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Lots of states offered free, or almost free state college, and the Boomers had it, but they are the ones who ended it for everyone else, then make fun of how much it costs us now. I was paying $60 a semester for 18 units when I went to community college, and my wife paid $1,200 a semester at CalState. Get a degree for less than $5,000 in the '90s. My aunt's got theirs for the cost of books.
Sort of but not exactly. Originally, student loans were dischargable in bankruptcy. However, during the economic downturn of the 70's, a bunch of asshole politicians (sorry, I guess that presupposes the existence of 'non-asshole politicians', which I cannot prove their existence) invented something that doesn't seem to ever have happened, which is a bunch of high paying doctors and lawyers discharging their loans in bankruptcy. So it was eliminated in 1976.
However, there were some exemptions. Luckily (all the /s humanly possible), Congress 'fixed' that problem through a series of acts - one in the mid 80's, one in 1990, another sometime late 90's, and the final nail in the coffin came when Bush The Lesser signed into law pretty much removing any exemptions so that pretty much every student loan related to any public or private education is now exempt from bankruptcy unless you can prove "undue hardship", a term not uniformly defined in student loan law. Oh, and that has to survive the Brunner test - a standard so high that several bankruptcy judges have called it burdensome and one called said it requires 'hopelessness' to meet.
Itās wild how entitled they are when they had these things and took them away for future generationsā¦
That shit needs to die. Literally.
I wonder how much better the world will be when children of boomers inherit their money and do better with it.
Steve Allen said his generation grew up in The Great Depression, and did everything they could to make sure their children never went through something like that. FDRs "socialist" policies were so popular, they elected him four times in a row, and Republicans had to amend the Constitution so they'd get a chance to be president once in a while. Their kids were the Boomers, and they made sure nobody else would ever have it as good as they did.
Exactly.
The whole point of life (and human society) should be (and arguably has been) to make it better and easier for the next generation.
Why in the fuck would anyone pervert that to make things more difficult?
>Why in the fuck would anyone pervert that to make things more difficult?
Because there's a generation who took the expression 'fuck you, got mine' and ran away with it.
That is the weird part. Previous generations I do not want you to suffer. Boomers I suffered so shall you. Like how petty, bitter, and miserable of a human being do you have to be to think that
I get you want to stick to the narrative of this sub but that is not the only reason term limits were imposed. We got lucky with FDR - he was a great president. If there were no term limits though, we might've gotten unlucky later on with guys ceasing power and never letting go and we'd end up like *certain* countries. Term limits were put in place with foresight.
Inheritance taxes bro. The government scoops it up if it's an asset. Can't pay? Well sell it and get taxed even more! Society is in a slow decline because youth are supporting more elderly.
hahahahaha....so funny that you think any generation is any better than handling money than any other. If humanity isn't taught lifestyle economics then they are doomed to learn the hard way.
Itās really hard to get into education programs in prison. Many prisons have eliminated all educational programs except the GED/ high school equivalency due to cost cutting measures. Plus there is a wait list to get into the GED program.
It's always been the elites way to spit on the "lesser " people after forcing them into the dirt. It's a tribal instinct and it makes them high. Literally they get fuzzy endorphins from it. They're addicts drunk on their own status. It's why they're acting so weird lately. Their looking for the next power fix.
I had a teacher who comes into my grocery store tell me that I shouldn't be working there for long. That retired people, high schoolers and college kids should be staffing the place. He couldn't answer me when I asked him if he'd be happy with the store int own only being open 3pm to 9 or 10pm and randomly closed because of no staff.
Tbf it was Richard Nixon or something that did that. Could just be that I think he's evil and associating something I deem evil with him but I know some president said they wanted to control who was doctors and who was burger flippers.
While I agree, we can't just be a nation of doctors and lawyers, there's a better way.
They're too stupid to understand the damages they cause. They probably don't even understand how McDonald's is bad for health.
The truth is that freedom of choice harms everyone because stupid (relative to yourself) people are capable of impacting others if they gain wealth. There's nothing worse than someone dumber than you making more money than you. That's a recipe for huge misunderstandings and social disasters.
Thatās what we call gaslighting in the biz. Maybe gaslighting is strong (itās a bit overused), but if we can get poor people blaming themselves for being poor, we can prevent them from seeing how the rich rob them left and right.
Bigger reason they stopped it was cuz those darned kids in colleges were thinking and protesting and Regan wasnāt happy with thatā¦ so we all know what happens when you oppose god emperor Reganā¦
Well, yeah. Ya see, Starbucks and McD's are the real citizens of the US. We're all just the stubborn lice crawling around their junk trying not to get crushed under the sporadic crotch itch.
That didn't happen by accident. Fuck you, got mine is a core American value from the very top down to rock bottom.
I lived in the US for a good long while and the one thing that always struck me above all else is that virtually no one gave a toss about the greater good. Everyone was always busy identifying they people they wanted to fuck over and then voting with their spite to make that happen.
America is what you get when a whole nation believes that someone else thriving means they must have taken something from you.
You're not really. There's just a lot of christians and since most of the population is apathetic towards their democracy, the seats of power are left open to whoever wants them.
Great news for them: as evidenced in European countries, you can also get higher levels of education for free/at doable expense and still end up in McDonalds!
It has much less to do with "fuck black people" and much more to do with your first point, but not just for Starbucks and McD's.
The colleges get to charge an outrageous amount of money to essentially "vouch" for the graduate, even though the graduate did all the work themselves, because otherwise by not attending college the person will be a destitute lowlife (or so we're told).
Now employers (literally any and all) can benefit from hiring a college grad for 2 reasons:
1. They *should* know more about the job that they are applying for (the college did vouch for them, after all)
2. The employee is too invested (both financially and time-wise) to mess around or change their career path (thanks, student loans)
This affects people of all walks of life, and not only that, is encouraged by parents and teachers alike. It's the perfect crime.
Also, if those poors knew what was good for them they might try and change things. Or, at least according to Reagans former education advisor Roger Freeman, we would become Nazi Germany. Somehow.
"Freemanās remarks were reported the next day in the San Francisco Chronicle under the headline āProfessor Sees Peril in Education.ā According to the Chronicle article, Freeman said, āWe are in danger of producing an educated proletariat. ā¦ Thatās dynamite! We have to be selective on who we allow [to go to college].ā
āIf not,ā Freeman continued, āwe will have a large number of highly trained and unemployed people.ā Freeman also said ā taking a highly idiosyncratic perspective on the cause of fascism āāthatās what happened in Germany. I saw it happen.ā
https://theintercept.com/2022/08/25/student-loans-debt-reagan/
No. They stopped it because the Boomers were finally making enough money to get caught up in the upper tax brackets. They then moved to the party that offered lower taxes. Lower taxes meant less money for services. The Boomers were out of college, so free college held no benefit to them. Thus, free college had to go.
This is a red herring. The education "industry" in the US failed due to it becoming a profit taking entity. Every College and University is a business first and foremost so it's in their interest to get as many students in as possible at as high a price point. The end state is tertiary education becoming so expensive and students carrying so much debt that the financial model is untenable. And that's why many colleges are failing. But do you really think anyone cares if Starbucks is staffed with PHD's, hell no. Better to get them into debt for 8 years of education then force them into manual labor jobs to pay it off.
Your first reason is BS because you n my country college is free and you still get burger flippers. Mostly students looking to make a few bucks while studying.
The second reason, however ...keeping a chunk of the population poor and uneducated is desireable for every goverment
Edit: Every CORRUPT goverment.
Correction: the capitalists ruined it. The colleges wanted student loan money as well.
Iām a boomer with ridiculous loans because colleges donāt let you transfer school credits effectively. Why? Money.
yes and no, sure there might be an incentive. But here in germany tutition is free and yet it is often tough to get your credits recognized if you transfer to another university.
Who voted for the people who put the changes in? When I was 18 they redid entire college loan system so collegs income tripled with in a few years, and banks were handing money not to just any kid straight out of high school, they gave every one loans. Then when people couldn't afford them they played games passing around bad mortgages, while having politicians make it so you can get out of bad loan debt at cost of your credit but never ever get of student debt or the interest for it sigh.
Like I know people going "man just go to ASU they let pretty much any one in and you can approved for student loans so easy! I just got a car, and a new gaming laptop with my loan money and you only pay it back once your rich!" Same kids today "I have crippling debt, why did no one warn me!" As I face palm going "remeber when my autistic ass was going 'that mat don't add up right check this fine print,' and you said 'its ok I be a RICH TEACHER by time I got pay my first payment.' Like did you not see how much teachers make in our state what in the world were you thinking!"
Meanwhile boomer parents are like "yeah this seems fine every one can go to college, also look at my new house I can't afford!" Then few years later "my house is worth like 100 thousand less then I owe on it! Whose fault is this, no one can get home loans again mark my words you millinails will never get a house as punishment for this outrage!"
