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Obama Is Forgiving the Student Loans of Nearly 400,000 Permanently Disabled People (marketwatch.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Hundreds of thousands of student loan borrowers will now have an easier path to getting their loans discharged, the Obama administration has announced. The Department of Education will send letters to 387,000 people they've identified as being eligible for a total and permanent disability discharge, a designation that allows federal student loan borrowers who can't work because of a disability to have their loans forgiven. The borrowers identified by the Department won't have to go through the typical application process for receiving a disability discharge, which requires sending in documented proof of their disability. Instead, the borrower will simply have to sign and return the completed application enclosed in the letter.
This program has been around since 2010. The only difference now is that the administration is sending out letters to people they see as eligible for this program. Up until now there have been few who have applied for it. It could be they do not know about it, think it is too difficult, or that they do not qualify. All the letter does is emphasize that they can apply and sets out the process. This is not a straight out forgiveness. Each disabled person must apply and be approved to have their loan forgiven.
Ever known someone who was disabled who applied for Social Security benefits based on it? It's not easy to get them to admit that they are disabled. It seems unlikely to me that successful disability fraud would be all that common, because it's so damn difficult to get disability payments with a genuine disability. Got any references?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Disability is the new welfare. It is another place we hide true unemployment numbers. In a time where every business has to be handicapped accessible and when most of us that earn a good living do so by basically sitting on our arse all day in front of a monitor, the term "permanently disabled" with the possible exceptions of quadriplegics and such strikes me as pretty ridiculous.
I have to say that your post made me pretty angry. I have a degenerative neck injury. While I am perfectly capable of getting around and living a relatively active lifestyle, there are days where I can't get out of bed. Eventually I will probably have to go on disability. Sure I sit at a desk all day but what employer wants to put up with me being unable to work randomly because I'm in too much pain? As it is now I take more time off work than I'd like going to doctors appointments and for treatment. Every 6-18 months I have to have a nerve ablation. It's a pretty painful procedure but I'd already be on disability now without it. I've managed to hold down a job despite my injury for the last 7 years. If I'm lucky I'll be able to make it another 20 before it becomes too much. I have no interest in going on disability but I will be surprised if I can avoid it my entire life. Crack a few vertebrae in your neck and tell me how you feel even when youre "just sitting on your arse all day."