Are You Upset that Taxpayer Money Will Be Spent on Paying Off Some of My Student Loans?

Student loan relief and parent privilege — both are unfair

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

When you heard that President Biden signed an executive order for student loan relief, did you think, “It’s unfair that taxpayer money is being used to pay off some people’s student’s loans”?

If you believe that student loan relief is unfair, you may be struggling to understand it because you had a form of privilege that I call “parent privilege”.

Privilege is a term that’s bandied about these days, but this is more like an economic privilege. It means your parents had enough money to help you out financially.

Your parents didn’t have to be rich or even middle-class to give you this kind of privilege. They were just willing to help you here and there, even in minor ways, like

• Giving you an allowance, even a small-ish one
• Helping you buy your first car
• Paying for your car insurance though you had to work to pay for your own gas
• Letting you keep the money you made from summer jobs in high school to save towards college
• Giving you a little bit to help you make a down payment on a house (“A rental home…