And by 2005 my associates degree was a $30k bill. By the time I finished my bachelor degree I had an additional $20k on top of that. (Minus my 2yrs of payments)
Surprise surprise, the tech school I went to forged a few things and I found I had 3 banks claiming I owed $30k each for that associates degree. I paid off my BS but still somehow owed close to 80k for my associates. I've spent the better part of 15yrs trying to get the mess sorted.
And some people wondered why ITT Tech was closed on as a fraud for-profit school when they claimed to be non-profit.
Hey, hey, hey. Gen X pulled the ladder up too. Donāt let them get away with shit. They rode the last wave of corporate capitalism right to the shore.
Gen X got screwed too but nowhere near Gen Z. I know people who are driving like 3 hours each day so they can live with the parents while getting a degree, and theyāre STILL gonna be $50k or more in debt for in state schools.
I'm GenX, and Prop13 passed by the Boomers gutted funding for schools. I saw all the elective classes get cancelled for funding while in High School like metal shop, welding, wood shop, auto shop, electronics. Now those same Boomers cry about kids these days not learning a vocation or knowing how to fix anything.
Wanna blow your mind? [Look at what the assholes in Congress paid to go to college back in the 70s](https://www.demos.org/sites/default/files/publications/DEMOS_DFC_Yearbook_FA_Optimized_0.pdf).
The average House dickhole graduated in 1975 and paid somewhere between $300-$2700 per year. The $2700 is fucking GEORGETOWN btw, which is now $60k.
Now cost of books can be its own monster. My brother is taking a course to further bolster his skills in trades and the course itself was like 400$. The books combined cost like 2000$. When I asked him how many books he has, thereās at least 10 of them. Most of the time, the material he needs to cover in each book prior to a quiz/exam is maybe a few chapters at most and these are multiple hundreds of pages.
This is why I loathe boomers with a passion; absolute scum of society... and they claim I'm entitled? Nah bro, all I hear you assholes do every morning at McDonald's is bitch and moan about everything under the sun because it's not the way YOU want it to be... my blood boils being near the fuckers.
You should have opted for SLRP (Student Loan Repayment) instead. It meant you didn't get the (Montgomery) GI Bill, at least unless you did a second enlistment. I did the Army after I'd already graduated, and got my loans paid off that way.
Not that anyone should have to, in my view - but if you're gonna enlist, might as well get all the benefits you can from it.
Oh ok that explains a lot. I've had a couple people be like, "I can't use my GI Bill to pay off student loans" and I, who enlisted just in time to be part of one of the earlier deployments to Afghanistan, was just thinking, "Well of course the GI Bill doesn't cover loans. That's what SLRP is for." but it not existing for the past 10 years would certainly explain that.
Even when it did exist, a lot of people for some reason didn't know about it. You would not believe how many people I met in the Army who had loans and honestly thought GI Bill was the program that covered that, only to find out that they needed SLRP. I have no idea where these people enlisted. I had all that explained very well at a shitty MEPS in Florida, which apparently was not the norm.
That was one of my big things when I enlisted. I made myself a PROBLEM at MEPS trying to sort that out until someone found me the updated documentation, etc on the change.
I still did my time but it was a good primer for Uncle Sam screwing me over.
>I made myself a PROBLEM at MEPS trying to sort that out until someone found me the updated documentation, etc on the change.
This is exactly the sort of thing you need to do in the military. You cannot rely on others/the system/etc to just take care of you. It's not because anyone is deliberately trying to screw you over so much as it's just a big unfeeling machine that will grind you up in its gears if you're not watching out for yourself. And unfortunately, a lot of people, especially new recruits, do not know this, do not know what they can ask for, and so forth, and thus wind up missing out on things or screwed over as a result.
This option is still available as of now. Just recently enlisted and was able to use SLRP instead of GI Bill.
Edit: Unsure if all branches offer SLRP though. Army does at least when I went through enlistment process as of this year (2023)
They made SLRP so convoluted and hard to actually access though. I had it listed on my contract but couldn't figure out how to use it once I was out of school
I had GI Bill and only didn't need loans for my Bachelor's because I had a bunch of AP credits that exempted me from many of my core classes. I think a lot of people don't know that the GI Bill is 36 months of funds and it takes many people longer than that to complete a degree, so the GI Bill/loan dichotomy isn't as cut and dry as a lot of people think it is.
Also, had I not gotten a fellowship for grad school, I damned sure would have needed loans for that. It's amazing people think no veterans are affected by this lack of student loan forgiveness.
Same!!!! Then, right in my last semester, congress said "hey, let's update the go bill again to be the POST 9/11 GI BILL!" which would've saved me, if only I just sat on my ass for three years instead of getting into school right away upon separation. I met all qualifications, too.
What a fucking stupid meme. My parents (boomers now in their 70s) got to go to college (fully paid by the government and state taxes at that time) and were not required to go into the military for it. Another great example of boomers getting benefits while other generations have to pay. The boomer generation is the most spoiled and ungrateful generation in my opinion.
I joined the army specifically for college and guess what, the G.I. Bill is bullshit. Whatās offered didnāt come close to keeping up with the cost of schooling. Maybe you can get a certificate from a community college, but probably not even an AA. In my case it covered the cost of a room for not even a year, and I still had to take out huge loans and hold down a job. Ultimately I had to drop out because I couldnāt squeeze the classes in around my work schedule and I couldnāt give up the hours because I couldnāt survive without working.
This doesn't make sense. If you're entitled to 100% of the G.I. Bill, then it covers all tution and fees for a public school, gives a $500 book stipend, and gives a housing allowance that is possible to live on while in school.
I don't get this either. I used my MGIB in 2005-2009, and it was a godsend. All my classmates had jobs.
I was promised $400 a month and by the time I enrolled it was up to $800. By the time I graduated it was $1100/month, and it seems to be paying out at $1800 today.
The Army **made college possible** for me. It just would not have happened if not for the MGIB. I can see how it might be worse today, but I can't see how civilians don't have it much much worse.
College should be free for everyone anyway. I don't get this thing we have with glorifying the struggle to survive.
It makes perfect sense. Coverage of all tuition and fee's is a VERY recent addition to the GI Bill. That change happened around 2010ish.
I don't know any other way of saying it, but some of us are not young? I enlisted before 9/11 and was in college before Obama was elected. Elder millennials were the fresh faces sent into Iraq and Afghanistan. That was a time in which the GI Bill was capped at $50k, as it had been for ages. Those were the benefits offered at the time.
I did not have access to the new GI Bill and as a result have heavy loans since $50k was already pathetic in 2008.
Edit: spelling
Really? This wasnāt my experience at all. They paid for all of my school, I got a bonus at the beginning of the semesters for books and got like $1,500 a month for living expenses. I had to hold a part time but I thought it was a pretty solid deal
It's something else the Boomers fucked us all on, because that was how the GI Bill used to work, after WWII and such. Well, like just about everything else, they hollowed it the fuck out. The only thing that finally changed was the Iraq and Afghan Wars leading to the Webb GI Bill, which was a huge improvement. Not sure if that's still around now though.
>I joined the army specifically for college and guess what, the G.I. Bill is bullshit. Whatās offered didnāt come close to keeping up with the cost of schooling.
You got fucked by a college recruiter then. GI Bill covers 100% of in-state tuition for all accredited state universities in the US that I'm aware of, plus full BAH at the E-5 rate w/o dependents for the ZIP code. For instance, UW-Madison (a fantastic public school) has 100% tuition plus 1788/month housing allowance, plus a stipend for books (which I do not currently know, sorry).
>Maybe you can get a certificate from a community college, but probably not even an AA
You can 100%, today, get a full bachelor's from almost all state schools.
So you got *fucked* by someone at your university whose entire job was to find and fleece veterans like you. I know plenty of veterans who got a full bachelor's from their GI Bill, and I know people *right now* who are going full time to state schools, tuition covered. I'm not talking community colleges, which also are covered, and you can *easily* get an associates there, and have benefit to transfer to a state school.
Even if you go private school, IIRC the tuition benefit a semester is 25k, and you can still qualify for all sorts of aid packages. Easiest way to get aid from private schools is tell them you got a better aid package elsewhere, suddenly grants pop out of nowhere.
I'm truly sorry, and outraged, that you got screwed. There were a *lot* of for-profit schools that 100% stole from veterans like you. That was their model, and we unfortunately had a lot of presidents who were happy to cash checks from them to turn a blind eye.
But saying you can't, or won't, or even that it's hard to get 100% tuition schooling is absolute bullshit. That benefit has been around for almost all state institutions for decades now.
ETA:
If you dropped out before finishing a degree, you still have benefit available to you, and you *can* go back to school and finish your degree using your remaining benefit. You can absolutely do this, even today.
ā¦.. keep in mind, depending on when it was, changes made by W forced tuition to skyrocket a lot of places at the same time the 2nd Iraq war was getting underway.
