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The federal government has, in recent years, paid debt collectors close to $1 billion annually to help distressed borrowers climb out of default and scrounge up regular monthly payments. New government figures suggest much of that money may have been wasted.
Nearly half of defaulted student-loan borrowers who worked with debt collectors to return to good standing on their loans defaulted again within three years, according to an analysis by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. For their work, debt collectors receive up to $1,710 in payment from the U.S. Department of Education each time a borrower makes good on soured debt through a process known as rehabilitation. They keep those funds even if borrowers subsequently default again, contracts show. The department has earmarked more than $4.2 billion for payments to its debt collectors since the start of the 2013 fiscal year, federal spending data show.
[...] Officials at the CFPB say the government should reexamine whether the loan program, and the lucrative contracts it bestows on private firms, is working for the millions of Americans struggling to repay their taxpayer-backed student debt.
"When student loan companies know that nearly half of their highest-risk customers will quickly fail, it's time to fix the broken system that makes this possible," said Seth Frotman, the consumer bureau's top student-loan official.
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 22 2017, @08:56PM (6 children)
He got +5 because the phrase "virtue signal" is itself a virtue signal.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by ikanreed on Monday May 22 2017, @09:09PM (4 children)
That's the standard turn-around on the idiots who use the phrase, but I don't think it's accurate.
The under-educated sociologist in me says it's actually a tribal signal. They aren't trying to communicate that they're good, trustworthy people to form bonds with. They're indicating an affiliation. It's more akin to wearing a Red Sox jersey to work than talking to a stranger about how you're on the way to a soup kitchen to volunteer, after you hit the gym. And the upvoters are exactly the kind of tribalists who would buy it.
Either way, the clear distinction between definition and usage tells me they have no interest in meaningfully trying to communicate a real concept.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday May 23 2017, @02:46AM (3 children)
I think you're missing that it's being used ironically and derisively. SJWs have no real virtues, thus the need to signal so hard.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 23 2017, @06:27AM (1 child)
Standard response to idiocy. Followup sentence about potential trolling. Heading off TMBs inevitable statement about it being completely serious. Realization that the whole exercise if futile. Cynical statement detailing the failings of tribal members.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday May 23 2017, @07:55AM
If you can't see the irony in what you just posted, I despair for your future.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday May 23 2017, @02:17PM
Does your brain work, buzzard?
There's no "irony" in using a phrase a bunch of neofascists cooked up to vaguely and incorrectly attack the very same people the neofascist movements hate. You know you can't just say "it's a joke" after being called on your shit unless, you know, it's actually true.
No wait, you don't know that, because you have a complete absence of personal integrity.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 23 2017, @01:37AM
I modded you up because your post had "virtue signal" in it twice.