Student Loans, The Life-Altering Differences Between White and Black Debt, and a Shrimp Burger

If Tressie McMillan Cottom is going to be on a podcast, I’m going to listen to it.  A few weeks ago, driving to get a shrimp burger at the beach on a sunny October day, I had to pull over and take notes as she spoke on Call & Response by Adia Victoria about the idea of a persuasive  “soft violence” and how it can lead us to harm ourselves.  It was exactly what I’d seen unfold at school dozens of times, in the form of the “do it for the kids” admonishments that chasten and coerce hours of unpaid labor and hundreds of dollars from staff who want to be “good”.

This week, Tressie has taken over hosting on the Ezra Klein show, and she and her guest Louise Seamster illuminate the traps of student loan debt in ways we should all make it our business to know about.  They discuss how the very concept of being indebted functions in our psyches to erode the stability of this country in ways we’re still discovering, and in ways deeply enmeshed with our history of systemic racism.

On this episode, Seamster introduced me to the concept of measuring a student’s need for financial aid through assessing wealth rather than income.  Most people think wealth means millions or billions, but wealth is also the $10,000 your parents gave you in the form of your first car.  It’s your uncle’s beach house you could stay in rent-free for a summer.  Wealth is inheriting even a little bit from someone who came before you.  Wealth is the safety net of knowing that even if you mess up, you won’t be living in the streets, because your family has resources.  

Two separate households living side by side could have exactly the same income, but the wealth that has accrued among generations could put one family in an entirely different place than the other, financially, emotionally, you name it.  Wealth, not income, is what changes things.  

But you don’t feel wealthy?  Neither do I.  Neither does hardly anybody, really.  I’m a teacher, and I’m white, and I know a lot of white teachers who don’t feel wealthy. Almost everyone I know feels stretched beyond comfort to balance their personal budgets.  

But here, let Louise Seamster explain it, and it will click in a way that makes your jaw drop.  At least, it did mine.  (Quotes are hers; emphasis added is mine.)

“You feel so stretched because of the disinvestment in the social safety net...because your health insurance premium is going up 10% every year, and you’re looking at the sticker price on college tuition when your kid is 12 years old.  And all of these things that we agreed we wouldn’t invest in collectively, because the fear that “undeserving” people might get them means you don’t get them, either...All of these things were hashed out as debates within a context of white racism, where it was a perception that ‘we don’t want black folks to have these things’ and so we will give it up for ourselves as well.  And so that is why having white wealth doesn’t make you feel secure.  Because you’re not economically secure.  You’re just better off than a lot of folks who don’t even have what you have.  And I think a lot of people confuse their lack of stability with needing more wealth, when we have alternative ways of organizing resources that actually probably cost less ultimately...but they can’t buy into the idea that we could just get something for free.”

That idea of confusing a lack of stability with needing more wealth took my breath away. I don’t know of anyone, not even the billionaires who launched themselves into space recently, who doesn’t inherently feel they need more wealth. And everyone bristles when they feel threatened by losing any of that wealth…because deep down, what scares us is a lack of stability. The stability that social safety nets can and do offer.

If that doesn’t convince you to listen, then tune in for this easter egg Seamster drops midway through: of the millions of folks promised since the 1990’s that social justice careers like teaching could lead to student loan forgiveness, only 32 people have made it through the gauntlet of red tape and gotchas and actually had their loans forgiven.  That’s thirty two people, not thirty two percent, as Tressie points out….which equates to 0%.

I hope you’ll listen and tell me, what did you learn?