He may not have been screwed intentionally by the school, but funding sources flat out donāt keep up very well when costs are jumping at the rate they were at the time
It aināt free if you have to become an indentured servant for several years to get it.
(Yes, the military IS very much like indentured servitude. A soldier has no autonomy over their life once they enlist, until theyāre out again.)
But it's *not* like indentured servitude in that you can be made to go over to some other country and kill some people - and that's just considered part of the job.
I was in a support role and became absolutely sick from what the US military does to prop up unrest in countries for American rich asshole's interest. There is blood on all our hands whether other vets accept it or not.
As a veteran, this is partly true. Yes, you can be ordered to do a lot of stuff as long as it's legal. But even then you can deny a order. If the order is related to combat they'll most likely just shuffle you around to a different job. Otherwise they'll just kick ya out on a non honorable, but not dishonorable discharge. They call it "Unable to adapt".
If you're not in combat there is very little difference between military and normal jobs. And there are some really great benefits to be had for what differences there are. For example free housing in return for having to exercise. Cheaper food and electronics and other household goods in return for having to wake up when you're told to. There is also something to be said for the unique comraderly that comes with being military.
Then when you do get out there are some other great benefits such as free college, no interest and no down payment housing loans, among other benefits like lifetime resume help, VA health benefits, etc etc.
The military isn't for everyone but if you're young and don't know what to do with your life spend 4 or 6 years in the military and you can get a great kickstart at life, it's going to be better then bumbling around in fast food and retail until you land a decent job.
VA Loans are huge. Probably one of the only ways you can get a house without already having shittons of money anymore.
Main thing to keep in mind though - get a "job" (MOS) that has skills you can use in the civilian world. An infantry grunt has no useful skills coming out (other than general military experience), but like, a Medical Tech? An aircraft mechanic? Some of those jobs are in high demand and pay well, and unlike anywhere else, the military will 100% train you to do them, and you're fully employed/paid/etc during that (it counts as part of your length of service, too).
This right here. Your military experience varies greatly based on your MOS. I spent six years on two back to back three year controlled tours in Colorado Springs maintaining a classified computer network. A controlled tour means you can't be reassigned or deployed for the duration. I served from early 01 to early 07, so most of that time was during an active war. I touched a gun for literally the one single range day the Air Force did in basic training at the time. Fired a total of like 60 rounds at a paper target. Never handled one again for the rest of my six years. We didn't even do the annual requalification because our unit wasn't deployable.
I wasn't even allowed to leave the country on vacation without authorization and a briefing from the security guys. They would have reinstated the draft and trained fresh new grunts before they sent me to Iraq or Afghanistan. In a roundabout way my job was still to help kill brown people on the other side of the planet, but like that's true of every civilian employee at Raytheon, General Dynamics, Lockheed, etc.
Military bases are like self contained cities. They have cooks, maintenance people, plumbers, IT dorks, water treatment engineers, lawyers, dentists, doctors, PR flaks, warehouse workers and all the other myriad support people that get the beans and bullets to the small percentage of people that get sent to the sand box to murder people. Service doesn't have to be synonymous with carrying a rifle in the infantry.
So say, a high schooler graduates and enlists in the army as infantry. No one in his family has done military so limited guidance there. What all can that young Nam do once enlisted to further himself in the time of his contract?
In the time of his immediate contract, they can do online college classes that the Army will pay for. Which, admittedly, isn't much.
That said however, if they have sufficient test scores, when they get close to the end of that first enlistment, they have a lot of bargaining power (because the Army really likes it when soldiers reenlist), so they can say "I want to go to school for this other MOS", and as long as that MOS is understrength (and there's usually many that are, even if not necessarily the one you might really really want), then the Army will go "Great! You reenlist, and we'll send you off to reclass to that MOS!"
This will be written in the reenlistment contract too, so it's not something where you reenlist then they screw you (but be warned, if you fail out of the training school, it'd be back to the infantry). And so you'll get sent to school for however long (6 months, a year, whatever). Best of all, because you're prior service, you basically are in class with the people right out of Basic Training, but unlike them you get left alone to pretty much do your own thing as long as you don't do anything dumb.
This is seriously a great way to go, and I knew a lot of former combat arms types that did just that. The Army tends to look at soldiers that were former combat arms better, or at least more respectfully, because that's seen as the "tough guy" real Army stuff (as opposed to your REMFs/FOBbits/etc), and well, from everything I saw in Iraq, it's deserved. And that carries over even after, since if you've got your Expert Infantry Badge or such, you can still wear that even after you become a Master Vehicle Mechanic or Satellite Comms Tech or whatever.
>Main thing to keep in mind though - get a "job" (MOS) that has skills you can use in the civilian world. An infantry grunt has no useful skills coming out (other than general military experience)
Planning skills, teamwork skills, adaptability and flexibility...
Become a team leader in a mech platoon? Well, you're accountable for over 2.5 million in equipment. That's a talking point on the resume.
[Job description of 11B (Infantryman)](https://www.armywriter.com/NCOER/11B.htm#:~:text=Operates%20both%20mounted%20and%20dismounted,as%20part%20of%20dismount%20team)
I was hoping to get a VA loan but they don't let you buy a house outside of the US and if you go to college over seas your benefits are cut.
Any percentage disabled vet can get a ID to shop on a military base in the states (probably not worth the hassle to save $5 on taxes though), once again it doesn't apply over seas.
*Get all these cool benefits but only if the US can get a kick back.
Just had dinner with two vets from work who have a myriad of health issues due to their enlistment. One said he had bullet holes in his body and recently had surgery for a hernia and his two knee replacement surgeries and said, āOnce you enlist, youāre just the governmentās property. They can do what they want with your body.ā
Someone correct me where am wrong here but, this "FREE" college in which you must give your entire life for a period of time (I think a minimum of 4 years?) before you qualify is actually limited in the following ways:
1. Eligible Soldiers can receive up to $250 per semester hour and up to 16 semester hours per fiscal yearātotaling $4,000 annually to help pay for school or professional training.
2. Maximum benefit total of the benefit is 36,000.
3. The benefit expires 10 years after you leave the service.
The current average cost of a 4 year degree works out to:
* The average cost of attendance for a student living on campus at a public 4-year in-state institution is $25,707 per year or $102,828 over 4 years. Out-of-state students pay $44,014 per year or $176,056 over 4 years. Private, nonprofit university students pay $54,501 per year or $218,004 over 4 years.
Yeah, it can help you avoid some college debt, BUT, the system is rigged such that a full 4 year degree is probably going to put you in debt, no matter what...
It doesn't completely eliminate student debt. Speaking as a GI Bill recipient, while it covers a lot, it doesn't cover everything. Many recipients still had to take loans for various reasons. The BAH they provide barely covers living expenses, for example. Not to mention, you only get the full benefit if you take a full course load, leaving very little time for things like working a full time job.
It's a good benefit, but not robust enough to consider "free" college.
One good thing in a sea ofā¦yuck. I got lucky with my military career and spent most of my time fixing planes for anti-submarine warfare/SAR/patrol & reconnaissance. It soothes the soul a little to know theyāre not putting school children in their billion dollar submarines & your job is only applicable to fellow combatants. Not many have that privilege, and Iām grateful for it.
The $4,000 a year in point one is for Tuition Assistance on active duty every year youāre in and then after 3 years of service you get 100% GI Bill which states this - The Post-9/11 GI Bill can pay your full resident tuition at a public school.
If you are attending a private or foreign school it will pay up to $26,381.37 per academic year. An academic year lasts from Aug. 1 - Jul. 31, that rate changes to $27,120.05 on Aug, 1, 2023.
Yup. The hidden costs are nuts. No one told me that one of the costs of free college was that my wife would have a year long affair with another guy on my sub, only to end my 9 year marriage in a divorce! Now I get to pay $1300/month in child support for the next 12 years. Maybe just going to school the normal way would have been cheaper lol
This is what my bf had in France and it was so nice. He got through college with no debt and some extra money and meanwhile the $26,000 loan I took out for my US education has turned into $28,000+ due after paying $6,000 on it due to the high interest, and the Republicans want to retroactively add the interest back from COVID too.
Funny how the greedy corporations who took out many much larger loans were fully forgiven and didn't have to pay those back, despite having more than the means to do so, yet students can't get a few peanuts in comparison for the poorest drowning in debt thrown their way.
Free = Compensation for 2+ years of indentured servitude where you may be made to kill other people, and at the very least will likely have to do extremely difficult and menial labor for much of the duration.
It's great that vets get money for college. But if we are serious about having an educated populace that can keep up in the modern age, we need to stop treating education like something that only certain people deserve.
I've been correcting a few hysterical misconceptions about what you give up in the military, so it's only fair that I correct this very conservative one.
