Vice President Joe Biden and the Middle Class Task Force members conducted a town-hall meeting today (Fri., Apr. 17) at University of Missouri – St. Louis. The meeting, entitled “Making College More Affordable for Our Families”, focused on inspiring students to attend college as a way to improve economic conditions in America.
The event was used as an opportunity to announce ways to help middle-class parents who cannot afford to send their children to college as well. Task Force members also included the Vice President’s wife Jill Biden (who is an educator), Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and Cecilia Rouse, White House Economic Advisor. Senator Claire McCaskill and Gov. Jay Nixon joined the task force members at the event.
“We are here to make sure every person who is capable of attending college has the opportunity,” Biden said as he addressed about 400 parents, educators and students at the University of Missouri- St. Louis. “I don’t want your Mom or Dad to look at you and say you can’t go to college because we can’t afford it.”
Biden told the crowd that the economic downturn has crippled the middle class and left many unable to afford college tuition. Biden defined the middle class as, “anybody who can’t go two paychecks without being in trouble.”
“The economic downturn has devastated their savings,” Biden said. “And many who were depending on the equity in you home. … you don’t get to borrow that money now.”
According to Biden, the Obama administration is proposing to expand low-interest loans for students, to increase federal financial aid, and to work to educate students and teachers about financial aid such as Pell Grants before high school. The administration is also asking the U.S. Treasury Department to study ways to strengthen the tax-deferred savings plans that many families use to save for college. The plan, called
529 plans are savings plans offered by states as a way to let families save for college. But the health of the 529 is dependent on the health of financial markets. “We need real substantive ways to reinvest in student aid and putting money directly into the pockets of students who need help…,” Biden said.
Rose Bruce, a parent whose son is scheduled to attend the University of Missouri this year, attended the town hall meeting and said she is glad a task force has been created. Bruce and her husband Carl saved and invested in property as a way to ensure funding for their son’s college education. But the economic downturn has eliminated that possibility.
“We are in a crunch,” Bruce said. “We are in that group who earns too much to get financial aid,” she said.
Biden said the plans are designed to help families such as the Bruce’s and people who are aspiring to be middle-class. “It’s not just a moral imperative,” Biden said. “It is an economic imperative.”
He told listeners the reality is that incomes increase along with the amount of educational experience obtained.
“We will measure success by the living standard of the middle class and those aspiring to be middle class,” Biden said. “So we are working to find a way to close the gap between education and income. Education is the passport to the future.”