So, a whole lot has happened.  So much in fact that it’s hard to decide exactly what to write about.  First there is this

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/17/business/law-school-economics-job-market-weakens-tuition-rises.html?_r=1

And if you’re here on this site you are aware of everything in the story linked to above.  What makes it newsworthy is that it’s in the New York Times.  I suppose I should be happy that one of the most widely read newspapers in the world has taken note of my specific plight.  But instead all I did was crack a beer.  Then I cracked another, and another and then I got REAL mad.  Is this how people who see parents murder their children all the time felt when the media found Casey Anthony? And now thanks to the NYT article…well, my life’s still over.  I’ve got this blog, I do my part to help the next generation.  All I am left with his emptiness.

But there’s more.  How about this

http://abovethelaw.com/2011/07/suing-law-schools-potpourri-tidings-from-law-schools-named-after-a-thomas/thomas-cooley-lawsuit-cl/

That’s right.  Kids like me are rising up and suing their law schools.  Read on to hear what I think about that.

Sure.  If you went to a third rate law school nobody has heard of with few if any successful alumni and you can find a job doing something else or whatever the hell else you did before you went to law school than sure, more power to you.  It’s not like you can’t find a lawyer these days to take virtually any case on contingency.

Me, I went to an Ivy League school.  Sure, they hiked up tuition.  Sure, they lied about employment statistics (though not nearly as brashly) but they have A LOT of powerful alumni who in theory could stand to lose a lot if the name of their dear old alma mater was besmirched.  You see, my law school COULD use its own to defend a lawsuit I would bring against it with some freshly minted Cooley graduate.  Plus I did technically (however very briefly) have a job upon graduation so according to all of this I should be dancing in the street.  Because apparently I didn’t go to law school for a career in law I went to have to have a six-figure job for a couple of months.

So I really don’t know what to write about.  I mean none of this effects me.  None of this effects the people who have been derailed for YEARS.  I don’t this is progress either.  These are just the things that happen as a scam matures.  Everyone knows the pitfalls of playing the lottery or selling knives door-to-door.  Everyone knows that Taco Bell doesn’t have real meat in their tacos.  Everyone knows that Disney World is just paying a ton of money to spend your only free week of the year waiting in lines in 100+ degree heat.  BUT PEOPLE STILL DO IT.  And they probably always will.

Ugh.  Nothing changes.

Hello, my name is Benito Mario.  I am a 31 year-old balding two-time graduate level ivy-league grad who is unemployed, living with his mother and has never held a full-time job for more than 18 months.  My two older brothers each earned their GEDs after age 35 and are millionaires.  They refuse to employ or speak to me because they feel our parents favored me due to my academic success.  They won’t come by the house if I’m there unless it’s Thanksgiving or Christmas.  My mother tolerates my presence in part out of stubborness towards them.  That’s my reality everyday when I wake up in the morning. Oh, and I have $200k in debt that I have no way of ever paying.

Now, here’s what I could have said

Hello my name is Benito Mario.  I’m a doctor (of the arts).  I stay on campus, I try to give something back to the kids you know? Do you like my hat? I’m a free spirit, I could NEVER do the 9-5 thing.  I mean, corporate America? Hello?? I’m the first in my family to go on to do post-graduate work, and if you’re going to do something you might as well do it all the way right?  I mean you can’t go ivy-league for undergrad and then settle for less afterwards right? My older brothers give me a lot of shit about the debt but come on, they are plumbers who never even graduated from high school.  They resent me because I was the favorite. In fact, I’m the only one who ever checks in on mom.

It’s tempting to go with the latter statement.  Heck, if you can keep your hat on it might even get you an invitation to come home with someone.  Their are two problems with the statement.  The first is you might start actually believing it.  The second is that if you busy yourself living a lie or creating a facade, you can’t do anything about the underlying problem – in this case the multi-billion dollar student debt industry.

The first problem isn’t that big a deal given the fact that you eventually die and that one only has but so many opportunities for happiness.  On balance, I am not prepared to say that if you put off shame at every opportunity and just lie to yourself you might not on average feel better over the course of your life than if you accept the grim reality of your situation, all the shame that goes with it, and from there move on to regain some level of dignity.  I chose the latter path and all I can say is if this is the better path then the paths must be pretty similar.  After all, I boldly declared in January that this would be my last year of debt.  Even opened up a bank account that I was confident would somehow have $200k in it by December.  Current balance: $0.  Well, it’s negative actually, as there are penalties for maintaining a zero balance but that is another story.