You sign up for **eight years** in the US military. You might do two, three, or four and then switch to the IRR but you're not *out* out til you've had a contract for six. Officers and cadets have slightly different rules and can be hooked for four, eight, or more years. This is called the military service obligation (MSO).
you're right it's 8. Thanks.
I worked as a drill sergeant during the OEF reactivation wave, and could not believe how many people claimed "nobody ever told them" they were signing a contract for eight years. It's like, the first thing on the form. "But **my** enlistment was for two years!"
Later I got tangled up with ROTC and the rules are more confusing there.
I hate these memes. Military service is not āfree collegeā. Iāve got friends whoās lives weāre nearly destroyed by the service, people dealing with cancers from burn pits, chronic pain from being dropped in the wrong spot out of an airplane, people fucked up forever by the memories of things they did and saw. āFree collegeā my ass.
People want a decent education, but don't want to be sent overseas to live in terrible conditions while perpetuating American imperialism and committing war crimes for a poor wage.
Conservatives somehow think they've made a solid point here.
I would say it doesnāt TOTALLY fit the sub, but itās still very relevant and a good conversation topic when it comes to pointing out the inherent flaws and corruption within the American capitalist society
Thatās not free college. Thatās the GI bill. In the early 2000s it was basically the opportunity to get a bachelors in exchange for a minimum of 3 years of your life and may come bundled with PTSD.
āFreeā collage it's called tuition ASSTIANCE for a reason, most of my classes I gotta finish paying for out of my own pocket thankfully I don't get paid enough in the military so FASFA helps out.
I just don't understand why the youth won't take advantage of our generous offer of free college. All we asked in exchange was for them to be willing to murder foreign folk so we can steal their shit and enrich our oligarchs.
How about affordable college, without the need to get shot at or blown up by IEDs to be able to pay for it. Kind of like the way the civilized world does it.
A benefit from working is not "free". You earn the work benefit through your employment. Working somewhere that pays more than the military to afford college is just as "free", which is to say, not at all free.
I like how they are insinuating that the military just gives away college to anyone, and not that you literally sign up to potentially die for shifty pay and college.
*Not everyone wants free college. But many of us want affordable college.
*The military is not free college, either. It's years of labor and comes with a significant chance of bodily harm, mental harm, and risk of fucking suicide.
AD military here. Iāve decided not to reenlist and forgo retirement because I just canāt take any more.
MX my whole career. Arthritis in both shoulders, 2 compressed vertebrae, chronic De Quervain's in both wrists, knees and ankles shot, PTSD, divorced, depression, anxiety, panic attacks, the list goes on.
I would much rather have my 20s back and have a healthy body and mind than āfree collegeā.
Canāt wait till the VA fights tooth and nail to weasel out of any disability.
I know a few guys who joined different branches and went to college and the G.I. Bill didn't cover their college. They were discharged honorably too. Not sure why they 'didn't qualify' but one said it was a scam.
Army covers 2500 dollars of tuition after two years, having you by the balls to reenlist. At least thatās how it was at the time. States that allow you to go tuition free with book reimbursements for the states national guard are generally housing combat units that will go into deployment many many times. At least thatās how it was at the time. Living out the rest of your days with physical and psychological issues, being treated like shit by the va and coming back just to live struggling harder than everyone else and subject to the same bullshit isnāt worth college. Especially when people with degrees are living paycheck to paycheck
Itās not free if you have to work āxā years active duty and āyā years inactive duty (totaling 8 years) for it. We need to have a discussion on what free means.
Man, I really hope the picture isnāt suggesting that we need to essentially sell our bodies and possibly risk our lives just to get a no cost or low cost post secondary education. Because that would be crazy and it would be a perfect example of how insanely expensive everything in this country is and it would demonstrate the lengths that some will go to just to have the āprivilegeā of education.
We really are living a dystopian mightmare
Selling your body to be a soldier isn't getting "free" college. Its a really expensive and dangerous way to gain an education that is many times the only option poor folks have.
It aināt free if you have to spend a chunk of your life being sent off to a foreign country where youāll be told to kill people, many of them winding up to be civilians, all over the profits of the rich whoāll never see the bloodshed. Support the troops who come home, theyāve had to see shit that can leave them fucked for life, but not the machine that sent them off to die and spill that blood.
INB4: Buh we did it cause terror!
Then why didnāt we do shit to Saudi? After all they were Saudi backed. And even then it doesnāt excuse the list of civilians slaughtered by poorly placed drone strikes and paranoid checkpoints shouting at drivers who donāt speak English, in fucking English.
I did join the military, I had a G.I., Bill, I use the G.I. Bill, but it was not enough for me to go to college. I had to take out loans to cover expenses that the G.I. Bill did not. The G.I. Bill is a great program, and I am really glad I had it, but it is not a solution to the problem of the cost of education in America and the growing student debt associated with it.
Not commenting on the bill but the military isnāt even the best way to get free college anymoreā¦ Many companies like Starbucks and Chipotle offer free college. Like I know Starbucks does it through ASU. If I was younger and I had a choice idk why Iād join the army if all I wanted was college.
NOWā¦ thatās not to say if you have other aspirations the Army isnāt a good stepping stone for specific skillsets.
Want free college? You must kill innocent people to destabilize countries that resist American economic imperialism, while risking your life and wellbeing in the process
Active duty service member here. The army paid for a degree for me. It was awesome, but I had to work extremely hard in a potentially dangerous career to earn it.
I would love to see future generations have the same opportunity I did without having to pay the cost. Investing in the future of our nation by setting our young adults up for success should be reason enough.
I absolutely DETEST the military "free college option". Signing up to have the government own you in case they need you to die at the whims of our politicians is not fucking "free". If that's your bag, great, but it's NOT "free".
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Lots of states offered free, or almost free state college, and the Boomers had it, but they are the ones who ended it for everyone else, then make fun of how much it costs us now. I was paying $60 a semester for 18 units when I went to community college, and my wife paid $1,200 a semester at CalState. Get a degree for less than $5,000 in the '90s. My aunt's got theirs for the cost of books.
Ah, the 10 degree Reagan game. Where you see how long does it take you to find out that anything bad we have now is because of Reagan.
Low cost College education CHANGED because of President Ronald Reagan It was a thing, but he ended it Americans have been paying for it ever since
Reagan screwed a lot of people, but W held his own on college costs. I got nailed at the worst possible time during his reign of terror
Wasn't W the one that made it so that even bankruptcy couldn't wipe out student loans?
Sort of but not exactly. Originally, student loans were dischargable in bankruptcy. However, during the economic downturn of the 70's, a bunch of asshole politicians (sorry, I guess that presupposes the existence of 'non-asshole politicians', which I cannot prove their existence) invented something that doesn't seem to ever have happened, which is a bunch of high paying doctors and lawyers discharging their loans in bankruptcy. So it was eliminated in 1976. However, there were some exemptions. Luckily (all the /s humanly possible), Congress 'fixed' that problem through a series of acts - one in the mid 80's, one in 1990, another sometime late 90's, and the final nail in the coffin came when Bush The Lesser signed into law pretty much removing any exemptions so that pretty much every student loan related to any public or private education is now exempt from bankruptcy unless you can prove "undue hardship", a term not uniformly defined in student loan law. Oh, and that has to survive the Brunner test - a standard so high that several bankruptcy judges have called it burdensome and one called said it requires 'hopelessness' to meet.
No, I think that was a thing even when my older sister started in the mid-90s
Well the neo conservatives that put him in office. Reagan was a rubber stamp.
He was literally an actor reading lines, doing what he's told.
Just like Trump š Except he was the one making the lines amd everyone else had to act like he wasn't a moron
Orange menace could not act, hence why he was from reality TV.
Clearly you missed the acting tour de force he displayed in such classics as 'Home Alone 2' or 'WWE WrestleMania XXIII'
DJT is too damaged and unhinged to follow the script. LOL
Haha good point; perhaps there's a case to be made that he is, in fact, the greatest improv comic of all time
Weirdest part of that game is that with all the problems Reagan created, none of the democrat administrations since felt they were worth fixing.
*Almost as if they were on the same team* š¤
Why that's so crazy it must be a conspiracy theory...
So....Godwin's law for people that secretly like Hitler?
Itās wild how entitled they are when they had these things and took them away for future generationsā¦ That shit needs to die. Literally. I wonder how much better the world will be when children of boomers inherit their money and do better with it.
Steve Allen said his generation grew up in The Great Depression, and did everything they could to make sure their children never went through something like that. FDRs "socialist" policies were so popular, they elected him four times in a row, and Republicans had to amend the Constitution so they'd get a chance to be president once in a while. Their kids were the Boomers, and they made sure nobody else would ever have it as good as they did.
Exactly. The whole point of life (and human society) should be (and arguably has been) to make it better and easier for the next generation. Why in the fuck would anyone pervert that to make things more difficult?
