Student Loan Debt?

[deserteagle71]

People make their own choices. For many people, job satisfaction is more important than money. Many people refuse to move, and in today’s society/economy moving is often necessary to succeed in a career.

^This!

As far as I'm concerned I'm living in God's country; I absolutely love it here and would never consider moving. And I consider myself extremely lucky that in this location that I enjoy I was able to find a job that I not only enjoyed but paid very well also.

 

[paulsharvey]

When people think about a college major, they really should look 90% at career options, not just something that interests them.

 

[jyoutz]

When people think about a college major, they really should look 90% at career options, not just something that interests them.

Learning about all career options is very important. Choosing the highest pay over job satisfaction usually results in burnout and unhappiness. I have a BIL who worked 30 years as a welder and he made 50% more than me. Now he’s retired early with COPD and gripes about how happy he is to no longer be doing that job. But I know many others still working in their 70s in various fields that do it because they love what they do. Balance in all things…

 

[two_bit_score]

I have a stable job, so the economy must be fine

That is government employee thinking.

 

[paulsharvey]

I tell young people, get good at something that pays the bills. When you master a skill, you will learn to like it. I dont know that Love is the right word, or enjoy; but I you master something, you get satisfaction from it. Weather that's being the best defense attorney get creeps out of jail, or the best truck driver, or septic pumper.

 

[MossRoad]

Son wants to teach english and be a writer.
I went for EE and CS and made a good living, wife went for accounting and became a software developer.
We have friends who went the construction, electrician and my cousin is a carpenter and doing well.
Can't see my son in the trades, he is more writing and music.

Unfortunately there are a lot of majors out there that we would not even consider minors when I went......

I went to college to teach English. I quit after 1.5 years due to finally gaining an insight as to how things really work in the hierarchy of teaching, tenure, etc. Switched to local technical college and got two associate degrees in electronics. I only make average wages, but I've been gainfully employed for 40+ years.

Is your son planning on staying in-state or going out of state? Many colleges offer out-of-state scholarships that brings the cost down to the same or close to their in-state price.

Is there a local campus of your state college near you? Those tend to be less expensive than the main campus.

Both of our kids went to Purdue main campus (in-state for us) and it was only $10K per year tuition(still is). Room and board not included. Branch campus in NW Indiana was around $8k.

A lot of it also depends on which college the student is applying for at the university. For example, our oldest majored in Sociology and Anthropology, and minored in Spanish and Forensics. Those majors are in the liberal arts college. She got a 1/2 merit scholarship all 4 years. Our other child majored in Biology. That's in the college of science. She got zippo scholarships, despite having a slightly higher GPA, employed for 3 years, sport and more extracurricular activities. Fortunately, she got a scholarship from a member of the Purdue Club of St. Joseph Valley. It's a local Purdue booster club. She wrote a letter, sent it in, they read it, liked it, and a local businessman gave her almost 1/2 scholarship for 4 years provided she maintained a high B average. (she did, we were extremely grateful, and the last year she got it, at the award dinner, he offered me a job!).

So the college within the university has a lot to do with how much money they have to give away.

Look into local booster clubs for your state universities. They can be of help.

Look at your high school guidance offices. They usually have lists of scholarships and grants that can be applied for.

It's a little late now, but we started 529 plans when our last was born. $20-25 a paycheck for 18 years came out to about $18K! Shocking. The youngest, now 26, still has about $15K in the 529 and will be using that next year for Vet school.

Don't forget that most schools offer jobs for students that want to work while attending school.

We have friends who's kids worked doing dishes in the dining halls.

Our oldest had a job at the front desk of her dorm. It was a couple hours a night, several nights a week. She moved out of that dorm in year two, to a third dorm in year three, and an apartment in year 4, but kept that job at the original dorm all 4 years. The summer between years 1 and 2, she worked at the same newspaper I did stuffing ads into machines. Next two summers she got summer jobs at Purdue setting up for conferences, painting, cleaning, etc. Between us, scholarships, and her working, she got out debt free.

Youngest worked at Vet office here summers and breaks. Worked in animal labs at Purdue. Got out debt free as well.

It can be done.

Don't forget part-time college as well. And don't overlook jobs that have education benefits. They usually will pay for 6 credit hours per semester.

Good luck in your search.

 

[MossRoad]

Good gracious this discussion move fast....

Yes, I would say my food bill has doubled in the last few years. I documented the costs in this post, Student Loan Debt?.

Given we eat the same thing each month so only the costs have gone up. Not what we buy.

