Student Debt

Why not enable student loans to be part of bankruptcy?

Seems reasonable to me.

Also, if I were asked by the Wall Street Protesters where they ought to focus, my suggestion would be education cost. I would argue the main goal of colleges should be to cut tuition cost by 1/3 over the course of the next ten years. Our goal with college ought to be zero-debt for graduates and return to a system whereby a motivated student could work his or her way through college with minimal debt afterward. I believe such a system is feasible and would involve cutting administrative costs, stopping all construction on fancy new facilities, and cutting other things like food options and fancy dorms/apartments. There would be no cuts to professors or classroom functioning or books or other school-related materials. The facilities would not be as nice, but students would be getting the same education and they'd just have to tough it out.

Also, colleges would essentially get out of the business of financial aid. There would still be scholarships and grants administered by a much smaller group, but by cheapening the overall tuition, financial aid would become increasingly less important and less necessary.

One way to motivate colleges to reach such goals would be a protest of paying tuition. Cutting off the money would give colleges a good incentive to get their acts together and commit to the principle.

Also, colleges could take it upon themselves to do this without the consumer backlash. They might take a hit in test scores or quality of students, but they might make more successful, happy, enriched graduates. It is question of what is important - the service/education provided or the status of the institution.