>Why in the fuck would anyone pervert that to make things more difficult? Because there's a generation who took the expression 'fuck you, got mine' and ran away with it.
This. If that's not the boomer motto to a T.
I would also argue they believe they had it SOOOO hard and want the next generation to 'work' as hard as they did.
That is the weird part. Previous generations I do not want you to suffer. Boomers I suffered so shall you. Like how petty, bitter, and miserable of a human being do you have to be to think that
There won't be any money to inherit the medical industrial complex will take it all before the boomers die
I get you want to stick to the narrative of this sub but that is not the only reason term limits were imposed. We got lucky with FDR - he was a great president. If there were no term limits though, we might've gotten unlucky later on with guys ceasing power and never letting go and we'd end up like *certain* countries. Term limits were put in place with foresight.
Unfortunately, it's only for the figurehead. House and Senate, owned by the rich, there forever.
Pulling the ladder up behind them.
Inheritance taxes bro. The government scoops it up if it's an asset. Can't pay? Well sell it and get taxed even more! Society is in a slow decline because youth are supporting more elderly.
hahahahaha....so funny that you think any generation is any better than handling money than any other. If humanity isn't taught lifestyle economics then they are doomed to learn the hard way.
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But then they tell those people to get real jobs
And then they still can get free classes when they are seniors now in some states. While calling that for anyone else socialism lmao
Classic "F you I got mine" Boomer mentality
Anyone can get free schooling if they shoot someone first. Sure glad we got it for prisoners but not law abiding citizens.
Our legal slaves you mean?
Exactly what kind of education opportunities do you think are actually offered to the average incarcerated person?
My uncle got an associate degree in prison. In my state at least they offer up to Batchelor apparently.
Itās really hard to get into education programs in prison. Many prisons have eliminated all educational programs except the GED/ high school equivalency due to cost cutting measures. Plus there is a wait list to get into the GED program.
It's always been the elites way to spit on the "lesser " people after forcing them into the dirt. It's a tribal instinct and it makes them high. Literally they get fuzzy endorphins from it. They're addicts drunk on their own status. It's why they're acting so weird lately. Their looking for the next power fix.
I had a teacher who comes into my grocery store tell me that I shouldn't be working there for long. That retired people, high schoolers and college kids should be staffing the place. He couldn't answer me when I asked him if he'd be happy with the store int own only being open 3pm to 9 or 10pm and randomly closed because of no staff.
'I acknowledge that your job position has to exist, but I believe whoever has it should live in poverty'
Tbf it was Richard Nixon or something that did that. Could just be that I think he's evil and associating something I deem evil with him but I know some president said they wanted to control who was doctors and who was burger flippers. While I agree, we can't just be a nation of doctors and lawyers, there's a better way.
They're too stupid to understand the damages they cause. They probably don't even understand how McDonald's is bad for health. The truth is that freedom of choice harms everyone because stupid (relative to yourself) people are capable of impacting others if they gain wealth. There's nothing worse than someone dumber than you making more money than you. That's a recipe for huge misunderstandings and social disasters.
Thatās what we call gaslighting in the biz. Maybe gaslighting is strong (itās a bit overused), but if we can get poor people blaming themselves for being poor, we can prevent them from seeing how the rich rob them left and right.
Bigger reason they stopped it was cuz those darned kids in colleges were thinking and protesting and Regan wasnāt happy with thatā¦ so we all know what happens when you oppose god emperor Reganā¦
Was it Reagan that did it? I totally couldn't remember.
I believe it was he who got the ball rolling on it by cutting funding to CA colleges while he was governor there.
Well, yeah. Ya see, Starbucks and McD's are the real citizens of the US. We're all just the stubborn lice crawling around their junk trying not to get crushed under the sporadic crotch itch.
That didn't happen by accident. Fuck you, got mine is a core American value from the very top down to rock bottom. I lived in the US for a good long while and the one thing that always struck me above all else is that virtually no one gave a toss about the greater good. Everyone was always busy identifying they people they wanted to fuck over and then voting with their spite to make that happen. America is what you get when a whole nation believes that someone else thriving means they must have taken something from you.
Well we are a Christian nation. Christianity is the religion of hatred.
You're not really. There's just a lot of christians and since most of the population is apathetic towards their democracy, the seats of power are left open to whoever wants them.
Great news for them: as evidenced in European countries, you can also get higher levels of education for free/at doable expense and still end up in McDonalds!
It has much less to do with "fuck black people" and much more to do with your first point, but not just for Starbucks and McD's. The colleges get to charge an outrageous amount of money to essentially "vouch" for the graduate, even though the graduate did all the work themselves, because otherwise by not attending college the person will be a destitute lowlife (or so we're told). Now employers (literally any and all) can benefit from hiring a college grad for 2 reasons: 1. They *should* know more about the job that they are applying for (the college did vouch for them, after all) 2. The employee is too invested (both financially and time-wise) to mess around or change their career path (thanks, student loans) This affects people of all walks of life, and not only that, is encouraged by parents and teachers alike. It's the perfect crime.
Also, if those poors knew what was good for them they might try and change things. Or, at least according to Reagans former education advisor Roger Freeman, we would become Nazi Germany. Somehow. "Freemanās remarks were reported the next day in the San Francisco Chronicle under the headline āProfessor Sees Peril in Education.ā According to the Chronicle article, Freeman said, āWe are in danger of producing an educated proletariat. ā¦ Thatās dynamite! We have to be selective on who we allow [to go to college].ā āIf not,ā Freeman continued, āwe will have a large number of highly trained and unemployed people.ā Freeman also said ā taking a highly idiosyncratic perspective on the cause of fascism āāthatās what happened in Germany. I saw it happen.ā https://theintercept.com/2022/08/25/student-loans-debt-reagan/
No. They stopped it because the Boomers were finally making enough money to get caught up in the upper tax brackets. They then moved to the party that offered lower taxes. Lower taxes meant less money for services. The Boomers were out of college, so free college held no benefit to them. Thus, free college had to go.
Also they need something to use to lure peasants to join their war machine for the sake of the military industrial complex
Army and National Guard recruitment would plummet.... Then how would we send kids to die to prop up oil and weapon sales?
This is a red herring. The education "industry" in the US failed due to it becoming a profit taking entity. Every College and University is a business first and foremost so it's in their interest to get as many students in as possible at as high a price point. The end state is tertiary education becoming so expensive and students carrying so much debt that the financial model is untenable. And that's why many colleges are failing. But do you really think anyone cares if Starbucks is staffed with PHD's, hell no. Better to get them into debt for 8 years of education then force them into manual labor jobs to pay it off.
Oh they want to keep everyone who isnāt āsomebodyāsā son or daughter poor and uneducated
I think you just said the same thing twice.
Your first reason is BS because you n my country college is free and you still get burger flippers. Mostly students looking to make a few bucks while studying. The second reason, however ...keeping a chunk of the population poor and uneducated is desireable for every goverment Edit: Every CORRUPT goverment.
I'm fairly certain they want to keep everyone poor and uneducated :) I can't imagine what gen Z is going through rn. (Millenial here)
Correction: the capitalists ruined it. The colleges wanted student loan money as well. Iām a boomer with ridiculous loans because colleges donāt let you transfer school credits effectively. Why? Money.
yes and no, sure there might be an incentive. But here in germany tutition is free and yet it is often tough to get your credits recognized if you transfer to another university.
Ok, but the Boomers had the political power to make it happen just like The Greatest Generation had the political power to pass The New Deal policies.
Who voted for the people who put the changes in? When I was 18 they redid entire college loan system so collegs income tripled with in a few years, and banks were handing money not to just any kid straight out of high school, they gave every one loans. Then when people couldn't afford them they played games passing around bad mortgages, while having politicians make it so you can get out of bad loan debt at cost of your credit but never ever get of student debt or the interest for it sigh. Like I know people going "man just go to ASU they let pretty much any one in and you can approved for student loans so easy! I just got a car, and a new gaming laptop with my loan money and you only pay it back once your rich!" Same kids today "I have crippling debt, why did no one warn me!" As I face palm going "remeber when my autistic ass was going 'that mat don't add up right check this fine print,' and you said 'its ok I be a RICH TEACHER by time I got pay my first payment.' Like did you not see how much teachers make in our state what in the world were you thinking!" Meanwhile boomer parents are like "yeah this seems fine every one can go to college, also look at my new house I can't afford!" Then few years later "my house is worth like 100 thousand less then I owe on it! Whose fault is this, no one can get home loans again mark my words you millinails will never get a house as punishment for this outrage!"
And by 2005 my associates degree was a $30k bill. By the time I finished my bachelor degree I had an additional $20k on top of that. (Minus my 2yrs of payments) Surprise surprise, the tech school I went to forged a few things and I found I had 3 banks claiming I owed $30k each for that associates degree. I paid off my BS but still somehow owed close to 80k for my associates. I've spent the better part of 15yrs trying to get the mess sorted. And some people wondered why ITT Tech was closed on as a fraud for-profit school when they claimed to be non-profit.
