Congressional Record, Volume 161 Issue 50 (Wednesday, March 25, 2015)

[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 50 (Wednesday, March 25, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H2024-H2029]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

THE FUTURE FORUM

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 6, 2015, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from California
(Mr. Swalwell) for the remainder of the hour as the designee of the
minority leader.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address one
of the greatest moral crises of our time: student loan debt on my
generation. Because of student loan debt, an entire generation is in
financial quicksand.
Here are some startling facts of the student loan debt that our
generation carries today. Approximately 40 million Americans had one or
more student loans. The average amount owed on student loans is
$33,000, and 70 percent of students graduating this year will be
burdened with this debt.
On average, it will take a student with this debt, graduating with a
bachelor's degree, over 19 years to pay off their loans.
This evening, the House Democratic Caucus' Future Forum will address
this moral crisis, and we have got a number of Members who will work
with us this evening to talk about their personal stories or stories
that they are hearing in their district.
We have also asked Americans across our country, including in my
congressional district in the East Bay, to tweet or Facebook at us
under #mystudentdebt or #futureforum; and we will answer some of their
tweets this evening.
First, I am going to yield to a colleague of mine who came in, in the

[[Page H2025]]

113th Congress, somebody who had student loan debt himself and
represents a district in Washington (Mr. Kilmer).
Mr. KILMER. Mr. Speaker, I grew up in a small town in Washington
State that I now have the opportunity and the honor of representing.
My folks were schoolteachers. My father, actually, this year, is in
his 50th year as a teacher in the classroom. The reality is I couldn't
have gone to college if it hadn't been for the support of my community
and the assistance of financial aid.
I got grants and I got loans that made the dream of college a
reality, and I had a community that had my back, that literally passed
the hat by providing me with scholarships to help me fulfill my own
dreams of a college education.
I believe that education is the door to opportunity, and for a lot of
families, including mine, financial aid is the key to that door; but
the reality is, for too many families today, that door is locked. We
have got work to do.
In 2013, Democrats and Republicans came together to pass legislation
to protect student borrowers so that they can obtain low interest
rates, but our work isn't done. We need to continue to have a
commitment to quality and affordable education.
That is why I am proud to be a cosponsor of a bill that would allow
those with outstanding student loan debt to be able to refinance at the
same low rate as new borrowers.

