Buried beneath the thousand or so page monster known as “Obamacare” was a measure in place having nothing to do with actual health care, health care costs, or ways in which to provide affordable, high quality care for lower income Americans. IN this bill there was a provision put in place by Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi that would give the federal government via the Dept. of Education sole control of student loan access.

Now I’ve been asking this question for a good three years and I have yet to come across an answer: “What do student loans have to do with health care?”

I can recall the lessons in my English class from the 4th grade at Robinwood Elementary in Florissant, MO. We learned about “Cause and Effect”. We read sentences and stories rife with examples of cause and effect, and would point them out to the teacher, thus learning how to read and identify instances of cause and effect. However this process is not relegated to the world of literature and grammar, there are many examples of cause and effect throughout history, some with devastating consequence and some used as guidelines for a more stable and peaceful existence.

With such measures in place, stuffed behind measures and provisions, granted powers and commands, the Department of Education took control of the student loan program thereby eliminating their partnership with banks. Before this happened banks such as Citi and Bank of America provided federal loans, private loans, what have you. Now the government provides loans and banks are no longer able to offer any type of loan to students as a result.

Fast forward to this year and we’ve run into a little problem with rising interest rates and overall increases in student loan debt. One might assume full federal dominion over loan access might have solved the problem, not caused the problem. Well, sadly there are a lot of naive people out there who saw this as a good thing. But think about it, the more access students have to loans the more money is spent, resulting in more debt because students for the most part have trouble paying off the loans.

When private banks had the power of issuing loans at their discretion, there was a balance. If you wanted a private loan you needed private loan credit, most young people didn’t have the established credit to take out a loan for 15k. For that you needed a cosigner which is the extra added safety net for people started their life independent from their parents.

A cosigner would be on the hook for a majority of the repayment obligations, which in turn puts enough pressure on the primary loan beneficiary to be reasonable in how much they needed.

Now with the federal government handing out loans like Mr. Good Bar hands out ice cream treats, you’re going to have any and everybody taking out loans they can’t afford.

Yes we should have learned from the housing market debacle but know we didn’t and know we won’t. There are those in this country who believe things should be free, that we have a right to things that don’t belong to us. I’m currently in between jobs and about to resume the final two years of college starting in August. I know that i can’t go crazy on someone else’s tab because there are people, including my mom who pay taxes that goes toward my student loans.

If you’re a student it all comes down to how much you borrow and what you pay for in college. Far too many of our young people waste thousands of tax payer dollars going to “party schools” wasting their time and learning nothing, majoring in Women’s Studies or African American Studies, taking with them a degree that gets them nowhere but back to the basement of their parent’s house.

There’s a reason why going to school to learn how to fix cars, build Harley Davidson motorcycles, or becoming certified as a HVAC technician is worth far more than a Gender Studies major with a minor in Human Rights and at half the cost.

So hopefully the Supreme Court strikes down the entire Obamacare bill and that could actually benefit many students because that provision will no longer be in effect. When conservatives said Obamacare would have expansive consequences beyond health care I guess they were right.

You can make a solid argument that Obamacare has in effect been the single most burdensome yoke around the neck of the economy, student loans, health care, and social policy in America. Wow, all in one bill so much was negatively impacted.