Now, I am NOT including what my kids spend at the grocery store, or if my wife goes, so our actual grocery bill is higher than what I said. But since I am the one buying the same food week after week year after year, I have seen our grocery bill double or close to double, in the last few years.

Certainly this is because of the high diesel and natural gas costs caused by government programs which increase the cost of food. Putin's war has limited food production while driving up fuel prices which adds icing to the food inflation cake.

The other cause for the price increase is labor costs. Not only does it cost more to hire people in my area, since the pandemic, there are more workers in the store than before. They hired more cashiers to minimize lines, we could have VERY long lines a checkout, but that ended with the pandemic. The stores have also hired more people to stock the shelves. That puzzles me but it is what I am seeing and have been seeing. Far more people stocking shelves than ever before.

All of our grocery stores put in self-checks. During the pandemic, they expanded them. Now they only have a couple manned checkouts open and everyone uses the self-check.

While I see more employees in the grocery stores, they aren't at the checkouts. They are running around the store picking orders for on-line shopping. The stores get stocked at night.

Labor costs are surely a huge part of it. Every time wages are increased, prices rise. It's been that way since I can remember. I'm not a fan of high minimum wages. It's still $7.25 here, but most jobs we'd have considered minimum wage jobs are starting higher than $12. Average hourly wage here is $18. The bottom 25% average wage is $13.

 

[Torvy]

It's all about choices and desires. In the end, the borrower should be responsible for their own bad choices. I have no degree, but push near $300k. I got lucky that I had a passion for a lucrative trade and spent 20 years in it. The degree I was pursuing before I dropped out, probably wouldn't have provided this way for my family.
Choices and desires. In the end you are responsible for your outcome.

I took ground school as a Science class in college (2 physics credits). I have flown a bit for fun. I didn't know you could fly commercial without a degree. Seems silly, as you probably would only need about 30-60 credits worth of coursework.

I wanted to fly when I was a freshman. AFROTC. Problem was I wasn't ready for school at 18. Too much fun, not enough work. I dropped out and went back PT over years while working FT. Found out some jobs will not consider you w/o a degree even if the degree is not germane.

Once I had the paper with my experience, jobs were everywhere.

 

[MossRoad]

Just checked our grocery store advertisement for the week and New York Strip is $13 a pound but on sale for $9. From your link, New York Strip is $6 a pound. Now the steak in our store is Select not Choice much less Prime. We do have a butcher shop, and they have better cuts of meats, but they are more expensive. They do have better sausages than the grocery store for about the same amount of money. Their turkey was really expensive but better than the grocery store. I think the turkey was $40-50 and it was pretty big but I can't remember the weight.

The grocery store and butcher have dried aged meat, but the price is sky high, not that regular cuts are cheap.

We buy from that butcher shop several times a year. We usually get a whole rib eye which gives us a bit over 20 steaks. 20-40 pounds of bone-in chicken breasts. I bone them out at home and make soup and/or stock from the bones and scraps. They also have a good seafood section, so we get 10-20 pounds of fish, and a few salmon fillets as well. It's only about a 15-20 minute drive from us, and always packed with people.

Our groceries per week come from Aldi's, Meijer and a local chain called Martin's. Wife clips coupons on-line. It makes a huge difference. Many items get an additional $1 off if you do that. Martin's offers gas points. Sometimes it's as much as .50 a gallon if you buy $50 worth of groceries. Got gas a couple days ago for $1.02 per gallon (20 gallon limit, no problem with empty Suburban. )



Almost got me 3/4 of a tank.

 

[MossRoad]

So, a mandatory food plan, at University of North Florida is $2200/semester, for 1st year, first time college students, or roughly equal to a dual occupancy door room for a semester... That includes 14 meals per week at the cafeteria. Per meal, that's not terrible (not amazing), but the issue I have is; what student is going to eat at a cafeteria 2 meals per day, 7 days per week. I feel that is making 'paying' students subsidize the meals (operating cost of cafeteria) for the non paying students.

If the student (kinda want to say kid, but they are adults), has a job, I'm guessing they will average less than 3 meals per week in the college cafeteria. But they still force you to pay for 14/week. Think most people shrug, and go, it's part of the cost....

We got the oldest kid a full meal plan the first semester at Purdue. She begged us to stop a few weeks in. We cut it back to the minimum meal plan and she still had money left over. Towards the end of the year, she raided the convenience stores on campus and spent it all down to zero. She brought home many bags of chips, cookies, pop, etc.

She also used to Swipe Out Hunger. They have a kiosk in the dining halls. If you aren't using your swipes, you can donate it to hunger-oriented charity. So at least it didn't go to waste.