Student Debt

 Student DebtSources Biden-750 Billion in investments over 10 years:-Offer two years of tuition-free community college to students, both full-time and part-time, including DREAMers--Pell Grants to be doubled and to be modified to cover living expenses, -incentivize community colleges to partner with local organizations to provide support services for students-Invest $50 billion into workforce training, such as apprenticeships and community college business partnerships-Channel $8 billion into community colleges to improve their facilities-Simplify income-driven repayment plans, and allow student loan borrowers who make less than $25,000 to reduce their payments to $0 without accruing interest on their debt. Borrowers who make more than $25,000 annually would pay just 5% of their discretionary income (the current plans cap payments at 10% or more) and be eligible for forgiveness after 20 years.-Simplify the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program and allow eligible borrowers to get $10,000 in forgiveness annually for up to five years-Crack down on predatory for-profit schools and require that all institutions prove their value before accessing federal financial aid-Increase investments in Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Minority-Serving InstitutionsStudent loans should be discharged in bankruptcy.Bernie SandersSen. Bernie Sanders has the most expansive proposal where there would be an elimination of all 1.6 trillion in existing student loan debt by either federal government or private lenders. This is regardless of the borrower’s income level and would affect approximately 45 million people. Per report this act will increase the economy by 1 trillion over the next 10 years and create 1.6 million jobs annually. In addition it’d free up americans to make major purchases and start business venturesHe also hopes to have tuition reform by making public colleges and trade schools tuition free for families making under 125 K. Community college would be free for all. Part of this includes an expansion of Pell Grants and requiring participating states to cover the cost for a degree for low income students. There would be an interest cap of loans at 1.88%. He also plans to increase funding to HBCUs and provide greater funding for federal work study programs.The $2.2 trillion plan would be paid for by a new tax on financial transactions, including a 0.5 percent tax on stock transactions and a 0.1 percent tax on bond sales. That levy would raise up to $2.4 trillion over the next decade, according to the senator’s office..Donald Trump -No plan for debt cancelation and actually cancels one of the only current forgiveness programs PSLF as well as federal subsidized loans, but will institute loan forgiveness after 15 years of IDR payments on undergrad loans. Does increase funding for HBCUs.-"Student loan spending would be cut by $170 billion in Trump's plan, titled "A Budget for America's Future." The reductions include "sensible annual and lifetime loan limits" for graduate students and parents and the end to subsidized loans, in which the government covers the interest for borrowers who are still in school or experiencing economic hardship."-"The White House released the president’s fiscal 2021 budget. The budget requests $66.6 billion for the U.S. Department of Education, which represents a $5.6 billion, or 7.8%, decrease from the current year. Among the key initiatives for student loans and student loan repayment:-Undergraduates can get federal student loan forgiveness after 15 years-Limits annual and lifetime student loan limits for graduate students and parent borrowers-Eliminates subsidized federal student loans-Eliminates public service loan forgiveness-Expands eligibility for Pell Grants, supports borrower defense rule, and provides discretionary funding for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs)-There is no plan to cancel student loan debt."Health Care AccessSources differences in most candidates’ health care plans boil down to supporting a single payer “Medicare for All” health care plan vs. supporting an expansion of the Affordable Care Act and a “public option.” In our evaluation of the plans, we find the Medicare for All policy to best accomplish the goals of our members: guaranteeing universal health care, reducing health insurance bureaucracy, and controlling healthcare spending. The public option plans do not guarantee universal coverage (they rely on millions of individuals choosing to purchase expensive health care plans to increase coverage), do not address health insurance bureaucracy, and have no mechanism for lowering health care spending. Physicians groups are increasingly realizing the importance of Medicare for All; the American College of Physicians just recently endorsed Medicare for All as the most viable method to achieve a more functional and equitable health care system. As a pragmatic matter, Medicare for All has existing legislation in both the house and senate and is modelled on programs that successful work in other countries. A large number of analysts have evaluated the plan, including a study published last week in The Lancet. In contrast, the public option plans have received far less formal vetting, have not been implemented internationally, and do not currently exist as legislation, making it difficult to fully analyze the impact of this policy.Joe BidenJoe Biden currently supports a Medicare Public Option. When the public option was, controversially, a potential element of the Affordable Care Act in 2009, Biden was not a public proponent of the public option. Biden has a long history of supporting cuts to Medicare and Social Security, but currently states he would not cut these programs.programs. He has previously endorsed increasing the eligibility age of Medicare and increasing co-pays for Medicaid enrollees.Bernie SandersA proponent of single payer health insurance since the 1980s, Bernie Sanders elevated Medicare for All to the national mainstream during his 2016 presidential campaign. Sanders has also directly addressed the impact of Medicare for all on union-negotiated health care benefits. Under Sanders’ plan, unions would return to the bargaining table to ensure that workers receive wage/salary increases or other benefits in lieu of their previously-negotiated health care benefits. Sanders is the lead sponsor of the current Medicare for All bill in the Senate, which three other presidential candidates have signed as co-sponsors (Warren, Harris, and Booker).Donald Trump-His administration has no plan to replace the ACA other than allowing individual states to address the loss of coverage. -He has promised to repeal the ACA after vilifying it for 4 years as "hurting American families, farmers, and small businesses with skyrocketing health insurance costs." To be clear, without a replacement, a full repeal could result in, "a wave of disruption as an estimated 20 million Americans lose health insurance, insurance consumer protections crumble, drug approval pathways disappear, and Medicare fraud statutes are weakened, among many other effects."