Should Bernie Sanders Really Make College Free?

As Barack Obama’s second term presidency comes to an end, a new chapter begins for America with a new president. One of the most powerful presidential candidate running is Bernie Sanders. According to Sanders, America is suffering from a lack of infrastructure, low minimum wages, and just an overall crippled system that denotes the inequality in Americans. He can implement so many injections and programs to alleviate the tensions that is widening the gap between the rich and the poor and even males and females each and every day. The solution to him is easy: create more jobs to drive GDP up and spur economic growth, raise minimum wage, and restore Democracy back to its full extent. He plans on refurbishing the social and economic inequalities
that have been prolonging in the States. Essentially, Sanders wants to get stagnated America back on its feet to absorb the changes he has been waiting for. The first step to combat the lack of infrastructure is to simply just start building roadways, schools, etc. to employ the unemployed and to get people back to working on their feet. This type of achievement would be best to combat cyclical unemployment because empowering and feeding the wondering minds with an education and providing them with a means of transportation is the foundation to revitalize the economy while also even increase the public’s confidence with the government and economy. “Investing $1 trillion over the five years will put at least 13 million Americans to work” (Income and Wealth Inequality). The impoverished public plays a really prominent role with interacting with the government. People must be willing to cooperate with the government in order to actually see results and improvements. Secondly, Bernie plans on revitalizing the economy by “increasing the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $15” (Bernie Sanders on the minimum wage). Just by implementing this change, according to CNN, five million Americans would be lifted out of poverty at a $10.10 per hour wage (benefits of raising the minimum wage). “At this rate, by the year of 2020, people who work at least 40 hours a week should not be living in poverty” (Income and Wealth Inequality). Increasing the minimum wage will increasingly improve living standards and allow people to pay for their expenses, thus, leading to a less reliance on the government and state sponsored financial aid programs. Furthermore, Sanders plans on expanding equal pay by signing the Paycheck Fairness Act. Doing this will end the gender wage discrimination. According to the Gender Pay Gap graph, “Women working full time earn only 78 cents for every dollar a man makes. Today, African American women make just about 64 cents for every dollar a white man makes, while Hispanic women make just 54 cents” (AAUW). Easily by decreeing the Paycheck Fairness Act will ensure women and men are paid the same, regardless of race, religion, and gender. One of Bernie Sanders dream is to make all of college tuition free.
He believes a competitive global economy is hindering the current young civilians from going to college because college is too expensive. However, “by making college free, we will be formulating one of the best, educated workforce in the world because everyone would be able to afford going to college” (Bernie Sanders). By making college affordable and cheap, it is going to give the people some confidence to go to college and enter the workforce with very diligent and open minds. It’s a true burden of today’s economy that millions of people have piles of college debt to pay off. A lot of countries are starting to follow the same mentality as Sanders is proposing. Such countries like “Germany, Finland Norway, Sweden and many other countries offer free college to all of their citizens” (Bernie Sanders). Another tactic Bernie will take to make college debt free is to lower college student loan interest rates. Lowering the interest rate will easily stimulate the economy because it will encourage people to invest and borrow
more. It is important that the wealthy and large corporations pay their share in taxes because in reality, it will reduce the inequality gap between the rich and the poor.
There is a general bipartisan consensus that the wealthy and big corporations got too much power their hands. Sanders’ future fiscal policies revolve around shrinking the power in the upper class. Early in his campaign, Sanders drew attention when he has said a top marginal tax rate of 90% is too high because “when radical socialist Dwight D. Eisenhower was president, the highest marginal tax rate was 90%” (Politifact). During Sanders’ interview with CNBC, “taxing a 90% tax rate” on the rich won’t simply all go to the government. Sanders valiantly uses the key word in his statement that makes it flourish: “marginal”. He doesn’t want people getting confused over getting taxed 90% because he won’t be taxing 90% of their income, but of their marginal income. Marginal tax rate is a percentage of the next dollar someone has earned. Since people are on different levels of income, people will be taxed differently. There is also one guarantee Bernie is willing to make that will come true. He plans on raising the individual tax rates for the wealthy and big corporations and increasing the payroll tax everyone just a small number so everyone can contribute. But since high marginal income taxes can coexist with a growing economy, Sanders still expects the economy to grow under his
arms.

Bernie Sanders’ approach to revitalize America has received multiple condemnations and complaints about having ties to Socialism because he believes the government should be intervened in every step of the way. Many Republicans believe the government shouldn’t be involved in the public’s health care system. Whereas, Bernie’s plan proposes universal healthcare that is initiated by the government because “healthcare should be a right, not a privilege” (healthcare should be a right, not a privilege). However, providing universal healthcare to will most likely cause an increase in taxes because essentially, the public funds the healthcare programs by paying their taxes. A lot of people with the higher incomes complain about their money is going into the system and paying the health care for other citizens when they should be paying for their own health care, even though they can’t afford it. Sanders has also proposed to increase Social Security benefits to all Americans. The Social Security is currently one of the biggest budget item that is holding the U. S’s debt back. Expanding this program will most likely lose confidence of public because of the growing debt. Bernie plans on refurbishing the social and economic inequalities that have been prolonging in the States. Sanders advocates for a greater government involvement by building and providing a greater infrastructure to provide for the people. This will put millions of Americans to work and at the same time it will gloriously reshape the American Infrastructure into something greater and bigger. Bernie believes he will be preparing the future workforce by providing affordable college education that not only will be free, but also debt free! People won’t have to carry the burden of paying off college debt anymore. The only way college can become free and debt fee if only the taxes on the wealthy increases and if there’s a tax on Wall Street’s speculation being introduced. And that is going to happen either way. The rich people are going to get heavily taxed; it’s really inevitable. All of Bernie’s ideas sound appealing for America’s future but there are some people who are not impressed by his agenda. Conservatives accuse Bernie Sanders of having ties with Socialism with his reforms. However, Conservatives will call anyone a Socialist or a Communist whose ideology isn’t aligned with the Conservative spectrum, and that is not stopping Bernie Sanders from running as president. He is tenacious with his agenda and hopes to see America’s future brighter than it has ever been.