The second is the bigger problem. Now, it is true that one should be motivated by a sense of altruism to warn people about a trap they themselves fell victim to, even if it doesn’t help their situation…but I am a realist and I am going to appeal to a baser instinct: revenge.  After all, if you’re swallowed by a sea serpent, don’t you at least hope the bastard chokes? Even if he can’t eat any of the sailors still on the boat who are making fun of you because you can’t swim?

I know it’s tempting to forget the difference between an asshole and an enemy.  I also know low hanging fruit (sure Mr. Pretentious, go to law school, the BEST school, forget about that scholarship T-14 or nothing baby!) is attractive.  But the serpent counts on that.  So Embrace the shame.  And speak up about what happened to you.

President Obama and Retired General Powell each are undertaking laudable efforts to promote education in this country.  Sometimes investing in one’s education means taking on debt. I am undertaking a questionable effort to raise awareness about oppressive student debt that basically amounts to a prison sentence. Sometimes avoiding this debt means delaying or foregoing education. Are these two conflicting goals? I don’t think so. Plus, if they were, would Alpha Man write for a blog that questioned two black leaders of such prominence? Probably not.

Read on to see where I am coming from.

When Obama or Powell say “education” they mean a high school diploma plus MAYBE a two year college degree in some kind of trade (think ITT Tech before they started scalping students).  When I say “education” I mean a highly-specialized graduate degree where pre-2006 you could expect a six figure salary for the foreseeable future after completing the necessary post degree work (research, clerking, residency, exams, etc.) That’s a wide gap. Let’s examine the prospectives.

I do not pruport to be an expert on either of the aforementioned gentlemen. However I do know that Obama worked between college and law school and I believe Powell attended West Point (which is free if you get in). While both Obama and his wife Michelle had student loans they are simply more talented than you and I and being twenty instead of two years removed from school, had much more reasonable debt loads. On the same token as a white suburban kid they had tons of adversity whereas I occasionally overslept the alarm clock and would have to have a cold breakfast…or demand my hot breakfast and feel somewhat guilty as my dad drove me to school. The guilt was minimal.

Also Obama and Powell are concerned with education at a macro-level. Their policies, advocacy and foundations affect millions of students. This blog is concerned with education at a micro-level. The posts are highly anecdotal and meant to warn potential students who far and away have already exceeded the metrics that Obama and Powell are talking about.

There are countless other differences. Obama and Powell are targeting children. This blog targets adults. They command armies. I have a half-dozen surly bloggers. They have lived all over the world. I live in my mother’s basement…

Um, but back to the point. I believe that there is a great deal of overlap in our positions. I support a higher graduation rate. High School is free. Am I in favor of a longer school year? Sure, that’s more free school. Likewise Obama has eliminated alot of the middlemen allowing the Federal Government to loan directly to students.

Now that is not to say we’d agree on everything. Whereas Obama or Powell might tell some kid to follow his dreams Id tell him he’d be better off avoiding his nightmares or more specifically my nightmare. My endless horrid nightmare.

Point is parents, aunts, uncles, older siblings etc. Do not just dismiss what you read here as useless satire. There’s good stuff here and it’s not by any means anti-education.

It’s obvious that Above The Law is required reading here at Debtor’s Prison.  In fact, I think it’s unfortunate that the blog is dominated primarily by lawyers BECAUSE if say, American Legal work can be outsourced, what can’t? Without further ado here is the link:

First my two cents. The title is fitting because indeed those in the know DID know this would happen…and it’s a classic example of the “scam blogger” effect where even if you utter a highly watered down version of the truth most people not in the know think you’re at best crazy and at worst a cynical, whining, fingerpointing lay about. Is this pathetic? Yes. Would I take this job? Maybe and here is why: shame.  It might be worth poverty wages, stomach parasites, and leaving everything I’ve ever known to look myself in the mirror and know that I am surrounded by individuals who are staring at me for a very different reason.

Read on to hear what the gang thinks

Ha! This is hilarious. Americans with six-figure educations moving to India to have a better life. And to think not ten years ago white people were SUING to get into this school.  Would I go? No. Would I take note and perhaps look for entrepreneurial opportunities in India? Absolutely. But again hilarious, this is a top ten school.

Maybe I’ll get my JD in India or hell at least do a year there. I bet they are better at placing students.  I know Jr. Associates will be pissed at my firm if our contractors are outsourced, not only because it means they are next but because they LOVE yelling at some poor shmuck 15 years their senior over some perceived error.