{time} 1930

Two and a half centuries ago, Benjamin Franklin wrote: ``An
investment in knowledge pays the greatest interest.'' I think that was
true when he wrote it, and I think it remains true today. We know this.
Not every student is going to go to college, but we know that college
is a door-opener. We know that. And we know that America's
competitiveness depends on our ability to have a good, skilled,
qualified workforce, to have quality educational opportunities for our
workforce. We know that as educational attainment rises, so do wages
and so do employment levels.
We know that it is wiser to invest in education on the front end than
it is to pay for prisons and unemployment on the back end; and that, to
a large degree, is a decision that we make as a country and as a
society. But that only works if we provide opportunities for students,
if we ensure that they don't drown in debt.
In our Nation, student loan debt now surpasses credit card debt. We
need to make sure that when young people graduate college, they have an
opportunity to join the workforce, to start a business, or to teach the
next generation, not simply to be bogged down with debt.
One of the coolest parts of this job is the opportunity to get to
meet with young people, to get to meet with college students and high
school students, people who have a long way ahead of them. And I think
about what I want for those students. I think about what I want for my
own kids. I want them to be able to look at the future not with fear of
debt and fear of astronomical financial obligations but with hope for
their future.
I know that the college education that I was afforded and the
financial aid that I received that paid for that college opportunity
enabled me to live a lifetime that was filled with hope. So we have got
work to do. And I, for one, am committed to working with the good
gentleman from California and others in this Congress--hopefully from
both sides of the aisle--to address this opportunity and make sure that
all young people and, frankly, all who want to pursue educational
opportunity see that door open to them.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I know there are a number of colleges in
your district in Washington or around your district. And when you talk
to young people today and they are thinking about going to college, how
much are you hearing that the potential of debt is weighing on that
decision?
Mr. KILMER. I appreciate the question. It is the main concern that we
hear.
I was in a high school classroom just last month and heard concerns
from students who said: I want to go to college. I want to pursue that
opportunity, but I am fearful that I won't be able to afford it.
We have seen in my State and in States all throughout this country
that as States faced difficult budget times, two things happened. One,
State support for our educational institutions got cut, and tuition
rose. Oftentimes, financial aid--either from the institutions or from
other sources--didn't keep up with those increases in tuition. So young
people are concerned about that. They recognize that further education
is going to be really important for their chances of getting a good
job. Again, not every job requires higher education, but as we look at
those fastest-growing jobs in our economy, more and more of those jobs
require at least some postsecondary education.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. And is it just young people who are
concerned about it? What do you hear from their parents as far as what
the debt means if they have got a child who has just graduated college
and is out there in the job market? Are you hearing from the parents as
well?
Mr. KILMER. It is certainly a huge concern.
In nearly every town hall meeting I have, concerns around student
loan debt and access to affordable, quality education come up. But even
outside of parents, there are folks in my community who have,
unfortunately, lost their jobs and want to go back to school.
I was at Olympic College in my district in Bremerton, Washington, and
their foundation had a luncheon that was to support students and their
ability to pay for college. We heard from one of the students who was a
more mature student who had started her college career either sleeping
in her car or sleeping in the student center. And that, for too many
people, is a reality these days. We need to make sure that education is
affordable, that education is quality, and that the key that financial
aid represents to that door of opportunity is available for everybody.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I thank the gentleman from Washington,
and I look forward to seeing your good work across Washington and in
this Congress to address this moral crisis of our generation.
Mr. KILMER. Thank you.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I mentioned that we are going to be
having a conversation not just here on the House floor, but we have
been talking to young Americans and people with student debt across
America. So you can tweet on your phone at #mystudentdebt or on
Facebook at #mystudentdebt or also tweet under #futureforum.
I just want to read one of the first tweets that came in on this, and
this came from Natalie Collier. She is from my hometown in Dublin,
California. It is a place where, when I was growing up there, only less
than 30 percent of the high school graduates were going on to 4-year
universities. That number has more than doubled today. But young people
like Natalie who have gone on to college have this to say.
She is in college now and she said that she pays $300 each month to
reduce her interest payments, and without such payments, she could save
to buy a house.
So we are asking on social media, first: What is your monthly payment
for your student loan debt? For some student loans, you have to start
paying them immediately while you are still in college, especially for
many of the private ones. Others you have to pay them immediately upon
graduation.
The second question is: What would you do with that money if you
weren't spending it on your student loan debt? How would you spend that
money?
With Natalie's $300, we can imagine if she didn't have to spend that
on her student loan debt, that would be spent in the economy, hopefully
allowing her to save to buy a home, pay her auto payment, pay her rent,
hopefully near where she works, and she doesn't have to spend as much
time on the road.
So there is a ripple effect that goes out into the economy if we can
lessen the burden that the student loan debt has on younger people in
our country.
This issue is one that is personal to me because I have student loan
debt. My student loan story is that I was fortunate to go to college on
an athletic scholarship. That was the only reason I was able to go to
college.
My parents were not able to afford to send me to college, and I knew
that I had to work hard and play soccer well,

[[Page H2026]]

and that would be my ticket and that I would be the first in my family
to go to college. But like many young athletes, I got injured. I wanted
to stay in college, so I had to take out student loans. About 90
percent of the student loans I took out were Federal student loans, but
there had to be a bridge between the Federal student loans I had and
the tuition that I owed. So we had to take out some higher interest
private loans.

