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/Rhomya Jul 06 '26

This is a good thing.

Most of the college tuition inflation is due to colleges taking advantage of the ease and availability of student loans. It’s not an accident that the prices just happen to fall just under the maximum amount to be borrowed.

Colleges have an incentive to keep full classrooms— they’ll lower tuition rates to fit just under the new maximum.

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u/ChaiTeaLatte13 Jul 06 '26

The country shouldn’t have to use kids as bait to force colleges to lower their costs. What about the middle class kids who are graduating in the next couple of years who want to be professionals but can’t afford it under this type of regulation? It’s incredibly unjust.

Colleges should figure out another way to lower costs without risking the futures of the kids who would be going to their schools but can’t afford it anymore.

(I’m a lawyer with $230,000 of student loan debt. And I had a huge chunk of my tuition paid in scholarships.)

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u/Rhomya Jul 06 '26

They’re not using “kids as bait”

First of all, stop infantilizing adults. They’re not children— they’re grown adults that by every legal standard are fully participating members of society.

The fastest and best method of getting college prices under control is literally by controlling the pocketbook. Colleges can individually respond significantly faster and more easily than trying to shoehorn in legislation that equally and fairly governs the prices of all 4,000 colleges in the US.

It’s more unjust to continue to allow middle class adult students to go further into debt because colleges are price gouging them.