US House to Current Student Loan Holders: "Sorry about your luck!"

H.R. 4872, the Health Care & Education Affordability Reconciliation Act of 2010, includes wording to remove subsidies to private loan providers. That's all fine and well, but Section 2214 of the bill - the section previously touted by the Young Democrats to help those of us currently drowning in student loan debt - only reduces payments and payment maximum terms for "New borrowers on and after July 1, 2014." Other wording earlier in the bill suggests that Federal consolidation loans may not be available for current borrowers come 2014, thus making us ineligible to become a "new borrower." This is unacceptable. If you find problems with this, you should contact your Senators immediately as the bill has already passed the House.

Update: The bill will soon be sent back to the House. Try contacting your House members as well!

Broken American Higher Education System Encourages Illegal Activities

Jeremiah Mondello was a damn good software salesman. While he was still in college, he started a backyard eBay business that earned  him some $300,000 in three years, mostly shipping Intuit's Quicken financial software at the rock-bottom price of about $30 a pop.

His secret? He pirated the software, burned it onto counterfeit discs and laundered his profits through a series of PayPal accounts established under stolen identities. This week a federal judge sentenced the 23-year-old to four years in prison for identity theft, copyright violation and mail fraud, in a prosecution hailed by the Justice Department as a warning shot to software counterfeiters.

"I just sold a few to pay for gas and lunch. I was on financial aid. I didn't want to take out any more student loans," he said. "That was the starting motivation. Later, I guess I kind of decided I thought it would be a good idea to save some money and start my own business and do some travel."

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