Democrat Economists Rip Joe Biden over Student Loan Forgiveness Scheme

Prominent economists who served under previous Democrat presidents ripped President Joe Biden over his $300 billion student loan forgiveness scheme.

Summers — who served as treasury secretary under Bill Clinton, director of the National Economic Council under Barack Obama, president of Harvard University, and chief economist of the World Bank — in a series of posts on social media this week, said, “Every dollar spent on student loan relief is a dollar that could have gone to support those who don’t get the opportunity to go to college.”

“Student loan debt relief is spending that raises demand and increases inflation. … It will also tend to be inflationary by raising tuitions,” Summers continued. “The worst idea would be a continuation of the current moratorium that benefits among others highly paid surgeons, lawyers, and investment bankers.”

“If relief is to be given it should not set any precedent, it should only be given for the first few thousand dollars of debt, and for those with genuinely middle class incomes,” Summers added.

Additionally, Professor of the Practice of Economic Policy at Harvard University and the Harvard Kennedy School Jason Furman — who served as Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Barack Obama and on the Council of Economic Advisers and the National Economic Council under President Bill Clinton also ripped Biden for his loan forgiveness scheme.

“Pouring roughly half trillion dollars of gasoline on the inflationary fire that is already burning is reckless,” Furman said in a series of posts on social media. “Doing it while going well beyond one campaign promise ($10K of student loan relief) and breaking another (all proposals paid for) is even worse.”

“There are a number of other highly problematic impacts including encouraging higher tuition in the future, encouraging more borrowing, creating expectations of future debt forgiveness, and more,” he continued. “Most importantly, everyone else will pay for this either in the form of higher inflation or in higher taxes or lower benefits in the future.”

On Wednesday, Biden announced his decision to forgive up to $20,000 in student debt for Americans making less than $125,000 a year. The president announced details of his plan on social media, describing it as a “campaign promise” to give “working and middle-class families breathing room” on student loans.

According to the University of Pennsylvania’s Penn Wharton Budget Model, Biden’s student loan forgiveness program would cost taxpayers more in its first year than the Inflation Reduction Act is estimated to reduce the federal budget deficit over the coming decade.

“The Penn Wharton Budget Model estimates this will cost $300 billion in its first year. If the program is continued over the next decade, the cost will rise to $330, according to the model,” Breitbart News’s John Carney wrote about the model, noting that the same model had estimated that the Inflation Reduction Act would reduce budget deficits by $248 billion over a 10-year period.

Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jbliss@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter @JacobMBliss.