Over $100,000 is what I have today, and I never complained about it.
I knew it was an investment in my future. And I worked every job I
could to try to make it work and to meet the tuition demands that I had
every semester.
But I have talked to young people from where I grew up and across our
country, and I have realized that this isn't something that is just
affecting me. I pay roughly $400 a month still on my student loan debt.
It is something that is weighing like an anchor on young people across
our country--41 million young people, approximately, with over $1
trillion in student debt.
It weighs on every major decision they have to make in their
formative years: when or whether to start a family, being able to buy
their first home, leaving the job they have to take a risk and go out
and start a business on their own.
Of all of these decisions, the biggest factor for young people today
is that student debt that they carry. And it is weighing them down. It
is weighing an entire generation down, and it is something that this
United States Congress must do.
I am glad to see here for his second Future Forum appearance my
colleague from Colorado, Congressman Jared Polis.
And I would be interested, Congressman Polis, in what you think and
what you are hearing from young people as far as how this weighs on
decisions they have to make and what we can do here in the Congress.
Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from California for his leadership
on this issue and for raising public awareness about the role that
Congress should play and is failing to play with regard to making
college more affordable.
This morning I had the opportunity to meet with the chancellor of one
of our flagship State universities in the district I represent, the
University of Colorado at Boulder. Chancellor Phil DiStefano came by,
and we talked a lot about college affordability.
Now, the university, in its own right, I am proud to say, is doing
what they can. They are creating a new 3-year program, where students
can graduate in 3 years and only have to pay for 3 years of tuition.
They are also creating an interest-free installment program, where
students can pay their fees spread out over a longer period of time
without interest, financed through the university.
And I am very proud to report that CU will only increase student
tuition by 3 percent this year, which is the lowest increase in several
decades.
Now, moving from what many of our universities are trying to do in
their own right to what Congress can do is where we need to shift the
discussion here. Making student loans more affordable, reducing the
interest rate, and in some cases, raising the cap available are all
absolutely, absolutely critical to help young people afford a higher
education that enables them to succeed in the workforce.
We are not doing enough. We ought to address some of the cost drivers
within higher education. I think we took a good first step with the
Affordable Care Act, with looking at some of the costs of health care
in education.
Another example is looking at some of the costs of content
acquisition. Dr. Phil DiStefano was telling me that their library costs
of acquiring material and keeping their professional journal
subscriptions is increasing at 15 percent a year. One of their cost
drivers. That is why some of us here supported a bill--and President
Obama took the first steps on this--to make sure that taxpayer-
supported research, money that is funded through NIH research--it is
funded through NIH or NASA, taxpayer-funded research--is made freely
available to the public and is not only available in prescription
journals that not only raise the costs for our universities but make
access to the very science that we, the people, financed less
egalitarian by limiting it to those who can pay for it.
In addition, we talked about open source textbooks. Would you believe
that after you pay tuition, after you finally, you know--oh, my gosh,
with this debt and my parents' help and my job--oh, but then guess
what? $1,100 for textbooks. I kid you not.
I had heard from a lot of students that their textbooks were $1,100,
$1,200. And I asked the chancellor today. I said, Am I hearing from the
students in the worst-case scenario? He said, No, that is average. That
is average. It is costing the average student $1,100 a semester for the
textbooks they need to succeed. We don't need that. We can, through
innovation, disintermediate that and have collaborative open source
content of the same or superior quality that professors put together
for students and is available for free or near free.
It doesn't matter if people want it online or as a textbook. The
physical act of producing a textbook is only $3 or $4, not $50 or $100.
Most of that profit margin goes to textbook companies. Very little is
with the authors or the professors who contributed the work. They
largely do it for professional consideration and prestige. And if we
can build a culture that supports and empowers content platforms that
are open source, we can truly bring down those textbook costs which are
so onerous for students in higher education.
So we should challenge Congress to do something about the looming
student debt crisis, not just for the students that are accruing it
today, but for people who graduated 5 or 10 years ago and are still
suffering under the yoke of the debt that they incurred that allowed
them to have a decent job in America.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I mean, this seems like a problem of,
What do you do with the student today and the student tomorrow? And
that revolves around what the interest rates are going to be.
And you just alluded to, this isn't just about today and tomorrow.
This is about the generation that took on the debt and is carrying it
now and is in the workforce.
We have just introduced in the Congress the Bank on Students
Emergency Loan Refinancing Act, introduced by our colleague from
Connecticut, Joe Courtney, which kind of goes to this. And maybe you
could talk a little bit about what can we do for students who already
have this debt and they hear most of the focus being on the interest
rate for the future. What can we try to help them as they try to
navigate with this debt?
Mr. POLIS. We can't forget students who financed their education at
higher interest rates, when inflation was higher, who years after their
graduation still suffer under the yoke of debt. That is the reason why
Representative Courtney brought forth his bill.
And when I hear from constituents, that is one of the top things that
I hear. I hear from people who might have graduated 3 years ago, 5
years ago, even 20 years ago, but their debt load is impacting their
ability to live their lives; their ability to buy a home, which they
can't do because of it; their ability to have a family simply because
of the way or the manner that they financed it or the time they
financed it.
So I think it is absolutely appropriate for us to find a way to make
sure that people are rewarded for their educational achievement and not
penalized.

