By: Ashley Plotkin
What is the difference between equality and equity? According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, “[t]he idea that sometimes sameness of treatment (equality) does not result in proportional fairness (equity) is one way that these words are distinguished from each other, even in similar context.”[1]
In recent decades, America has worked toward equality in education, but this has fallen far from equity. Equality in education looks like integrating schools, creating scholarships, and implementing affirmative action in admissions. Under this equality, “students benefited from broad public investment in higher education. However, not all students benefited equally: Black students had little access to GI Bill benefits and, even a decade after Brown v. Board of Education (1954), predominately white institutions (PWIs) in many states resisted integration and equal treatment. Further, state and federal governments continued to inadequately and inequitably fund historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) despite the high-quality opportunities they provided and the critical function they performed for Black students and communities.”[2] Once the Civil Rights Movement won equal access to the classroom, the burden for Black students became monetary rather than physical.
While the law purported “equal treatment” in education, the Black community was already disadvantaged by Jim Crow policies like redlining. Many Americans, including Black Americans, were told they could improve generational wealth by getting their degree. “But a college degree does not eliminate the income gaps between white and Black workers. Black students finance their education through debt, and thus college degrees actually further contribute to the fragility of the upwardly mobile Black middle class.”[3]
Despite years of affirmative action, “the average white family has roughly 10 times the amount of wealth as the average Black family, while white college graduates have over seven times more wealth than Black college graduates.”[4] Even controlling for income, Black college graduates have lower homeownership rates than white high school dropouts.[5]While shocking, student debt affects creditworthiness, and hence, the student debt crisis is in many ways a housing crisis.
Why has “equal treatment” resulted in such skewed shares of debt and wealth? To begin, the American tax system is more favorable to those who can write a check for their tuition. “The nation’s tax system invisibly subsidizes high-wealth households, who use Coverdell and 529 education savings accounts so that tuition functions as a tax-advantaged intergenerational transfer. For students with education debt, the IRS allows tax filers (married or single) to deduct up to $2,500 in student loan interest from their taxes each year. This means that borrowers with high debts will only be able to deduct a portion of their interest payments.”[6] In other words, those with the highest student debt can write off the least amount of educational expenses on their taxes.
Furthermore, the racial disparities in student debt and subsequent wealth are more pronounced than other educational disparities: “the black-white total debt gap is five times bigger than the debt gap by parental education, and almost twice as big as the debt gap between those who received Pell grants as undergraduates and those who did not.”[7] For this reason, the student debt crisis is not just a financial issue. It is not just a class issue.
Student debt is an issue of racial equity in America. “The student debt crisis is just one of the latest iterations in the long and shameful history of too many unkept promises to Black and Brown communities. This country didn’t keep its promise to give formerly enslaved people the land that they worked on to build wealth following the Civil War. Then from redlining, inaccessible GI benefits, and now the decreased value of college degrees, Black people have continuously had the roads to economic success blocked outright.”[8]
In practical terms, Black and Brown students pay more for their education but receive less in return. The median Black borrower still owes ninety-five percent of their student loans after two decades.[9] In the same lapse of time, the median white borrower has paid off ninety-four percent of their student loans.[10] But, the median Black borrower and the median white borrower face different obstacles: Black people are more likely to pay for their own education,[11] less likely to have access to generational wealth,[12] less likely to have access to mortgages,[13] and less likely to finish college with their degree.[14]
Even after beating the financial hurdles of student loans, a degree is less worthwhile when Black graduates face disparities in employment. A 2016 study by the Brookings Institute followed two cohorts of graduates: those who graduated in 1993 and those who graduated in 2008.[15] Four years after graduation, their employment was analyzed by race.[16] Surprisingly, Black graduates had the same levels employment as their white counterparts in 1997, but in 2012, Black graduates trailed their white counterparts by about eight percentage points.[17] From 1997 to 2012, equality in education was expanding, so why the inequity? It’s the economy, stupid. “This employment gap is consistent with other data showing that the Great Recession hit black college graduates much harder than white college graduates, as well as with evidence that employers are more likely to discriminate against minorities in weak labor markets.”[18]
What now?
On October 6, 2021, the Biden administration announced changes to federal student loan forgiveness, allowing thousands of public sector workers to get debt relief. The Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program (PSLFP) has been virtually nonfunctional.[19] “The new policies outlined by the U.S. Department of Education would affect an estimated 550,000 borrowers and give them an extra two years of progress toward forgiveness . . . through Oct. 31, 2022.”[20] The program is meant for public servants, including teachers, nurses, first responders, and will apply to previously-exempt “consolidated” loans.[21]
While not sufficient to solve the student debt crisis, relief for the public sector is a step in the right direction. In 2020, nearly one in five Black workers were employed in the public sector.[22] These jobs were some of the first opportunities available to the Black community going back to Reconstruction, and today, many public sector positions are populated by the Black labor force.[23] By forgiving public sector student debt, the government gives back to its employees, but also distinctly helps the Black community.
With this said, the fight against student debt does not end here. As long as there is racial inequity in education and wealth, student debt will be a race issue. Expanding the PSLFP is one step, but it also underestimates the problem: education should never have gotten this expensive. Steps must be taken by the Biden administration to address the inflated costs of education. Until we approach this type of equity, “equal opportunity in education” is just a catch phrase.
1 Merriam-Webster Dictionary, ‘Equity’ and ‘Equality’, https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/equality-vs-equity-difference.
[2] Brooks and Harrington, Student Debt is a Racial Justice Issue, ACLU, (March 30, 2021) https://www.aclu.org/news/racial-justice/student-debt-is-a-racial-justice-issue-heres-what-president-biden-can-do-to-help/.
[3] Perry, et al, Student Loans, the Racial Wealth Divide, and Why We Need Full Student Debt Cancellation, Brookings, (June 23, 2021) https://www.brookings.edu/research/student-loans-the-racial-wealth-divide-and-why-we-need-full-student-debt-cancellation/.
[4] Id.
[5] Id.
[6] Id.
[7] Li and Scott-Clayton, Black-white Disparity in Student Loan Debt More Than Triples After Graduation, Brookings, (Oct. 20, 2016) https://www.brookings.edu/research/black-white-disparity-in-student-loan-debt-more-than-triples-after-graduation/.
[8] Brooks and Harrington, Student Debt is a Racial Justice Issue.
[9] Id.
[10] Id.
[11] Id.
[12] Id.
[13] Perry, et al, Student Loans, the Racial Wealth Divide, and Why We Need Full Student Debt Cancellation.
[14] Li and Scott-Clayton, Black-white Disparity in Student Loan Debt More Than Triples After Graduation.
[15] Id.
[16] Id.
[17] Id.
[18] Id.
[19] Reuters, Biden Administration Expands Student Loan Forgiveness Eligibility, (Oct. 6, 2021) https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-administration-expands-student-loan-forgiveness-eligibility-2021-10-06/
[20] Id.
[21] Id.
[22] Madowitz, et al, Public Work Provides Economic Security for Black Families and Communities, Center for American Progress (Oct. 23, 2020) https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/economy/reports/2020/10/23/492209/public-work-provides-economic-security-black-families-communities/.
[23] Id.
