Weekly Writers Round-Up: The Student Loan Crisis, Flawed Border Aid, and Fighting Black Markets with the Free Market

Each week, we’ll be featuring opinion pieces from the alumni and current participants of AF’s Writing Fellows Program. A few highlights from the past week are below. For more information on how the program can help launch your career in writing, see here.

I worked as a janitor to keep my student loans low. Wiping debt punishes students like me. by Christian Barnard (Spring 2019) in USA Today
On Monday, presidential candidate Bernie Sanders announced a new proposal to cancel all student loan debt and to fund free four-year public and community colleges. Altogether, the proposal would cost $2.2 trillion over 10 years — making rival candidate Elizabeth Warren’s radical $1.25 trillion over 10 years loan forgiveness plan look relatively moderate.

As appealing as it might sound, though, Sanders’ proposal is a slap in the face for college graduates like me who had planned ahead, compromised on our choices and struggled in order to limit our student loan debt. Not to mention, it’s just one massive handout to the wealthy that fails to address the root of the college affordability crisis…

Progressives Lost Big Time on the Border Emergency Aid Bill by Billy Binion (Spring 2018) in Reason
The House voted 305–102 last week to pass a $4.6 billion border funding bill. In theory, the money will improve conditions in the government’s detention camps for migrant kids. But Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D–N.Y.) argued that the Trump administration doesn’t need more money; it needs to release the kids it’s holding. She was right, but she failed to stop the legislation.

The progressive and Hispanic caucuses weren’t able to strip $81 million out of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) budget. Instead, the bill will direct $788 million to new Border Patrol facilities; $112 million to food, medical care, and other necessities for people in Border Patrol custody; and $866 million to shelters under the jurisdiction of Department of Health and Human Services. This was basically the same bill that previously cleared the Senate, 84–8…

Feds must join California in getting #weedwise on black market by Randal Meyer (Summer 2016) in the San Francisco Chronicle
California recently rolled out its “Get #weedwise” campaign in an effort to stamp out black-market cannabis products in the state. The campaign is an important measure to support the California industry, but the state should be looking elsewhere for sustainable and long-term solutions to this issue: the federal government. The black market can grow for only one reason — the current federal prohibition on interstate cannabis trade. It is an inescapable consequence of supply and demand.

California maintains some of the highest standards in the world for cannabis product purity to ensure patient and adult users are getting safe and known products; people should not have to worry about ingesting hard metals and dangerous pesticides. These regulations are a cost of doing business, along with paying significant taxes to support the state’s regulatory regime — a cost the black market does not bear…