen

Should Student Loan Borrowers Making Under $100k Receive Student Loan Forgiveness?