Government not dealing with real issue, still exploiting students

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20091221/de_la_torre

Reports that Student loan Giant Sallie Mae corp, spending thousands on lobbying efforts in congress is actually adding jobs instead of loosing them.

Sallie Mae, the student loan giant, has had no shortage of work lately. It has spent $125,500 on campaign contributions, at least $3,052,000 this year on lobbying and at least a quarter- million more on advertising against a bill in Congress, the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA), which would cut wasteful government subsidies to student loan companies

Lately, Sallie Mae executives have been paying visits to Capitol Hill to make their case against SAFRA, claiming it will mean thousands of jobs lost. But there is something objectionable about a company manipulating data and its own workers to preserve the corporate welfare on which it has long thrived. According to Sallie Mae's own numbers, even if SAFRA becomes law and the subsidized Family Federal Educational Loan (FFEL) program is abolished, the company may actually end next year with nearly the same number of employees in the United States as it has now, and possibly even more.

Sallie Mae's dubious calculations are not the only funny numbers being bandied about the halls of Congress. Lenders have also been claiming that passage of SAFRA would cost the country between 30,000 and 35,000 jobs. These numbers are frightening at first glance; but if one digs a little deeper, they mean almost nothing.
With all the fearmongering coming from the lenders, it is easy to lose sight of what this debate should really be about: making sure that every child has the chance to get a good and affordable education, from kindergarten to college.
While this is a goal that cannot be accomplished with one bill, or solely by acts of Congress, the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act would take a major step in the right direction. It would do this not by increasing taxes or growing the deficit but by making the federal financial aid system work for students rather than just for student loan companies. Most of what it would eliminate from the student loan industry is not the jobs of everyday workers but the enormous windfall profits and top executive salaries taken in by Sallie Mae and a handful of other companies--privileges reaped while taxpayers have borne the actual risk of lending, and privileges maintained through years of aggressive Capitol Hill lobbying.

ALSO,
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=9293199

ABC news is reporting that a student loan companies bottom line has resulted in its stock price going up. News that not as many students have defaulted, has resulted in the prices of its stock to go up by 86 cents per share. If this is not exploiting students, I don't know of a better example.

This is NOT what the original Higher education act was supposed to accomplish!

So the exploitation of students continues because congress is not dealing with the real issues.

They MUST remove the profitiablity by 3rd parties, on student loans. If companies want to profit from student loans, it should be by the result of hiring students with college degrees who are highly trained, not by investing in student loans and causing the students to end up paying 3-5 times what their education actually cost.