-The main damage was done to the ACA with the stunted implementation in the early 2010s and exacerbated by the Republican congress effectively removing the individual mandate tax in 2017.-His changes to HHS during his term have focused on improving cost transparency rules as a strategy to reduce costs, with no clear benefit as of yet. -In his most recent proposed budget, severe cuts to Medicaid and ACA subsidies would amount to $1 trillion or 85% of the anticipated expenditure on those programs by 2029.-These cuts could mean a decrease of $52 billion from GME funding.-Trump's current budget proposal a 7% spending cut to the NIH-Every budget proposal by the Trump administration has included cuts to the CDC budget (congress yet to accept these proposals), including a 16% reduction in spending on his current proposal ImmigrationSources BidenBiden supports providing healthcare and creating a pathway to citizenship for all who are in the country illegally. He proposes allowing local governments to petition for new immigration visas to support economic growth if there are not enough local workers to fill jobs. He also supports DACA and would overturn Trump’s public charge rule and muslim ban. He would cease funding for construction of the border wall. Is against family separation. However, Biden is against decriminalizing unauthorized border crossing and is also against abolishing ICE. Notably, the Obama/Biden administration had record levels of deportation during their time in office.Bernie SandersBernie Sanders’ plan seems the most progressive of all plans and had 3 dreamers shape his policy. He would institute a moratorium on ALL deportations until a thorough audit of current and past practices and policies is complete. He would stop all construction on the border wall and decriminalize unauthorized border crossing and seek to provide legal status and pathway to citizenship within 5 years. He plans on overturning the muslim ban, instruct the DOJ to drop any litigation or funding restrictions relating to sanctuary cities, end President Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” policies and allow asylum seekers to make their claims in the US. He would also overturn President Trump’s public charge rule and reunite immigrant families together who were separated upon crossing. He would extend TPS status to undocumented immigrants. He is the only candidate who supports abolishing ICE. Sander’s Medicare-for-all plan would cover all undocumented immigrants.Donald TrumpTravel Ban-Washington State v. Trump – SEIU submitted an amicus brief on the Washington State vs. Trump case, which placed a national Temporary Restraining Order, or TRO, on the Travel Ban. The amicus brief included the story of our Interfaith CIR member who was stuck abroad due to the Travel Ban. -A CIR member from Interfaith Medical Center was on vacation at home in Sudan when the Travel Ban was signed by President Trump. CIR’s organizer for the hospital worked with the residents to start a media campaign (replete with signs, one of which went viral!) to bring attention to his situation and coordinated with the hospital administration to tell the story of this particular resident as well as the effect of the Travel Ban on residents generally. Meanwhile, Legal worked to coordinate the best strategy for the resident’s return to the U.S., based upon the changing legal landscape and the airlines policies for boarding nationals of the 7 banned countries, which also shifted regularly and without notice. Finally, on the morning of February 5th, CIR welcomed our resident home at JFK Airport!- The Trump Administration’s work to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) Program has allowed individuals who entered the U.S. as minors without documentation to apply for a renewable two-year period of deferred action from deportation, and be eligible for a work permit. -The Trump Administration’s changes broaden the rule to include non-cash benefits and also extend the pool of impacted individuals to foreign nationals seeking to enter the U.S. The Public Charge rule is used in certain immigration cases to determine who can be denied permanent residency (green card) status based on their use of certain public benefits as their main source of support. The Public Charge rule is also used to determine eligibility for foreign nationals to enter the U.S. The Trump Administration’s changes broaden this rule widely to make it easier to rule a person a “public charge” and deny them status. -Donald Trump “supports ending chain migration, eliminating the Visa Lottery, and moving the country to a merit-based entry system.” -Committed to building a border wall and breaking up families. -Donald Trump has also created refugee camps and continues to separate children from their families-His administration is responsible for the child deaths in those camps by not allowing medical professionals to treat those inside the camps. -Has deported American military veterans.Labor RightsSources BidenJoe Biden has managed to receive the endorsement of several unions, despite a significantly vaguer labor platform than other candidates, and a more ambiguous record. Nevertheless he continues to pledge himself as a “union man” and avows himself a friend of organized labor seeking to expand its ranks.Bernie SandersThe labor movement is vital for our democracy, ensuring fairness at work and addressing economic inequality. Central to our goal as a union is increasing membership and our ability to expand nationwide, including to bargain on behalf of the resident workforce as a whole. Bernie’s extraordinary labor platform, encapsulated in his Workplace Democracy Plan, builds off of a lifetime experience as a participant in the labor movement, and accounts for the significantly greater number of labor