Political Compass - where do you sit?

[schmunk]

Student loans are deducted from net income. I think they should be deducted from gross income - i.e. you should pay tax on what you earnt minus your student loan deductions.

But that would mean that the more student loan you took out as a student, the less tax you'd pay as an earner...


A slightly more sensible alternative may be to calculate student loans on the after-tax salary, but this would make it harder to calculate for payrolls, and certainly for self-employed people who self-assess.

[badass]

But that would mean that the more student loan you took out as a student, the less tax you'd pay as an earner...

and the less money you would have in your pocket at the end of each month. What is your problem with that?

[TheAnimus]

and the less money you would have in your pocket at the end of each month. What is your problem with that?

Because rather than paying tax, you'd be paying off a loan. You'd be taying less tax overall, so fewer incubators for the childrens hospital.

[Rave]

A more sensible system would be to have a graduate tax paid only on earnings above the higher rate tax tax threshold. That way people who have profited from their degree would pay for it, and people who have used their degree to get worthwhile jobs as teachers, or research scientists etc. wouldn't be unduly penalised.

It's hardly the greatest of New Labour's crimes, but I marched against it in 1998, and I still believe that withdrawing the right to a paid for higher education-- that _all but one_ of the post election 1997 cabinet benefitted from- was a massive betreyal of young people by the 'we're all right jack' Baby Boomer generation. Is it any surprise now that such a massive proportion of this country's wealth is now held by the over 50s?

Nowadays it seems to be a fait accompli that young people are expected to be paying for their education until they're at least 30, but why the hell didn't anyone get in Tony Blair's face in 1998 and ask why we were expected to pay for something he got for free? Alright, so the proportion of the population actually going to university has increased considerably, but then the value of a degree has decreased significantly as a result. Now that the manufacturing sector in this country has been decimated several times over, there aren't even reliable jobs for those students who do manage to make it through a science degree without running out of money. The more I think about it, the more I'm glad that I flunked out at the end of my second year. At the age of 29 I will (if all goes to plan) be earning more than the median wage for London. Could I have done that as a graduate engineer? I have my doubts.

[TheAnimus]

I'd have to disagree with your notion of a grad tax replacing the loan. I think there are two main issues here.

One tuition fees... oh sorry NL pledged you wouldn't do that, how could i of been so silly to confuse them with TopUp Fees.
Living Expenses loans.

Now i think the idea of having to eventually pay back your living expenses is fair, but i don't think paying to goto uni is. However if you made it so that only high tax payers funded uni, you would find more people would just take the easyer route. As it stands i've got a paper that i really should spend the time to publish, i'm dropping by my old lecturer next month to discuss it (he's very excited by it). Part of me knows the reasons why it would be good for the IEEE Transactions on Education come from my 'proffessional life' in finance. Just because i'm working dosen't diminish the validity of my work, and without been arogant, its better than at least 2 of my old course mates PhDs (only one of which is funded thou).

So my main bugbear with Rave's logic is that worthwhile people are poor. Closely followed by the fact it removes the slight deterent we have that if you do a degree such as physcology or english at a 3rd rate uni (a 'babysitting degree') you don't get any penalty. Where as if you do say mechanical engineering, and as a mate of mine now does, work 14 hour days traveling up and down this country fixing laser systems, you get penalised.

The Student Loans Company should be brought to awnser to the FSA, have an intrest that reflects base properly, or tracks it in a standard legal definition (as you would expect a highstreet product too have).

[ajones]

According to this, I'm a mix between Gandhi and Stalin!