Look assheads. There are people with Harvard degrees working at Mickey Dees. There are Yalees strung out on drugs. There are Princeton Tigers collecting unemployment. Am I blown away that some lowly Wolverines might have to work in India?  Um, not really.  It was poor judgment to allow such a job posting on campus but that’s all it is…Michigan needs to realize that it is PERCEPTION not RANKING that effects the worth of your degree. Don’t sacrifice the former for a small fraction of the latter. The real loser here is Michigan. As for me I am 100% American and you couldn’t DRAG ME away.

Being a resident sucks. This also counts as a post. Second, am I the only one who thinks it’s a little presumptuous to assume that just because a job is in India that it’s awful? I hate using the phrase “My Indian Friends” so I won’t because you don’t have to be Indian to see the fact that a job posting with no stated salary in a market where everyone and especially young lawyers are out on their ass might be good or it might be bad and if you are emphatically claiming one or the other you’re reading something into it- a pre conceived notion as it were. Now I’m not claiming to be in the know as far as legal is concerned just like I wouldn’t expect a lawyer to know how lucrative dermatology is…but come on.

That’s right I participate in roundtables now. What do I think of as an incoming law student going to an inferior school that costs about the same? I’m elated, tickled, yet not surprised. To add to my colleagues comments: I agree with Alpha Man this is hilarious, I also agree with Mike Triforce that this obviously happens and to that I add- just as every good school has it’s epic failures so does every crappy school have it’s runaway successes. And that will be me. When I am rolling in dough with my TTT diploma I can’t wait to sponsor a former American’s Visa to come back to the states and scrub my toilet, the highest paying job he can get 15 years out of Michigan. And I don’t care what the law says he ain’t getting healthcare.

Give me your energetic, your wealthy
Your flamboyant shooting stars for sale
Send me your multiple homeowning overclass
I lift my lamp beside my gold-plated door…

And I will deport my own poor bastards to make room

For the second article in a row I am posting a link to a story that might be the beginning of the end of our suffering

http://abovethelaw.com/2010/06/could-law-school-loans-become-more-easily-dischargeable-in-bankruptcy/#comments

Could it be true?  I am like a Goat in Narnia that’s just seen Santa’s sleigh.  Perhaps the endless winter is coming to an end.  Now before we get all giddy, let’s explore the two reasons why this isn’t likely to happen and analyze the BEST option for beating the odds and finally getting out of this hell hole. 

The first reason this isn’t likely to happen is of course lawyers.  Remember, it was their bankruptcy declaring asses on the second day after graduation that got us in this damn mess in the first place.  The second reason is the fact that an educational loan has no collateral.  There’s no car or home to repossess in the event you can’t pay…or is there?

Let’s be honest here.  The only thing we learned in law school was how to push the outer limits of our alcohol tolerance and what the townspeople in Huckleberry Finn felt like who’d seen the second showing of the play put on by the King and Duke.  The only “value” comes from the credential.  Why can’t we give that back?  Hell, I’d give my JD back for a hot meal, a new baseball cap or gas money /bus-fare for next week.  Wipe out my loans and you can take me off the esteemed list of individuals who have earned a JD from an ivy T-7.  If I want back on I have to fork over the dough or pay for a new one.

Ok, but what the hell is a bank going to do with a bunch of fake lambskin with typo-riddled latin all over it.  Who would pay for that?  Who benefits from that?

Every other professional who holds that degree, that’s who.  Bar associations could use a portion of their dues to buy back those degrees, thereby driving the supply of those individuals down and thereby making the rest of them more valuable.  Medical associations and Engineering associations all do the same…any job that REQUIRES some credential to it has an association that, with the right prodding, could be convinced that this is a proper expenditure of money. Plus, how much past it’s prime shrimp cocktail and Grade B steaks can these organizations feed themselves?

But what about undergraduate degrees?  Well, alumni associations should buy them back.  Think about it.  You care enough about Harvard to be involved with the alumni.  Do you really want some poor person holding the same degree you do?  Ruining all that hard earned prestige that has built up over the centuries? How dare you major in Art History because you like it, not because your Daddy has castles that need decorating? 

So please.  Take my degrees.  They are sabotaging my interviews at fast food restaurants anyway.  Take my degrees let me go to work at Arby’s.  I’ll work there for a few months, get promoted to beef slicer, and then if I am lucky I can go work at one of those new Whole Foods or Wegman’s grocery stores in the deli department.  Then maybe I can afford to move out of my mother’s basement.

Hi kids.  I am sure each of you are familiar with the two individuals in the title, known collectively as “World’s Finest.”  Last week I was sitting in my mother’s basement connecting different wires in an attempt to…let’s say maximize the number of channels that make up basic cable, I stumbled upon some old cartoons featuring none other than the DC Comic flagships.  Four hours later I had a new analogy to describe the unique dilemma of the student debtor.  We thought our fancy degrees would make us Superman, but they made us Batman instead.