union endorsements compared to all other candidates (notably AFSCME 3299 and UPTE-CWA at the University of California, SEA/SEIU Local 1987, National Nurses United, United Teachers Los Angeles, and the National Union of Healthcare Workers). He calls for doubling union membership by the end of his first term by making it easier for us to form unions and to improve the capacity of unions to win great contracts. He has led the campaigns in calling for sectoral (i.e. industry-wide) bargaining and employee ownership of businesses, which would indeed extend democracy further into our workplaces. He received the top lifetime rating from the AFL-CIO. Bernie’s pledged to become our “organizer-in-chief” as President to ensure fairness at work nationwide. For our UCLA chapter, he used his extensive reach on social media to promote our bargaining team, and his campaign joined our walkout in 2019.Donald Trump -Openly attacked federal unions by passing Executive Orders to weaken federal unions. -Placed openly anit-union individuals to key labor positions like the NLRB in order to reach decisions that weaken worker protections and roll back on worker rights. -The NLRB rulemaking has also decreased the pool of workers it can protect by redefining their status such Management and STUDENTS (sound familiar?) -Openly celebrated the Janus decision that was designed to weaken public sector unions. Climate Change Sources BidenJoe Biden’s plan involves similar changes of shifting away from fossil fuels and using diplomatic pressure on other countries to reduce greenhouse emissions. He has similar goals to reach net zero emissions by 2050, but some fear his plan is not comprehensive enough to reach the goals set by the international community.Bernie SandersBernie Sanders’ plan adopts the Green New Deal, setting the most aggressive climate goal of eliminating all carbon emissions by 2050 (instead of net zero emissions like most of his opponents) and transitioning to 100% renewable energies in the US by 2030. The Green New Deal also plans on upgrading and expanding upon existing infrastructure for renewable energies, including to industries in farming, transportation, and phasing out of nuclear energies, oil, and coal. Under his plan, new renewable energy would also be publicly owned and managed by federal authorities and agencies.Overall SummaryRecent national polls have shown that climate change ranks as one of the two top most important policy issues facing American voters along with health care. Our planet’s climate is rapidly changing in response to carbon emissions from fossil fuels, and leading climate scientists urge that “rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society" must be undertaken by 2030 to avoid catastrophic consequences on a global scale. In reviewing the climate proposals from all Democratic candidates, we believe Bernie Sanders has the most comprehensive and progressive plan for addressing climate change with his Green New Deal. The resolution calls for transitioning 100% of all power demands in the US to clean, renewable, zero-emission energy sources by 2030. It would plan to build and upgrade existing renewable energy infrastructure and would provide an industry of new jobs and economic stimulus for working families, ensuring a just transition of employment for all affected by the move away from non-renewable energies, namely farming, mining, and transportation. As the candidate who is most seriously taking on climate change, Bernie’s climate plan has received the highest ratings from GreenPeace, Data for Progress, and the Sunrise Movement, among several other leading climate organizations. He is also the only senator in the race who opposed the Trump trade deal (U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, USMCA), which he has publicly declared does not improve the situation with regard to climate change. Of all of the Democratic nominees, when it comes to climate change, Bernie Sanders most accurately recognizes the urgency and necessity of curbing climate change to create a viable and just future for all.Donald Trump -Withdrew the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement. Denies any that to the climate or environment by human activities and perceives concerns as "job-killing" Chinese conspiracies invented to threaten our economy and energy security.Greenpeace: "Trump denies the reality of the climate crisis and is actively promoting fossil fuels while weakening existing climate protections. His Cabinet is filled with former coal and oil lobbyists. Trump gets an “F” for putting our most vulnerable communities — and our very futures — at risk."Sierra Club: "Donald Trump is the worst president for the environment and climate in the history of the United States. What he failed to say tonight is that he has sought relentlessly to gut the clean air, clean water, climate, worker and wildlife protections that make our country great. This is a presidency that continues only under a cloud of deep shame, and which will stay that way throughout history."Paid Family LeaveSources: Biden His campaign site is non-committal, and he did not respond to the PL+US survey.During his campaign he has verbally stated that he believes Americans deserve 12 weeks of paid family leave to care for a child or a sick family member. In 2016, he also supported New York City Governor Andrew Como’s push for 12 weeks paid family leave paid for by employer contributions. Bernie SandersSanders co-sponsored the FAMILY Act which guarantees 12 weeks of paid leave. However, as President his plan is to guarantee 6 months of paid family leave full wage replacement for low income workers. As a sponsor of the FAMILY Act he supported 66% payment replacement with a cap of $4,000 month max and $580 min. However, as president he would like to see all low wage workers get 100% pay and plans to pay for this with a 0.2% increase in payroll taxes. Donald Trump -He has included 6 weeks of paid parental leave in his presidential budget. -Recently voiced support for family paid leave in his SOTU but the proposal is limited. -It only covers newborns or newly adopted children under the age of six. -It does not cover care for sick family members. -Does not guarantee job protection.-Cost are covered by allowing workers to borrow against their future earnings. -Supports gender neutral parental leave.-Supports establishing national paid leave ................
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