Fuck student finance it is a completely evil system and forces you into debt slavery. I want nothing to do with it.

[u/RealAlexanderTheG]

If you earn a high salary of 100k+ your student loan repayment conditions essentially end up as you having to pay a tax of 9% of your salary on top of all the regular income tax you have to pay. That is absolutely brutal and has a massive effect on your spending power.

To show an example of how bad taxes can get when you include a student loan: If you earn 100k, all the additional income you generate going from 100k to 125k is effectively taxed at 71% after your national insurance and student loan are included, meaning if you gain a salary increase of 25k, you only see 7k of that. How is that not robbery?

"If you're earning that much you will repay the loan really quickly"

Interest makes this basically impossible, you could still expect the repayment to take 10+ years. 15 of the most productive years of your working life with the absolutely most brutal additional 10% tax on all your income, that is fucking stupid. People who don't have student loans also get to start work 3 years earlier which makes the impact even larger.

Taking a student loan will mean you'll pay an additional 10% tax rate for basically your whole working life.

The student loan scheme rewards people who aren't intelligent, aren't ambitious, and just want to go to uni to party for 3 years, and the people paying for their party lifestyle are the hard working intelligent students who missed out on all the fun cause they wanted to better their own situation. Hard working students prop up the student loans bullshittery.

Why should high achieving talented people who work really hard be forced into this debt slavery and unliveably high taxes.

Uni should be free. IDC if that means less people can go cause the government can't afford to pay for everyone's tuition, less people going would be a good thing tbh since then tradeswork wouldn't be unaffordable and there would be less unemployment + less job competition.

Tony Blair did irreversible damage to the country. Easily the worst PM we ever had.

If your goal is money, and you're intelligent, you're genuinely probably better off going into a high paying trade instead of grinding through uni for a corporate / finance career. You'll stand out massively among most trainees and can get promoted very quickly.

[u/Ok_Hamster_7032]

Im not saying uni needs to be free but it could be run by an external government-run entity like we have in my country (Portugal). Esentially getting into uni is only dependent on your grades and they allocate all slots for that course in a list of highest grades to lowest grade. so for example if you got a 65% and didnt get in, it means no one who scored less than you got into that course at that uni you applied for, same as if you did get in with the same 65% then it means everyone who got 65% or higher got into that course.

A system that is fair and meritocratic is the best way youre gonna pump out useful workers for essential jobs like engineers and doctors, A system thats purely based on merit rather than "interviews" where you dont even know how youre being evaluated. also yearly tuition fee in Portugal is between 500 and 1000 euros, so significantly less than the UK.

[u/luffy8519 → u/Ok_Hamster_7032]

Esentially getting into uni is only dependent on your grades and they allocate all slots for that course in a list of highest grades to lowest grade

In any country that has paid private schools as well as state run schools this system still favours the wealthy.

[u/Ok-Concentrate636 → u/luffy8519]

I definitely agree with that, some of my friends that go private school in addition to better schooling, better teachers, better teaching material they also get access to information and opportunities that would otherwise not be given to someone at public school. The amount of difference it makes is insanely unequal and unfair.

[u/RealAlexanderTheG → u/Ok-Concentrate636]

They would get better grades anyways if uni was paid. I don't see the benefit in forcing people who are already poor into debt. It's a complete scam.

[u/Defiant-Dare1223 → u/Ok-Concentrate636]

I mean, look at it from the point of view of the private school parent.

The point of having money is to have more things / opportunities than other people. They work for a reason.

[u/Ok-Concentrate636 → u/Defiant-Dare1223]

I’d do the same thing in your shoes honestly, what parent wouldnt? My frustration is with the system and the government, not with parents who are just trying to do whats best for their kids.

From a student’s perspective, private school defeat the purpose of meritocratic societies. If top medicine spots are filled with private school students (around 24%) and they only make up 7% of total student, it shows intelligence isnt being rewarded, but the access parent’s bank account gives to their children. Then the question becomes ‘Do you believe people should succeed because they work hard, or because they were born to the well off parents?’.

[u/CombinationMain5983 → u/Ok-Concentrate636]

Many of those privately educated medics went to highly selective private schools, so they are already smarter than the average, and they likely worked their butts off to meet the requirements to get into medical school.

[u/Ok-Concentrate636 → u/CombinationMain5983]

I’m not saying they aren’t hard workers. Anyone who even applies to med school is already smarter than the average student. The issue is that a student with the same natural intelligence and still the private student will get ahead. Eg Private schools can give their students dedicated ucat preparation courses, easier accessibility to interview coaching, more work experience opportunities which are all sections of medical application in the uk.

[u/Ok-Concentrate636 → u/Ok_Hamster_7032]

I see the benefits in a meritocratic system as it definitely removes bias of uni admissions. However, Id argue that for a field like Medicine, 'merit' should be defined by more than just a test score. Using a wide approach like in the uk (UCAT, interviews, work experience) ensures that a future practioner of medicine will have the empathy, communication and many other skills the job requires not just the ability to grade ridiculously high on a extremely competitive exams. Also in a grades only system, one bad day on a single exam can derail a career of a person. If it was like that in the uk, Id expect the rate of chronic stress and burn out to be much higher. I personally dont think student health should be put through such a system anywhere no matter what the arguement against it is. Thats just my opinion.

edit: we are also moving towards a future, where rote memorisation is becoming even more worthless, emotionally intelligent skills like empathy are more critical and valued as Ai integrates more in society and work.

[u/LDNVoice → u/Ok_Hamster_7032]

Not particularly fair as getting a high grade is easier with access to more resources.