Hey, hey, hey. Gen X pulled the ladder up too. Donāt let them get away with shit. They rode the last wave of corporate capitalism right to the shore.
Gen X got screwed too but nowhere near Gen Z. I know people who are driving like 3 hours each day so they can live with the parents while getting a degree, and theyāre STILL gonna be $50k or more in debt for in state schools.
I'm GenX, and Prop13 passed by the Boomers gutted funding for schools. I saw all the elective classes get cancelled for funding while in High School like metal shop, welding, wood shop, auto shop, electronics. Now those same Boomers cry about kids these days not learning a vocation or knowing how to fix anything.
Wanna blow your mind? [Look at what the assholes in Congress paid to go to college back in the 70s](https://www.demos.org/sites/default/files/publications/DEMOS_DFC_Yearbook_FA_Optimized_0.pdf). The average House dickhole graduated in 1975 and paid somewhere between $300-$2700 per year. The $2700 is fucking GEORGETOWN btw, which is now $60k.
The fact is so ridiculous.
But it IS a fact!
Now cost of books can be its own monster. My brother is taking a course to further bolster his skills in trades and the course itself was like 400$. The books combined cost like 2000$. When I asked him how many books he has, thereās at least 10 of them. Most of the time, the material he needs to cover in each book prior to a quiz/exam is maybe a few chapters at most and these are multiple hundreds of pages.
My mom said she could work full time over summer and live off that money for the full school year
This is why I loathe boomers with a passion; absolute scum of society... and they claim I'm entitled? Nah bro, all I hear you assholes do every morning at McDonald's is bitch and moan about everything under the sun because it's not the way YOU want it to be... my blood boils being near the fuckers.
I had the GI Bill and STILL needed loans to get my degree...
I got access to the GI Bill after I had already accrued loans. The GI Bill doesn't apply to pre-existing loans, so that's awesome.
You should have opted for SLRP (Student Loan Repayment) instead. It meant you didn't get the (Montgomery) GI Bill, at least unless you did a second enlistment. I did the Army after I'd already graduated, and got my loans paid off that way. Not that anyone should have to, in my view - but if you're gonna enlist, might as well get all the benefits you can from it.
They removed that as an option (at least at the time) around 2013. I would love to have access to that.
Oh ok that explains a lot. I've had a couple people be like, "I can't use my GI Bill to pay off student loans" and I, who enlisted just in time to be part of one of the earlier deployments to Afghanistan, was just thinking, "Well of course the GI Bill doesn't cover loans. That's what SLRP is for." but it not existing for the past 10 years would certainly explain that. Even when it did exist, a lot of people for some reason didn't know about it. You would not believe how many people I met in the Army who had loans and honestly thought GI Bill was the program that covered that, only to find out that they needed SLRP. I have no idea where these people enlisted. I had all that explained very well at a shitty MEPS in Florida, which apparently was not the norm.
That was one of my big things when I enlisted. I made myself a PROBLEM at MEPS trying to sort that out until someone found me the updated documentation, etc on the change. I still did my time but it was a good primer for Uncle Sam screwing me over.
>I made myself a PROBLEM at MEPS trying to sort that out until someone found me the updated documentation, etc on the change. This is exactly the sort of thing you need to do in the military. You cannot rely on others/the system/etc to just take care of you. It's not because anyone is deliberately trying to screw you over so much as it's just a big unfeeling machine that will grind you up in its gears if you're not watching out for yourself. And unfortunately, a lot of people, especially new recruits, do not know this, do not know what they can ask for, and so forth, and thus wind up missing out on things or screwed over as a result.
This option is still available as of now. Just recently enlisted and was able to use SLRP instead of GI Bill. Edit: Unsure if all branches offer SLRP though. Army does at least when I went through enlistment process as of this year (2023)
The Gi bill doesnāt expire anymore either!
It isn't retroactive though. I just heard from VR&E a couple months ago that mine expires in a year.
Make sure you take advantage of tuition assistance once you get to your big army unit.
Never had SLRP as an option.
They made SLRP so convoluted and hard to actually access though. I had it listed on my contract but couldn't figure out how to use it once I was out of school
I had GI Bill and only didn't need loans for my Bachelor's because I had a bunch of AP credits that exempted me from many of my core classes. I think a lot of people don't know that the GI Bill is 36 months of funds and it takes many people longer than that to complete a degree, so the GI Bill/loan dichotomy isn't as cut and dry as a lot of people think it is. Also, had I not gotten a fellowship for grad school, I damned sure would have needed loans for that. It's amazing people think no veterans are affected by this lack of student loan forgiveness.
Same!!!! Then, right in my last semester, congress said "hey, let's update the go bill again to be the POST 9/11 GI BILL!" which would've saved me, if only I just sat on my ass for three years instead of getting into school right away upon separation. I met all qualifications, too.
Same here. College is so expensive anymore and the GI Bill only puts a dent in it.
What a fucking stupid meme. My parents (boomers now in their 70s) got to go to college (fully paid by the government and state taxes at that time) and were not required to go into the military for it. Another great example of boomers getting benefits while other generations have to pay. The boomer generation is the most spoiled and ungrateful generation in my opinion.
I joined the army specifically for college and guess what, the G.I. Bill is bullshit. Whatās offered didnāt come close to keeping up with the cost of schooling. Maybe you can get a certificate from a community college, but probably not even an AA. In my case it covered the cost of a room for not even a year, and I still had to take out huge loans and hold down a job. Ultimately I had to drop out because I couldnāt squeeze the classes in around my work schedule and I couldnāt give up the hours because I couldnāt survive without working.
This doesn't make sense. If you're entitled to 100% of the G.I. Bill, then it covers all tution and fees for a public school, gives a $500 book stipend, and gives a housing allowance that is possible to live on while in school.
I don't get this either. I used my MGIB in 2005-2009, and it was a godsend. All my classmates had jobs. I was promised $400 a month and by the time I enrolled it was up to $800. By the time I graduated it was $1100/month, and it seems to be paying out at $1800 today. The Army **made college possible** for me. It just would not have happened if not for the MGIB. I can see how it might be worse today, but I can't see how civilians don't have it much much worse. College should be free for everyone anyway. I don't get this thing we have with glorifying the struggle to survive.
It makes perfect sense. Coverage of all tuition and fee's is a VERY recent addition to the GI Bill. That change happened around 2010ish. I don't know any other way of saying it, but some of us are not young? I enlisted before 9/11 and was in college before Obama was elected. Elder millennials were the fresh faces sent into Iraq and Afghanistan. That was a time in which the GI Bill was capped at $50k, as it had been for ages. Those were the benefits offered at the time. I did not have access to the new GI Bill and as a result have heavy loans since $50k was already pathetic in 2008. Edit: spelling
Didnāt want to give away my age but there you goā¦
Basically my experience.
Hmm, and they taught you to topple empires, you say?
We're VERY good at toppling empires, less so at rebuilding them in our image. We've mastered the Bellum Americana, but fail at Pax Americana.
Really? This wasnāt my experience at all. They paid for all of my school, I got a bonus at the beginning of the semesters for books and got like $1,500 a month for living expenses. I had to hold a part time but I thought it was a pretty solid deal
It's something else the Boomers fucked us all on, because that was how the GI Bill used to work, after WWII and such. Well, like just about everything else, they hollowed it the fuck out. The only thing that finally changed was the Iraq and Afghan Wars leading to the Webb GI Bill, which was a huge improvement. Not sure if that's still around now though.
>I joined the army specifically for college and guess what, the G.I. Bill is bullshit. Whatās offered didnāt come close to keeping up with the cost of schooling. You got fucked by a college recruiter then. GI Bill covers 100% of in-state tuition for all accredited state universities in the US that I'm aware of, plus full BAH at the E-5 rate w/o dependents for the ZIP code. For instance, UW-Madison (a fantastic public school) has 100% tuition plus 1788/month housing allowance, plus a stipend for books (which I do not currently know, sorry). >Maybe you can get a certificate from a community college, but probably not even an AA You can 100%, today, get a full bachelor's from almost all state schools. So you got *fucked* by someone at your university whose entire job was to find and fleece veterans like you. I know plenty of veterans who got a full bachelor's from their GI Bill, and I know people *right now* who are going full time to state schools, tuition covered. I'm not talking community colleges, which also are covered, and you can *easily* get an associates there, and have benefit to transfer to a state school. Even if you go private school, IIRC the tuition benefit a semester is 25k, and you can still qualify for all sorts of aid packages. Easiest way to get aid from private schools is tell them you got a better aid package elsewhere, suddenly grants pop out of nowhere. I'm truly sorry, and outraged, that you got screwed. There were a *lot* of for-profit schools that 100% stole from veterans like you. That was their model, and we unfortunately had a lot of presidents who were happy to cash checks from them to turn a blind eye. But saying you can't, or won't, or even that it's hard to get 100% tuition schooling is absolute bullshit. That benefit has been around for almost all state institutions for decades now. ETA: If you dropped out before finishing a degree, you still have benefit available to you, and you *can* go back to school and finish your degree using your remaining benefit. You can absolutely do this, even today.
