I have just read yet another article about the predicament of crushing debt for some students coming out of college these days.

College costs have risen 240 percent over the last 30 years. But we continue to pay them. We let our teenagers sign for loans that put them in way over their head.

Where are the parents when these decisions are made? Who lets their adult child sign for $200,000 in loans in order to get a job that pays just $55,000 a year? The math doesn’t make sense.

They can’t get out of these loans. They are saddled with them for many decades. Parents just need to say “no” when their young adults can’t afford a particular school.

I work in the restaurant business and have young people working for me who have $50,000, $70,000 or $90,000 in loans and have a degree in something like English or art history. These degrees do not offer realistic career paths and should never have been the basis for such large loans.

On the other hand, I know people whose young adult daughter wanted to be a teacher. Beginning teachers make about $32,000 a year.

Could she afford Boston University? No. She went to the University of Maine and got out with loans paid for by Stafford because she stayed and taught in Maine. Four years out, she is debt-free.

Another young adult did not know what she wanted to be when she grew up. She went to UMaine and through working two jobs, scholarships and some other help, she has about $7,000 in loans after four years of college.

Expensive private schools keep going up in price because we continue to patronize them. The University of Maine System almost never fills up year to year because it is unglamorous. Our teenagers want to go somewhere that is cool, expensive and socially acceptable. And we let them.

Michael Sullivan

Saco

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