{time} 1945

The greatest asset our country has is our intellectual capital. It is
the ideas and knowledge of our people. That is our greatest asset. Yet
in this day and age the fact that we are penalizing people for
bettering themselves and for acquiring knowledge that is needed for our
economy to succeed is absolutely ridiculous, and that is exactly what
we need to do.
I invite the gentleman from California to talk about how some of
these issues were highlighted in the recent budget debates we had
because when a lot of people hear, oh, the Democrats and Republicans
are fighting about the budget, it seems very esoteric. They say: What
is this budget? What is that budget? Well, these are very important
statements because it shows how each party would govern. Specifically,
the

[[Page H2027]]

visions that each budget set forth with regard to higher education,
college and how to afford it are night and day.
I am hoping that you can talk about, just moments before on the floor
of this very House, the budget that, unfortunately, our Republican
colleagues passed and then contrast that with the budget that you and I
voted for which would have made college more affordable and helped
families afford college.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Just looking at the Twitter feed, we see
@hi_moya saying: As graduation approaches, my student debt looms over
me like an oncoming storm. It makes me hesitant to start grad school.
I appreciate the gentleman from Colorado alluding to the budget that
we, just moments ago on this House floor, voted on. We had two
competing budgets when it came to many issues that are important to
this country. But for my generation, looking at the generation of 18-
to 35-year-olds, there is no issue that is more important and affects
more people than student loan debt.
The Republican budget would cut $220 billion in funds for college
accessibility. It would cut Pell grants. It would cut subsidized
student loan programs, and it cuts income-based repayment. These
backward policies not only are hurting students, they are hurting the
progress of our economy. They would make college more unaffordable for
millions of prospective students.
Nine million students today benefit from Pell grants. Two-thirds of
African American students receive Pell grants, and half of Latino
students receive Pell grants. Nine out of 10 Pell grant recipients are
already taking out student loans. These students need more help from
their government.
I want to make it clear that no student that I have ever talked to,
no student who has ever taken on the debt believes that this should
just be a handout or a gift from the government. The position of the
Future Forum, the position of the House Democratic Caucus is that if
you believe in young people, if you take a chance on them, and if they
are hard-working and qualified, they will take that investment, they
will take that risk, and they will pay back their student loan debt.
But we don't have to gouge them. The government doesn't have to make
money on young people looking for a way up. The government doesn't have
to make money on people who are looking for and seeking to seize upon
opportunity.
Speaking of young people, just joining us now here in the House
Chamber is a first-term Member of Congress, someone who is also making
a second Future Forum appearance and someone who cares deeply about
what student loan debt means for the constituents in his Pennsylvania
district.
Mr. Chairman, I yield to Brendan Boyle.
Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. I very much appreciate the
leadership that the gentleman from California has shown in forming our
caucus, and also especially when it comes to this issue which is near
and dear to my heart. I have talked many times during my campaign about
the fact that I thought it would change the dynamic to now have a
Member of Congress who himself has tens of thousands of dollars of
student loan debt because I wanted to do exactly what we are doing
tonight, be able to speak on the House floor and say, yes, this is an
incredibly serious issue that needs to be dealt with as the national
problem that it is.
Depending on how you judge mortgages, student loans are considered
either the largest source of debt or the second largest source of debt
in America today, a tenfold increase in the last 20 years--tenfold
increase. That is unsustainable. I believe that it is unfair and a
tremendous burden to those who are young and, frankly, not so young and
raising families of their own. But not only is there the fairness
argument, there is also the argument that it just makes no sense for
