Your Degree by Richard Tornello

Richard,

You have a way of presenting the normal everyday details of life in a dark comic style which I happen to like. In this poem, the concept of losing one's degree to nonpayment of a college debt is clever if not sinister. I'm sure colleges and universitys would apply that policy if they could get away with it.

Clever concept and application!

Mark

No not sinister, just JUST. If you don't pay on your car loan they repop your car, or house. Same should be for a degree. Yes one "works for it" however one did get the loan to do it.

A little box on the bottom should have a degree release form. The degreed loans could be sold as a package, even make them marketable. Maybe Sallie Mae could pull itself out of the financial pits with this financial instrument.

People will walk away from a house or car ,but one's degree? I think not.

RT

[Robert_Moriyama]

I seem to recall reading articles indicating that in some cases, diplomas were withheld because graduating students had outstanding fees (maybe as trivial as library fines)... In Ontario, a new toll highway was built with public money then sold to a private company for a fraction of the construction cost (on the condition that the company would continue to maintain and expand the highway -- which it has done, while jacking up the tolls (mainly by extending the higher-cost "peak hours" pricing to cover most of the day)). The fun part of the contract was that it obligated the government to withhold license plate renewal stickers if vehicle owners had unpaid tolls!

I think it more likely that a college or university would send a notice to a student approaching graduation that his/her degree would be withheld unless outstanding tuition or other fees were paid than that they would revoke a degree already granted. Of course, corporations (and formerly "public" institutions are expected to behave like private corporations these days) follow the "if you make a mistake, you will be penalized; if we make a mistake -- you will be penalized" system, so... (viz. banks, the Big Three automakers, etc.)

Now imagine the ultimate expression of this principle: new parents fail to pay the bill for delivery of their child, and... (There's a story in there -- any takers?)

Now that is a Tom Clancy novel if I ever heard one! One could answer questions during the drafting stage like;

Where would the infants be kept?

What would the parents do if their children were lost or misplaced while the they worked to liberate them?

What if infants were assigned to the wrong parents?

Would babies be sold to other parents on the general market if the rightful parents were unable to pay off their debts by the required deadline?

Mark

No, the children would be indentured servants to the state until they paid off the original loan in addition to the cost of their upbringing. Rates adjusted every 3 month to LIBOR). Military and similar type service (length to be decided) would constitute payment. Death before final payment carries over to any children born of those servants.

Sort of like the Chinese making the family of the executed pay for the bullet.



There, I've solved your problem. Make me King.

RT

[Robert_Moriyama]

Now that is a Tom Clancy novel if I ever heard one!...Mark

I'd think it might be more Ira Levin (author of "Rosemary's Baby", but also "The Stepford Wives" and "The Boys From Brazil") territory. Or if focused on the legal maneuvering, John Grisham. Or Pohl/Kornbluth...

RM

Robert,

Robert Moriyama wrote:

I'd think it might be more Ira Levin (author of "The Boys From Brazil") territory.

"The Boys From Brazil" is one of my top five all time favorite movies and is to me, the best work Ira Levin has ever done! The plot clearly hardcore science fiction/horror was so well crafted and researched that he made it believable which was a monumental accomplishment.

Then the casting of Laurence Olivier and Gregory Peck added credibility to the movie depiction of the novel.

As with most of Olivier's films, the costars gives the performance of their lives which is so with Peck in this movie and was also true of Joan Fontane in "Rebecca" and Dustin Hoffman in "The Running Man".

So yes, an Ira Levin style novel would be the best choice for the children held for collateral story. It is a worthy story line for you to take up.

Mark

This could maybe another Modest Proposal, passing on the debt as a way to stimulate the moribund economic situations world wide.
If the economy is consumer driven, and if the credit has tightened up to the point whereby the consumption rate for all goods and services is in the toilet, and if the banks have hijacked the taxpayers, again (savings and loan), then the way out is to free up the pent up "demand" and intrinsic greed that is of the human's nature, by passing the responsibility on to the future generations. We as a planet and especially here in the USA are conducting an alike experiment doing that right now with the global warming situation especially when it comes to alternative vehicle propulsion systems.

Just a passing thought.

RT