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Abolish Student Debt! Defund the Pentagon!

Summer’s here! By now, millions of college graduates nationwide have accepted their diplomas. They’re ready to take their first step into the real world, get a job, and start paying off their student loans.

According to the Federal Reserve, 46 million Americans have student loan debt. Collectively, they owe a total of $1.75 trillion. On average, they spend $300 per month in loan payments. Many of them are unable to pay, as 11.1% of loans “were 90 days or more delinquent or in default.”

With so many young people spending their income on their loans, their debt not only financially burdens themselves but also the overall economy. A 2020 survey revealed half of respondents were unable to start their own business due to their debt, while a 2019 survey showed half were unable to buy a house for the same reason, according to Education Loan Finance.

Releasing these young people from debt would not only give them more money to spend in the economy, but also buy their own homes and start their own businesses. In short, student loan forgiveness would encourage consumer spending, home ownership, and entrepreneurship. It would be the biggest economic stimulus ever!

According to the Brookings Institution, overall federal loan forgiveness would cost $1.6 trillion. Most politicans have offered more modest proposals. Sen. Elizabeth Warren has proposed forgiving $50,000 per borrower (which would cost $1 trillion), while President Biden has proposed $10,000 (which would cost $373 billion).

How would we afford to pay all that debt? The obvious solution would be to increase taxes, especially on the ultra-wealthy. The GOP would hate that! But an alternative solution would be to cut government spending. The GOP should love that. They always complain about government waste. And our government undoubtedly wastes a lot of money. However, the GOP often neglects to mention the biggest waster of our taxpayer money: the military!

Since 2000, America has spent $13.34 trillion on its military; including the $3.18 trillion for the Veterans Administration, that amounts to a yearly average of $826 billion, as calculated by Scientific American. America spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined, with its budget three times larger than China’s and ten times larger than Russia’s, Scientific American reported.

Some people would argue we need to spend that much money to “protect our freedom.” But more often than not, the military wastes our taxpayer money on elaborate yet frivolous projects that do nothing of the sort. The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is the most notorious example. The experimental jet is expected to cost $1.5 trillion over its lifespan, yet despite having nearly 900 software defects and half of its fleet grounded for maintenance, the Pentagon insists on buying 2,400 more over the next 25 years, Scientific American reports.

Among the other overpriced “poor performers” on the Pentagon’s “$1.8-trillion shopping list” include “the $22-billion Zumwalt destroyer, a warship without a mission; the $30-billion littoral combat ship, which the Navy is already mothballing because it is virtually unusable; and the Air Force’s problem-plagued $43-billion KC-46 refueling tanker, which offers little improvement over current refuelers.” As Elliott Negin wrote: “If the Pentagon were a private corporation, gross mismanagement would have forced it into bankruptcy years ago.”

There’s no reason our military needs to waste so much money on so many failed boondoggles. We could slash military spending by 90 percent and still have the largest military on Earth! Meanwhile, we could use the rest of that money to free young people of their debt. Undoubtedly, they would do a better job of spending money than the Pentagon!

The views and opinions expressed in columns are not necessarily the views and opinions of Today & Tonight Magazine or Today & Tonight, Inc.