the United States of America in the 21st century to be going in this
direction, to be penalizing those who are attempting to better
themselves and become better workers, become better trained and ensure
that they can participate in the workforce of the 21st century.
So I believe that this is an issue, frankly, that has been
undercovered and underfocused on over the last several years. I believe
that there is a danger of this actually being a student loan debt
bubble. And I believe that it is about time that this Congress, the
House and the Senate, finally dealt with this as the national crisis
that it is.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. So I would ask the gentleman, I am
looking through our Twitter feed here, and we have got a number of
people who have kind of chimed in on it. One young person just tweeted
at us, Dolores Tejada. She is a child of immigrants from Guatemala, and
she is the first in her family to go to college. Her parents, she said,
make the minimum wage, and she has been working for 6 years at a
nonprofit and pays $350 a month on her student loan debt. She said
without this payment, she would buy a car--she currently has to share
one with the entire family--and she would move out of her parents'
house.
Have you heard stories like Dolores' in your district or across our
country?
Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. Well, first, I couldn't help
identify with the tweet from Dolores. Like she, I am a first-generation
American. My father is an immigrant. And like Dolores, I am the first
in my family to go to college. Student loans played an important part
in enabling me to go to college. So I don't in any way use my own
personal experience as a woe is me. I consider myself one of the very
fortunate ones.
But the fact that I had the benefit of winning scholarships and
piecing together student loans and tens of thousands of them along with
every work-study job you can imagine, the fact that I am actually one
of the lucky ones and it was that difficult, I know so many people in
the neighborhood where I grew up in Philadelphia who weren't as
fortunate. I know so many people today in my neighborhood and all
throughout the country who have exactly the same story that Dolores had
in that she says: Well, with this extra $350 a month, I would be buying
a car; I would be saving for a down payment on a home.
It is interesting. I hear these kinds of stories not just from those
who are in repayment, I hear them from Realtors who have been in the
business two, three, or four decades. They will say to me: Brendan, I
can't tell you what a difference it is today. Back when I was starting
out, I would sell so many homes to younger people, 24, 25, 26. Now I
don't have one customer in their twenties. Why? Because the student
loan payments are taking that up.
So that means that it doesn't only hurt the graduate who is in
repayment; it also has a spillover effect in our overall economy. It
hurts the Realtors. It hurts the contractors who would have done work
once that young couple or the young person bought a house. It hurts the
Home Depot down the street. There is this spillover effect in our
economy. And it is getting to the larger point I was talking about that
this is not just a problem for young people. This is a problem for
families who want to send their kids to college. This is a problem for
Realtors. This is a problem for anyone who wants economic development
to be spurred in our country. Essentially, this is a national issue.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. We are looking at Twitter, and I see
Jenna on Twitter from New York City, who says: I chose a State school
as the affordable choice over better schools where I was accepted and
still have $30,000 in student loan debt.
Are you seeing that in Pennsylvania where the State universities are
starting to see their tuitions go up almost as much as the tuition at
private universities?
Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. Well, unfortunately, yes. While
I am a born and raised and proud Pennsylvanian, I am sad to say on this
score we are the second worst in the country. We have the second most
expensive public colleges and universities in the Nation. Sure enough,
our Pennsylvania residents have the second highest amount of student
loan debt in the country. So this is a problem affecting my State. It
affects all 50 States, but, unfortunately, it is worse in my home State
than almost every other State in the country.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Now, we are talking about student loan
debt as well as student loan interest rates, two separate issues, but
both affecting

[[Page H2028]]

