Cultural Context: Debt, Markets, and Debtors' Prisons

It’s the ultimate financial nightmare. Kristin Collier, a young student in Minnesota, woke up one morning to discover that her mother had taken out $200,000 in Kristin’s name. Collier tells this story in What Debt Demands, a book about America’s student debt crisis that is both personal and political. Collier, who proudly defines herself as a “democratic socialist”, believes that student debt is a form of modern American serfdom. So what to do? She argues for massive debt cancellation, free public higher education funded by taxes on stock trades, and restoring bankruptcy protections that existed before 2005. But with the average American now carrying $105,000 in debt and one in four households living paycheck to paycheck, can any political initiative—a Mamdani democratic socialist style or otherwise—actually address this crisis before it triggers a nightmarish financial crisis in the broader economy?

1. Student Debt Has Become Inescapable Serfdom Since 2005, student loans—both federal and private—are nearly impossible to discharge through bankruptcy. Borrowers must meet an “undue hardship” standard so stringent that people are literally having their Social Security payments garnished in retirement to pay off loans taken out at age 20. Unlike mortgages or credit card debt, education debt follows you for life.

2. Private Student Lenders Operate Like Subprime Mortgage Predators During the mid-2000s, banks offered “direct consumer private loans” up to $30,000 with no school certification required, transferred straight to bank accounts, with interest rates of 10-12%. A $30,000 loan could balloon to $100,000. Collier’s mother was able to take out eight separate loans totaling $200,000 using only a Social Security number and forged signature—the system had no safeguards because lenders prioritized profit over verification.

3. Biden’s Big Moves Failed, But Smaller Wins Succeeded Biden’s signature executive action to cancel $10,000-$20,000 in federal student debt (which would have freed 20 million borrowers) was blocked by courts, as was his generous SAVE income-driven repayment plan. However, his reforms to Public Service Loan Forgiveness, existing income-driven repayment programs, and borrower defense protections have canceled billions in debt—demonstrating that incremental administrative changes work better than bold executive action in our current legal landscape.

4. The Debt Crisis Extends Far Beyond Students With average American consumer debt at $105,000 and one in four households living paycheck to paycheck, we’re potentially heading toward systemic economic collapse. The issue isn’t just student loans—it’s medical debt, rental debt, and a broader affordability crisis. Collier’s organization, the Debt Collective (born from Occupy Wall Street), treats this as a collective action problem requiring a union of debtors across all categories.

5. Debt Creates Psychological Haunting, Not Just Financial Burden Collier describes debt as both “presence and absence”—a constant bodily heaviness and dread. She feared her credit card would be rejected at grocery stores, dreaded checking her bank account, assumed every unknown phone number was a debt collector. This shame is culturally reinforced: Americans are taught that unpayable debt reflects personal moral failure, even when the system itself is predatory. One borrower told her he avoided dating entirely because he was too ashamed to reveal his debt burden.

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