I do. I am not saying that you cannot go to college, but that it's still not exactly easy to go get good education on varying levels.

First off even though I know about the loans I also know that for many people (people I know) it means decades of debt. I also know that this still doesn't mean you will have good access to good education (Ivory League colleges).

The thing that I wanted to point out is that it's still a decision that one cannot just make or if you do it might be one that one might really regret.

The problem with that is that it's not efficient in many ways. The US compared to other countries appears to end high school education at a slightly lower level. Therefor college becomes way more important. At the end of college the difference is evened out (sometimes/often better, sometimes worse than other countries, also depends on many factors). So that's good.

However the problem is that it's a loan. Yeah, it's better than not federally-guaranteed, but then for a country that claims to be the best in this sector it's kind of bad. The amount of money one needs for college, both for paying back and for just "living" are on the rise.

I'd consider the US democracy being designed in a really good way, but like founding fathers, various presidents and thinkers pointed out education is very important for a democracy.

The state with the loans is sadly kind of ridiculous. It's actually bizarre when one has to start out their live with ten thousands of USD of debt for going to college and that even after a successful college time there is still a big chance for the debt growing because of the interest.

And yeah, in many cases one can say "your own fault" and I even agree on that one, but as a CS person one is on the extremely "lucky" end of the spectrum.

I am not saying that it is realistic to just be perfect or just be like Scandinavia, but education is important and might to a degree even influence the other topics when it comes to civil liberties.

I hope I won't be called a communist, but I once knew a person from East Germany and at least he said something like "the Berlin Wall and Communism fell because they educated their people too well" and hey I think that should be a reason for the US to invest into good education.

I know that's just a random anecdote, but hope it gets my point across. The US could really benefit from some reform in certain areas and probably with that even reduce the costs of inefficient systems. Someone (not sure if that's true, don't know the exactly details) once told me that if the US would copy the welfare system of - I think - Sweden regarding healthcare and education they'd have way more money, better education and better healthcare and they could lower the taxes. Also said something about the system being largely based upon "making it not look socialist, even though it means more tax money and government control".

Not sure about my last statement. All I know about the US regarding education I know from a bunch of US citizens I am close to and a documentary called Ivory Tower. The documentary being a bit scary, but it also shows some really cool stuff that should be used more.

Like I sometimes don't get what's hindering to make the US way closer to how "the US" likes to depict itself. Is it just that nobody picks up those topics? Or is it that the parties just can't agree? Maybe someone knows more? What's the reason that the US seems a bit stuck with status quo on some issues.