essentially the same generation. We saw just this week our colleague,
Joe Courtney, within the past week introduced his bill. I want to see
if the gentleman has a position on this. It is the Bank on Students
Emergency Loan Refinancing Act. What it would do is it would allow
eligible student loan borrowers to refinance their private and Federal
loans. As the gentleman knows, if you have an auto loan or if you have
a home loan and if you have a business loan, you can often, if
qualified, refinance those loans as interest rates change and the
markets change. Right now, you can't do that with student loans.
How do you think this would change the debt load that young people
are carrying today if they could take that student loan to the
marketplace and find competitive refinancing rates.
Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. I am proud to be a cosponsor of
Representative Courtney's bill. Elizabeth Warren is the sponsor in the
Senate of the companion legislation.
This would have a transformative effect on helping those who right
now are struggling with the student loan payment. So many of the ideas
that we have are more geared toward those who will be going to college
and aren't yet college age. This is the one idea that can actually help
those who are living today under the burden of higher student loan
debt.
It is important to note that neither of us are talking about
forgiving debt or eliminating debt or giving people a free ride or
allowing them to get away from the debts they incur. We are simply
saying allow them to have the market mechanism that so many others
have; allow them to refinance at the current low rates. This would be a
tremendous savings, literally tens of billions of dollars saved. And
then that is money that in turn will be repumped into our economy. So I
believe it would have an incredibly positive effect, and I am a strong
supporter of it.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I am glad you mentioned the effect it
would have on the economy. I just heard 2 minutes ago from Andreas
Giraldo. He said with the $389 that is going to student loan debt, I
could be buying a house. If you just imagine, you take 40 million
people who have debt right now, and if we found a way for them to
refinance it or reduce it and save them hundreds a month, they are not
going to just sit on that money or put it under the mattress. They are
going to put that money back into the economy.
Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. I am thinking of you being in
California in a much more expensive area than, while Pennsylvania is
not cheap, by California standards, it is much more affordable. How
much of an effect would it have for the young, bright, well-educated
folks in northern California if they could suddenly have an extra, 3,
400 a month to help them afford the cost of living there and save for a
down payment?
Mr. SWALWELL of California. The bay area is a beautiful place to
live. It is 80 degrees there this week. It is one of the most educated
places in the world. It has an innovation economy that is charting the
course for the new American economy and is really defining how the
American worker is going to work going forward. But the biggest
downfall, the downside, if there is any in the bay area right now, is
the cost of living. It costs so much to own a house. It costs so much
for health care and starting a business. There are so many costs to be
in the bay area today that it is pricing out young people.
So if you go to a good school, you are qualified, you make it to a
good school, you take on the student loan debt, and you want to go into
the workforce, with the debt that you carry, first, chances are you are
not going to be able to live anywhere near where you are going to work
because you are not going to be able to afford it.
I had the California Association of Realtors in my office today. Our
local rep, Otto Catrina, was telling me how hard it is for him. He told
me the story today of somebody who works at one of the largest tech
companies in America. This person makes, he said, over $100,000 a year.
And because of the student loan debt that she has, she is having a
very, very difficult time buying a house. That is somebody who makes
over $100,000 a year, and that is in the upper echelon of incomes in
our country.
Can you imagine the middle class worker, the hard-working American
who is making $40,000, $50,000 a year, wants to maybe go do some good
and teach in a classroom? How is that person going to live near where
they work? How is that person going to buy a home? How is that person
going to start a family and have kids?
So I am glad the gentleman asked that, because those are the stories
I see back where I grew up. That is why people care about that issue.
Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. You actually just referenced
another point of this that I think is such a good point, and that is
that this student loan debt is actually preventing young people from
going out and starting their own businesses, which is a personal
tragedy for them, but also has, again, tremendously negative effects on
our overall economy. I am wondering, particularly in an entrepreneurial
area like the bay area, you must hear similar stories.

