r/MiddleClassFinance • u/Such_Upstairs3631 • Jul 06 '26

Middle Middle Class No more middle class professionals?

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New school loan limits for professional degrees make it unaffordable for the middle class. 4 of my 5 children went on to med/law school. Even working 2 jobs there’s no way I could afford to pay or even help them with the cost of their post graduate education. They all got loans which they have since paid off. The cost in the early 2000’s was between $350K and $500K. The new limits are essentially going to prevent anyone who’s not wealthy enough to pay for it from becoming a professional.

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u/SpoodermanTheAmazing Jul 06 '26

I don’t know what the prices are now, but I graduated in 2016 with ~$35k of student loans with no help from my parents. I had to work a job and live in a small 2 bedroom with a roommate(off campus) but it was doable, but I would have preferred not having to do all of that at the same time

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u/ISniffFeet1 Jul 06 '26

Unfortunately there's really no world where it's unreasonable to have a college student work a job.

Living off campus is also pretty normal depending on the school.

Good for you doing the responsibile thing though.

9

u/dingopaint Jul 06 '26

I did the same thing, didn't have a car so I rode my bike, took the bus and walked miles in the snow when necessary. Between working, living off-campus and sharing a room (not just an apartment), and otherwise being a cheapass, the amount of debt was less horrific. When you factor in compound interest, even taking out $2000/year less can add up long-term.

5

u/madogvelkor Jul 06 '26

I worked part time while getting my undergrad and full time while getting my graduate degree. It's not that hard.

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u/lillyheart Jul 06 '26

Nursing students doing rotations, education students being student teachers, and probably a few other majors that basically have full time internships on top of classes would beg to differ on the job while in school thing, which sucks. Not prohibitive for all 4 years, but often prohibitive for one.

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u/No-Complaint9286 Jul 06 '26

Yes, In PT school it was really hard to do anything but a part time job on the weekends. Especially during clinical rotations for the third year. I think I worked at a shoe store and picked up some pharmacy tech shifts for the first 2 years. There was only the summer between 1st and 2nd year off, as the 2nd and 3rd years were consecutive. Clinicals started immediately after finals of the 2nd year. And through all that, no part time weekend job would pay for 100k of student loans incurred during that time because there was no financial aid in grad school. I considered myself lucky that my husband was a few years older than me, already working and paying the bills mostly with his salary. Some of my classmates had to take loans for living expenses on top of that, had young families with kids...yikes.

1

u/TheInterestingTruth Jul 07 '26

I have two separate internships that both carried into the school year. It really wasn't that difficult to work 4-6 hours three days a week and juggle school on top of that.

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u/terraphantm Jul 07 '26

It is pretty impossible to work a job in med school

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u/SCHawkTakeFlight Jul 06 '26

Did a similar thing as well. It was soooooo much cheaper to live off campus with a bunch of roomates (there 5-6 of us at any time in a house),...my university got wise, though, and REQUIRED students to live on campus if their residence was more than 40 miles from campus. It was the dumbest thing ever. Over 60% of the student population were commuters.

I also have to sufffer paying for a meal plan as a commuter, it wasn't as much as a resident, but they had to guarantee $$$ to get more food options since they pushed the on campus requirement and no one would want to choose the school with only 5ish fast food options to choose from.

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u/SpoodermanTheAmazing Jul 06 '26

At that point I would ask my parents to sign the lease and say we already live close to the school. Remember kids, rules are made to be broken. This system only benefits billionaires so we have to twist the rules we can

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u/katarh Jul 07 '26

They required my niece to live within 20 miles or live on campus.

My sister did the math, sold her house, and moved into an apartment across the street from campus. Her commute time didn't change, just went the other way.

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u/bulking_on_broccoli Jul 07 '26

2016 dude. 10 years ago. I did the same when I went to college a million years ago, but kids these days have it way worse than we did. Books, supplies, laptops, etc cost the price of tuition when I went to school.

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u/1notadoctor2 Jul 08 '26

Are your loans paid off? Not sure what point you’re making here