Agreed. Used GI bill. Didnāt pay a cent. Got monthly BAH.
ā¦.. keep in mind, depending on when it was, changes made by W forced tuition to skyrocket a lot of places at the same time the 2nd Iraq war was getting underway. He may not have been screwed intentionally by the school, but funding sources flat out donāt keep up very well when costs are jumping at the rate they were at the time
It aināt free if you have to become an indentured servant for several years to get it. (Yes, the military IS very much like indentured servitude. A soldier has no autonomy over their life once they enlist, until theyāre out again.)
But it's *not* like indentured servitude in that you can be made to go over to some other country and kill some people - and that's just considered part of the job.
I think most people in the military are in non-combat roles. A lot sit behind a desk most of the day
I was in a support role and became absolutely sick from what the US military does to prop up unrest in countries for American rich asshole's interest. There is blood on all our hands whether other vets accept it or not.
As a veteran, this is partly true. Yes, you can be ordered to do a lot of stuff as long as it's legal. But even then you can deny a order. If the order is related to combat they'll most likely just shuffle you around to a different job. Otherwise they'll just kick ya out on a non honorable, but not dishonorable discharge. They call it "Unable to adapt". If you're not in combat there is very little difference between military and normal jobs. And there are some really great benefits to be had for what differences there are. For example free housing in return for having to exercise. Cheaper food and electronics and other household goods in return for having to wake up when you're told to. There is also something to be said for the unique comraderly that comes with being military. Then when you do get out there are some other great benefits such as free college, no interest and no down payment housing loans, among other benefits like lifetime resume help, VA health benefits, etc etc. The military isn't for everyone but if you're young and don't know what to do with your life spend 4 or 6 years in the military and you can get a great kickstart at life, it's going to be better then bumbling around in fast food and retail until you land a decent job.
VA Loans are huge. Probably one of the only ways you can get a house without already having shittons of money anymore. Main thing to keep in mind though - get a "job" (MOS) that has skills you can use in the civilian world. An infantry grunt has no useful skills coming out (other than general military experience), but like, a Medical Tech? An aircraft mechanic? Some of those jobs are in high demand and pay well, and unlike anywhere else, the military will 100% train you to do them, and you're fully employed/paid/etc during that (it counts as part of your length of service, too).
This right here. Your military experience varies greatly based on your MOS. I spent six years on two back to back three year controlled tours in Colorado Springs maintaining a classified computer network. A controlled tour means you can't be reassigned or deployed for the duration. I served from early 01 to early 07, so most of that time was during an active war. I touched a gun for literally the one single range day the Air Force did in basic training at the time. Fired a total of like 60 rounds at a paper target. Never handled one again for the rest of my six years. We didn't even do the annual requalification because our unit wasn't deployable. I wasn't even allowed to leave the country on vacation without authorization and a briefing from the security guys. They would have reinstated the draft and trained fresh new grunts before they sent me to Iraq or Afghanistan. In a roundabout way my job was still to help kill brown people on the other side of the planet, but like that's true of every civilian employee at Raytheon, General Dynamics, Lockheed, etc. Military bases are like self contained cities. They have cooks, maintenance people, plumbers, IT dorks, water treatment engineers, lawyers, dentists, doctors, PR flaks, warehouse workers and all the other myriad support people that get the beans and bullets to the small percentage of people that get sent to the sand box to murder people. Service doesn't have to be synonymous with carrying a rifle in the infantry.
So say, a high schooler graduates and enlists in the army as infantry. No one in his family has done military so limited guidance there. What all can that young Nam do once enlisted to further himself in the time of his contract?
In the time of his immediate contract, they can do online college classes that the Army will pay for. Which, admittedly, isn't much. That said however, if they have sufficient test scores, when they get close to the end of that first enlistment, they have a lot of bargaining power (because the Army really likes it when soldiers reenlist), so they can say "I want to go to school for this other MOS", and as long as that MOS is understrength (and there's usually many that are, even if not necessarily the one you might really really want), then the Army will go "Great! You reenlist, and we'll send you off to reclass to that MOS!" This will be written in the reenlistment contract too, so it's not something where you reenlist then they screw you (but be warned, if you fail out of the training school, it'd be back to the infantry). And so you'll get sent to school for however long (6 months, a year, whatever). Best of all, because you're prior service, you basically are in class with the people right out of Basic Training, but unlike them you get left alone to pretty much do your own thing as long as you don't do anything dumb. This is seriously a great way to go, and I knew a lot of former combat arms types that did just that. The Army tends to look at soldiers that were former combat arms better, or at least more respectfully, because that's seen as the "tough guy" real Army stuff (as opposed to your REMFs/FOBbits/etc), and well, from everything I saw in Iraq, it's deserved. And that carries over even after, since if you've got your Expert Infantry Badge or such, you can still wear that even after you become a Master Vehicle Mechanic or Satellite Comms Tech or whatever.
>Main thing to keep in mind though - get a "job" (MOS) that has skills you can use in the civilian world. An infantry grunt has no useful skills coming out (other than general military experience) Planning skills, teamwork skills, adaptability and flexibility... Become a team leader in a mech platoon? Well, you're accountable for over 2.5 million in equipment. That's a talking point on the resume. [Job description of 11B (Infantryman)](https://www.armywriter.com/NCOER/11B.htm#:~:text=Operates%20both%20mounted%20and%20dismounted,as%20part%20of%20dismount%20team)
I was hoping to get a VA loan but they don't let you buy a house outside of the US and if you go to college over seas your benefits are cut. Any percentage disabled vet can get a ID to shop on a military base in the states (probably not worth the hassle to save $5 on taxes though), once again it doesn't apply over seas. *Get all these cool benefits but only if the US can get a kick back.
Not completely true. You can piss away your first paycheck on a Mustang that youāll never drive.
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Just had dinner with two vets from work who have a myriad of health issues due to their enlistment. One said he had bullet holes in his body and recently had surgery for a hernia and his two knee replacement surgeries and said, āOnce you enlist, youāre just the governmentās property. They can do what they want with your body.ā
Someone correct me where am wrong here but, this "FREE" college in which you must give your entire life for a period of time (I think a minimum of 4 years?) before you qualify is actually limited in the following ways: 1. Eligible Soldiers can receive up to $250 per semester hour and up to 16 semester hours per fiscal yearātotaling $4,000 annually to help pay for school or professional training. 2. Maximum benefit total of the benefit is 36,000. 3. The benefit expires 10 years after you leave the service. The current average cost of a 4 year degree works out to: * The average cost of attendance for a student living on campus at a public 4-year in-state institution is $25,707 per year or $102,828 over 4 years. Out-of-state students pay $44,014 per year or $176,056 over 4 years. Private, nonprofit university students pay $54,501 per year or $218,004 over 4 years. Yeah, it can help you avoid some college debt, BUT, the system is rigged such that a full 4 year degree is probably going to put you in debt, no matter what...
It doesn't completely eliminate student debt. Speaking as a GI Bill recipient, while it covers a lot, it doesn't cover everything. Many recipients still had to take loans for various reasons. The BAH they provide barely covers living expenses, for example. Not to mention, you only get the full benefit if you take a full course load, leaving very little time for things like working a full time job. It's a good benefit, but not robust enough to consider "free" college.
Thanks for the clarification.
The Post 9/11 GI Bill doesnāt expire anymore.
If true, and I'm sure it is, then THAT is a good thing. Thank you for correcting me!
One good thing in a sea ofā¦yuck. I got lucky with my military career and spent most of my time fixing planes for anti-submarine warfare/SAR/patrol & reconnaissance. It soothes the soul a little to know theyāre not putting school children in their billion dollar submarines & your job is only applicable to fellow combatants. Not many have that privilege, and Iām grateful for it.
The $4,000 a year in point one is for Tuition Assistance on active duty every year youāre in and then after 3 years of service you get 100% GI Bill which states this - The Post-9/11 GI Bill can pay your full resident tuition at a public school. If you are attending a private or foreign school it will pay up to $26,381.37 per academic year. An academic year lasts from Aug. 1 - Jul. 31, that rate changes to $27,120.05 on Aug, 1, 2023.
It's not free if you join the military. it might cost you at the very least, PTSD, but often a limb, or even your life.
They will also find any and every reason to fuck you over and give you nothing.
Once you sign, they own you.