The whole reason we maximized our education was in order to command super salaries and be immune to things like downsizing, layoffs, unemployment and in certain cases even be free from the need to send out resumes, interview, network…after all I went to [ ] and graduated with a [].  I should be entertaining recruiters not begging for an audience.  This degree wasn’t supposed to simply open doors, they were supposed to empower us to kick those doors in permanently and with the greatest of ease.   If we’re talking about prospective employment I should be the one promising to call, looking bored, etc.  Similar to Superman, the only thing motivating me to do a good job, or indeed a job at all, is out of the philanthropic goodness of my own heart.  Sure, there’s kryptonite in the form of student loans but hey nobody is perfect. 

But instead the degrees were preparing us to be more like Batman.  We lived in a perfect world.  We did what was expected of us.  Then suddenly it all disappeared and we were left asking why?  We experienced a tragedy that the system was supposed to protect us against and we were left feeling hateful and bitter.  Before I get to far into this, I am in no way suggesting that what happened to us rises to the level of having your parents murdered in front of you…but part of the reason Batman does what he does is because he has a sense that his parents would be proud of him, and as a response to the helplessness he felt as an eight year-old.  Now, when you get tossed out in the street after earning an elite education you know your parents aren’t proud of you (or at least of that particular aspect of your life) and you also feel quite helpless.

So that is where we find ourselves.  And this is where it is up to us.

Superman’s powers came to him more or less instantaneously.  He sort of fell into the super hero gig.  The Batman did not become Batman overnight.  He took his rage, bitterness and sense of helplessness and turned it into something.  That’s why Batman is more compelling than Superman and ultimately Batman is the better super hero.  Superman has only one weakness, kryptonite, and he has never overcome it in issue after issue, movie after movie.

So that’s it kids.  We’re not Superman and we can never be Superman.  The degrees (Ivy League and fringe Ivy) we earned were advertised under false pretense.  However, with a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck, we can be Batman…well nobody can be Batman (after all he is the Dark Knight) but we can follow in his example in our own little way.

Benito wanted me to pen another article on debt and relationships based on a date I had last night and the ensuing conversation I had with him. Obviously if I am talking to Benito at the end of the night it did not go well. Instead, I have decided to scoop him and write the follow-up to his Ivy Veil Post.  I should have written it in the first place because after all I am the one who peaked behind and paid the price of going back. I have more to offer than relationship advice, remember my motto: “I am NOT Lisa Scottoline.”

The catalyst for this post was a piece found at ATL (link before the break). The piece and the ensuing comments illustrated the peculiar plight of the ivy-unemployed, a secret previously as well kept as the private failings of our public figures before the late 60’s.

Let’s start at the beginning. Why are ivy-league kids in the breadline worse off than their non-ivy counterparts? Three reasons: debt, haters and shame. Ivy league kids are more likely to have alot of debt. After all if your parents are rich and well connected enough to shell out all that tuition money they can probably make some calls and find you a job.

Let’s also face facts. Alot of people really want to go to an ivy league school. Alot of those who don’t get in go on to have very successful lives and rise to positions of power. Many of these individuals take great pleasure in the misery and failure of the graduates of institutions they were not accepted to – particularly if they rationalized this lack of acceptance by attributing it to an immutable characteristic they did not possess but that s particular Ivy grad did. Yes Alpha Man usually it’s race. Bottom line- these individuals are not going to give you jobs.

I am not a psychotherapist but it doesn’t take one to see how an individual who has attended an elite institution that indoctrinates members to believe they are special, better than others because they have attended have additional feelings of failure and inadequacy when suddenly they don’t measure up but alot of individuals from “lesser” institutions do.  I will be the first to say THERE IS NOTHING SPECIAL about the ivy league. It’s also cold, arrogant and less attractive. But this phenomenon is not due to elitism. A non-ivy person loses or fails to gain a job and it’s like the USA fails to win the Gold in Hockey. For any ivy kid it’s failing to win the Gold in Basketball. You can’t tell me there isn’t a difference.

So what does all this mean? Am I saying don’t go to an Ivy school or that it’s not worth borrowing for? Not necessarily. It’s just a gamble folks, plain and simple. You bet big and you can lose big too, even bigger than the person who took a more conservative path, investing not only less money, but less time and less effort. Sacrifice is not a risk-free endeavor despite the conventional wisdom that education is the best investment you can make. An investment is always a gamble on an uncertain future. All you can know is what you are risking from this moment forward.