{time} 2000

Mr. SWALWELL of California. We have become in the Bay Area a place
where approximately 75 percent of the venture funding is going right
now. There are a lot of smart, young, energetic determined people with
good ideas, but they don't have a lot of funding. And for them the
decision becomes, well, I have got this job right now that pays my
student loan debt and pays my other bills, but I have this great idea,
which is my passion, which is my dream. But if I leave my job and I
risk it all, I still have this debt; it is going to follow me, and it
is going to be really hard if this doesn't take off. I see that
decision point so often across the Bay Area.
I just think, as you said, we are not asking to just completely say
to every bank, You no longer can collect on this debt. I think what we
are asking is, Let's start the conversation. How do we reduce it? How
do we refinance it? How do we give people more money in their pocket
every month so that they can help themselves lift up their families and
help our economy?
I see in the Chamber here with us our former caucus chair John
Larson, the gentleman from Connecticut. I am putting him on the spot a
little bit here. But I know he cares just as much as the gentleman from
Pennsylvania and I do about what young people in his district are doing
and how student loan debt affects him. So I am just wondering if our
former chair could weigh in on what we can do in the Congress to help
young people with student loan debt.
Mr. LARSON of Connecticut. Well, first of all, I want to thank the
gentleman from California and the gentleman from Pennsylvania for their
hard work in this subject matter area.
Certainly we know that all credit debt combined is exceeded by the
amount of debt that those who attend and receive a college education
are currently bearing and the awful burden that that has created on the
working members of the middle class and how difficult a burden it is,
so I commend the gentlemen for their efforts here on the floor.
First of all, it starts with our budget that we debated today in
making sure that there are not cuts to Pell grants, but there are
investments made in Pell grants.
Frankly, as people talk about repatriation, that is, as both the
gentlemen from Pennsylvania and California know, where money has been
sent overseas, and there is a lot of talk about bringing money back and
what will we do with that, what about a trust fund that will allow an
opportunity for young people all across America to refinance and
restructure their ability to pay off their college debt? It is not a
novel idea.
After all, isn't that what we did for Wall Street after 2008? Isn't
that what we did to make sure that banks and financial institutions
didn't fail? Shouldn't we do this for the human infrastructure, for all
those hard-working families who have refinanced their home, who have
gone into their personal savings, who are saddled with enormous amounts
of debt?
What a great thing for the country and how valuable that would be for
people to once again be able to have completed a college education,
place themselves in a position to be more productive members of
society, but

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also in a position where they are not burdened with the debt that
prevents them from carrying on a life, to get married, to purchase a
first home, to buy a new automobile, all the things that help our
economy grow, all the reasons that they went to college in the first
place.
So I commend the two gentlemen for their continuous work in this
area, your support of the Democratic budget. What a great job that
Chris Van Hollen did today articulating the values that this side of
the aisle has been putting forward not only in terms of the morality of
the issue, but also the economic impact that it has on so many working
families.
I hope that our distinguished colleagues from California and
Pennsylvania will join us in the second hour in a discussion on all
generations on Social Security.
Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. I was just going to say how
happy I am to welcome Mr. Larson as the newest member to the Future
Caucus. There aren't many of us that have such wonderful white hair in
the future caucus.
But what is interesting is this is an exact linkage to the subject
that we are going to talk about next with respect to Social Security.
And that is, it is all part of the same system. The idea that you give
opportunity to people, you demand responsibility, they pay into a
system, they benefit at some point, and then the next generation
benefits.
People on Social Security today are able to benefit because of the
workers of today. Thirty, 40 years from now, those students who are
worrying about student loans will probably still be in the workforce
and making, hopefully, more money that will pay into Social Security
that will help the workers of today, who will be the retirees of
tomorrow. So this is all actually linked and part of making America
work.
So I am proud to be with the two gentlemen.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Thank you. I don't think we could end on
a more inspirational note than the eloquent words from our former
chairman from Connecticut, Mr. Larson.
This is about the future. I am proud to be a sponsor of the Social
Security Fairness Act. I am glad that is getting some attention this
evening.
To summarize, the Future Forum and what we aspire for young people to
have is not a handout when it comes to student loan debt, not a
complete free pass where you just take on government investments and
you don't give anything back.
What we are saying is that if you are qualified and you worked hard
and you have the student loan debt, it should be easier than it is
today. We should be able to pass Joe Courtney's bill and allow you to
refinance. We should find every way possible to reduce this debt for
each person as low as we can.
And if you are a student today, the government should not make money
on your student interest loan. They shouldn't make money. If you are
qualified and able to go to college, especially if you are like the
gentleman from Pennsylvania or myself and you are the first person in
your family to go to college, we should reduce every barrier to college
because it is a part of achieving that American Dream of starting a
family, owning a home, buying a new automobile, and saving for a secure
golden retirement.
So I thank the gentleman from Connecticut for his help this evening
and coming down as a special cameo guest appearance. And I also thank
the gentleman from Pennsylvania for, again, being a part of our Future
Forum.
You can tweet us at #futureforum and we will continue this
conversation until we address what is the greatest moral crisis of our
generation--student loan debt.
I yield back the balance of my time.

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