Economist: WH Lowballs Student-Debt Costs
Media attention has focused on President Biden’s main plan to cancel student debt but the “regulatory changes” he proposed along with it, which he’s moving ahead with, have “massive implications” and “would cost taxpayers far more than the White House is letting on,” warns Beth Akers at The Hill. The changes include halving borrowers’ monthly repayment minimums and the years of payments needed before the remainder is wiped away, forgiving some interest and other measures. A Penn Wharton Budget Model suggests the cost will be more than twice the White House’s estimates — as much as $361 billion over 10 years. Meanwhile, “borrowers will have more incentive to borrow” and “colleges will have no reason” to keep tuitions “in line with the value they offer” — worsening college affordability.
Legal desk: Don’t Call Supremes ‘Undemocratic’
Progressive outlets often claim “the Supreme Court is out of step with public opinion” and thus “deeply unpopular,” notes James Piereson at City Journal. Yet when it does diverge, that’s “more often due to liberal decisions that inflamed conservatives and moderates” — on, say, elections, school prayer and abortion — rather than decisions that please the right. Often the justices’ “instinct” is simply to take “issues off its plate” and give them “to the political branches to decide,” as in its recent calls on “legislative and congressional districting” and the Environmental Protection Agency. “The Court’s approach can be criticized from many directions, but it is especially wrongheaded to call it ‘undemocratic.’ ”
From the right: Biden’s Bad SOTU Bet
President Joe Biden revealed himself as “a high-rolling gambler” at the State of the Union, argues The Wall Street Journal’s Karl Rove. “He’s betting big that the economy is already turning around,” even though “Americans feel both that the economy is in bad shape and that things have gotten worse for their families since he took office.” Yes, “staying the course” paid off for President Ronald Reagan, but Reagan worked by “cutting taxes, slashing red tape and unnecessary regulation, freeing up the economy, reining in Washington’s spending, and creating confidence.” Biden’s “raised taxes, dramatically scaled up the regulatory burden, puffed up domestic government spending, and undermined public confidence with his bumbling ways.” So “Team Biden’s risky bet on the economy is unlikely to pay off.”
Schools beat: Little Bang for Exploding Bucks
Gov. Hochul plans to hike state education funding to more than $34 billion this year, yet such aid “has grown at nearly twice the rate of inflation over the past 30 years” even as “public school enrollment in New York has fallen 8 percent since 2012,” observe the Empire Center’s Ken Girardin & Emily D’Vertola. Those two factors “have combined to make New York’s K-12 per-pupil spending the nation’s highest.” Alas, the “increase in school aid has not translated into results.” On the upside, though, Hochul’s push for more public charter schools in New York City will help close “the persistent achievement gap” between “high-need” and other students. Unlike traditional schools, charters not only “save money” for taxpayers, they’re also “associated with academic gains on the NAEP.”
Libertarian: Gay Win May Doom College Quotas
Justice Neil Gorsuch’s 2020 decision boosting gay rights in Bostock v. Clayton County bodes ill for college-admission affirmative action, explains Reason’s Damon Root. In 2020, the justice invoked Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, insisting, “Only the written word is the law, and all persons are entitled to its benefit.” Now, Root warns, “Gorsuch may see affirmative action in college admissions the same way.” In oral arguments last October, a lawyer said, “The term discrimination in this context is ambiguous” — but, as Root puts it, “Gorsuch seemed to think there was no good reason to treat the word differently in two parts of the same statute.” Witness his reply: “Title VII does not permit discrimination on the basis of sex, and Title VI does not permit discrimination on the basis of race.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board
