• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    this action to the student loan forgiveness program benefited teachers cops, firefighters, and EMTs

    Cops receive substantially more support and benefit than a marginal amount of student loan forgiveness.

    This goes to wages and overtime, housing, medical, retirement… Teachers and EMTs don’t enjoy anything comparable. Only firefighters come close, and their departments are dwarfed by comparison.

    • papertowels@lemmy.one
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      4 months ago

      This seems like a tangential point.

      My point is that Biden did not prioritize police like the other guy was saying - they’re eligible for loan forgiveness alongside teachers, EMTs, and firefighters, and they were trying to criticize this development by portraying it as prioritizing cops, which isn’t the case.

      If anything, as you point out, the other careers make less, therefore loan forgiveness like this proportionally helps teachers, emt, and firefighters MORE, because the flat amount of loan forgiveness is a bigger proportion of their salary. Roll into this the fact that teachers typically have to get a graduate degree, and I’m thinking that this action largely benefits teachers, not cops, who don’t need degrees for their work.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        My point is that Biden did not prioritize police

        The Safer America Plan is a $37B budgetary proposal to hire 100,000 new police officers, to provide training to existing officers, and to integrate offices between cities and states for a tighter domestic surveillance network. This goes above the original $10B in the American Rescue Plan for police and associated public safety programs, passed the year earlier.

        Show me the equivalent proposal for education, emergency medical, or fire prevention.

        If anything, as you point out, the other careers make less, therefore loan forgiveness like this proportionally helps teachers, emt, and firefighters MORE

        “We paid you less so you should be thankful for these crumbs” is some powerful neoliberal bullshittery.

        • papertowels@lemmy.one
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          4 months ago

          “We paid you less so you should be thankful for these crumbs” is some powerful neoliberal bullshittery.

          Sure, sure, spin it how you want, but since this particular act helps groups a, b, and c, getting into a hissy fit and claiming that group b is being put first is blatantly wrong. Do you disagree that this probably helps teachers more than cops?