As a 30-something, I struggled a lot in my early adult life. I went to college for 3 years from age 17-20, and I took out a student loan to do so. I did not graduate. I fucked off and got stoned and drunk instead. I still do, but I used to, too. Everything that has happened to me from then and now is my own fault.
My initial loan was a relatively small amount. I did not make any payments on it at the time, nor did I do so until my later 20s. I ended up paying around 16,000 to 20,000 more on my initial loan than I should have if I were a responsible adult. I never bothered to look into the exact amount, but it was a significant difference compared to what the initial amount was.
I can make all sorts of excuses, but the fact of the matter is, I did not want to pinch every fucking penny while working as a janitor at many companies, cart-pusher at Cub Foods, retention specialist trying to keep people from smartly cancelling their Sirius-XM service, as an election tech testing and setting up the electronic election equipment we all vote on now, as a temp worker at various jobs, and as a shitty carpenter building houses for years. I wanted to actually thrive, rather than survive. Realistically speaking, I did not thrive during that time, but I did survive, and I wasn't miserable.
I have, within the past month, actually, paid off every single cent of my student loan. The only reason I was able to do so was because my mother helped me out with a second chance at college. I worked three jobs and went to school full-time for a terminal 2 year degree (Associate of Applied Science).
The term "terminal degree," essentially means that I will never be able to apply any of that 2 year degree toward say a bachelor's degree. A terminal degree is one that is supposed to prepare you for immediate employment with no further education. Due to my construction experience, and the fact that I am a giant fucking computer nerd, I was able to thrive with this degree, not just survive.
I make good money now, and I was able to pay the remaining balance of my student loan with a single payment from a bonus offered through my employer.
That being said, my experience may not be entirely unique, but I feel it is, in the fact that I was able to recover due to help from my family. If it were not for my mother, I would not be in the position that I am now. There are a lot of people who do not have an upper middle class mother to take care of a 30-year-old child.
I still support wiping out student debt and starting over, again, despite having paid tens of thousands of dollars repaying a loan I had taken out as a naive and ignorant child.
This whole crab mentality that America feels as a whole needs to fucking stop. The mentality of, I suffered, so should you, is ridiculous. Crabs will actively pull those who are trying to escape their imprisonment back down to their own level. If I'm going to die, you are too. Fuck that nonsense.
I suffered enough to know that I don't want other people to experience the same. I can't even begin to describe the shit I did as a janitor making $9 an hour. It was degrading, and oftentimes, infuriating. But, I did what I had to do to survive, but I did not thrive.
I think people conflate the notions of thriving and surviving. They are not the same. If a person can survive, sure, they'll live another day, but at the end of that day, they're still fucked. But, if a person can thrive, they'll add so much more to our world than they ever could if they were simply surviving.
Fuck everyone else, vote Bernie. If Bernie is robbed again, vote any democrat you can, because it's sure as fuck better than another 4-8 years of Trump, depending on how far America has gone down the toilet at this point.