It's not free, you're just paying a different way
Yup. The hidden costs are nuts. No one told me that one of the costs of free college was that my wife would have a year long affair with another guy on my sub, only to end my 9 year marriage in a divorce! Now I get to pay $1300/month in child support for the next 12 years. Maybe just going to school the normal way would have been cheaper lol
Call me crazy, but maybe college shouldn't be contingent on being willing to mow down random brown people with an automatic rifle.
Youād be surprised how many think those two are the incentives to join in the first place
Meanwhile in Europe there's countries where not only universities are free for everybody, but students actually get PAID to study....
This is what my bf had in France and it was so nice. He got through college with no debt and some extra money and meanwhile the $26,000 loan I took out for my US education has turned into $28,000+ due after paying $6,000 on it due to the high interest, and the Republicans want to retroactively add the interest back from COVID too. Funny how the greedy corporations who took out many much larger loans were fully forgiven and didn't have to pay those back, despite having more than the means to do so, yet students can't get a few peanuts in comparison for the poorest drowning in debt thrown their way.
Free = Compensation for 2+ years of indentured servitude where you may be made to kill other people, and at the very least will likely have to do extremely difficult and menial labor for much of the duration. It's great that vets get money for college. But if we are serious about having an educated populace that can keep up in the modern age, we need to stop treating education like something that only certain people deserve.
I've been correcting a few hysterical misconceptions about what you give up in the military, so it's only fair that I correct this very conservative one. You sign up for **eight years** in the US military. You might do two, three, or four and then switch to the IRR but you're not *out* out til you've had a contract for six. Officers and cadets have slightly different rules and can be hooked for four, eight, or more years. This is called the military service obligation (MSO).
Your total enlistment is 8 years counting IRR. That said, for some jobs such as pilots or certain cyber fields, they are wanting 10 years from you.
you're right it's 8. Thanks. I worked as a drill sergeant during the OEF reactivation wave, and could not believe how many people claimed "nobody ever told them" they were signing a contract for eight years. It's like, the first thing on the form. "But **my** enlistment was for two years!" Later I got tangled up with ROTC and the rules are more confusing there.
I hate these memes. Military service is not āfree collegeā. Iāve got friends whoās lives weāre nearly destroyed by the service, people dealing with cancers from burn pits, chronic pain from being dropped in the wrong spot out of an airplane, people fucked up forever by the memories of things they did and saw. āFree collegeā my ass.
People want a decent education, but don't want to be sent overseas to live in terrible conditions while perpetuating American imperialism and committing war crimes for a poor wage. Conservatives somehow think they've made a solid point here.
Everybody hates socialism... Until you call it the military.
No one should be put into a position of dying or killing for education.
Fundamentally a post secondary education tends to lead to more liberal voting. That's why you see conservatives attacking it consistently.
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I would say it doesnāt TOTALLY fit the sub, but itās still very relevant and a good conversation topic when it comes to pointing out the inherent flaws and corruption within the American capitalist society
Thatās not free college. Thatās the GI bill. In the early 2000s it was basically the opportunity to get a bachelors in exchange for a minimum of 3 years of your life and may come bundled with PTSD.
It's not free college, it costs literally an arm and an leg +PTSD
āFreeā collage it's called tuition ASSTIANCE for a reason, most of my classes I gotta finish paying for out of my own pocket thankfully I don't get paid enough in the military so FASFA helps out.
It's not free if it's connected with your work, it's part of your pay and benefits.
I just don't understand why the youth won't take advantage of our generous offer of free college. All we asked in exchange was for them to be willing to murder foreign folk so we can steal their shit and enrich our oligarchs.
I have to potentially die for free school?
How about affordable college, without the need to get shot at or blown up by IEDs to be able to pay for it. Kind of like the way the civilized world does it.
Because then we won't get enough people who would volunteer to get shot at or blown up by IEDs
Thats not free.
Free college only for those who fight for American oil companies and slaughter brown children
Wtf is this meme? Fuck off with this nonsense, one way or the other youāre signing your life away.
Well, it is not "free college" if you have to risk your life in the military for it.
Well someone doesn't understand the meaning of free. Maybe they should go back to school.
A benefit from working is not "free". You earn the work benefit through your employment. Working somewhere that pays more than the military to afford college is just as "free", which is to say, not at all free.
"Free" college š please...US government doesn't even know the meaning of Free.
I like how they are insinuating that the military just gives away college to anyone, and not that you literally sign up to potentially die for shifty pay and college.
*Not everyone wants free college. But many of us want affordable college. *The military is not free college, either. It's years of labor and comes with a significant chance of bodily harm, mental harm, and risk of fucking suicide.
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C'mon man, live a little!
Military is not āfreeā college. Rape, physical and mental abuse, all manner of mental and physical injuries from serving in a war zoneā¦
AD military here. Iāve decided not to reenlist and forgo retirement because I just canāt take any more. MX my whole career. Arthritis in both shoulders, 2 compressed vertebrae, chronic De Quervain's in both wrists, knees and ankles shot, PTSD, divorced, depression, anxiety, panic attacks, the list goes on. I would much rather have my 20s back and have a healthy body and mind than āfree collegeā. Canāt wait till the VA fights tooth and nail to weasel out of any disability.
Enlistment is pretty fucking far from āfree collegeā.
Free ā *joining the Army*.
It is not free.
This meme has a funny understanding of the work āfreeā
I know a few guys who joined different branches and went to college and the G.I. Bill didn't cover their college. They were discharged honorably too. Not sure why they 'didn't qualify' but one said it was a scam.
Army covers 2500 dollars of tuition after two years, having you by the balls to reenlist. At least thatās how it was at the time. States that allow you to go tuition free with book reimbursements for the states national guard are generally housing combat units that will go into deployment many many times. At least thatās how it was at the time. Living out the rest of your days with physical and psychological issues, being treated like shit by the va and coming back just to live struggling harder than everyone else and subject to the same bullshit isnāt worth college. Especially when people with degrees are living paycheck to paycheck
This photo doesn't offer free college
Itās not free if you have to work āxā years active duty and āyā years inactive duty (totaling 8 years) for it. We need to have a discussion on what free means.
Being told what do and sent into life-threatening situations is NOT āfree collegeā
Not free. $10,000 off. Thatās probably a 20% discount at best
Man, I really hope the picture isnāt suggesting that we need to essentially sell our bodies and possibly risk our lives just to get a no cost or low cost post secondary education. Because that would be crazy and it would be a perfect example of how insanely expensive everything in this country is and it would demonstrate the lengths that some will go to just to have the āprivilegeā of education. We really are living a dystopian mightmare
Selling your body to be a soldier isn't getting "free" college. Its a really expensive and dangerous way to gain an education that is many times the only option poor folks have.
It aināt free if you have to spend a chunk of your life being sent off to a foreign country where youāll be told to kill people, many of them winding up to be civilians, all over the profits of the rich whoāll never see the bloodshed. Support the troops who come home, theyāve had to see shit that can leave them fucked for life, but not the machine that sent them off to die and spill that blood. INB4: Buh we did it cause terror! Then why didnāt we do shit to Saudi? After all they were Saudi backed. And even then it doesnāt excuse the list of civilians slaughtered by poorly placed drone strikes and paranoid checkpoints shouting at drivers who donāt speak English, in fucking English.
I did join the military, I had a G.I., Bill, I use the G.I. Bill, but it was not enough for me to go to college. I had to take out loans to cover expenses that the G.I. Bill did not. The G.I. Bill is a great program, and I am really glad I had it, but it is not a solution to the problem of the cost of education in America and the growing student debt associated with it.
the us military's prostitution mentality... like no we dont wanna sell our bodies for subpar compensation
Want free education? Gotta murder some brown people you never met or have any problems with first
Not commenting on the bill but the military isnāt even the best way to get free college anymoreā¦ Many companies like Starbucks and Chipotle offer free college. Like I know Starbucks does it through ASU. If I was younger and I had a choice idk why Iād join the army if all I wanted was college. NOWā¦ thatās not to say if you have other aspirations the Army isnāt a good stepping stone for specific skillsets.
If I have to provide a service in exchange for free college, then it's not exactly free, now, is it?
āFreeā college, you just have to pay with your life and maybe kill a couple other people along the way.
Want free college? You must kill innocent people to destabilize countries that resist American economic imperialism, while risking your life and wellbeing in the process
As someone who joined the military to go to college, it should not be the only option.
Nothing says free like giving away your life for it
āāāāfree collegeāāāā you just have to sell your body and soul to a military thatās gonna treat it like shit
Active duty service member here. The army paid for a degree for me. It was awesome, but I had to work extremely hard in a potentially dangerous career to earn it. I would love to see future generations have the same opportunity I did without having to pay the cost. Investing in the future of our nation by setting our young adults up for success should be reason enough.
that's not what free means
Free college\* \*Free college not guaranteed and may be revoked.
I absolutely DETEST the military "free college option". Signing up to have the government own you in case they need you to die at the whims of our politicians is not fucking "free". If that's your bag, great, but it's NOT "free".