My little black coat is simple—it’s knee-length and has five buttons down the front. That’s your basic snowman model. The lining on both arms is shredded. Court is 22 years old.

Our three children graduated from high school rapid fire. There were two years when all three were in college at the same time.

An acquaintance who knew where we were going asked me if I could give him some advice. “Get a good winter coat now,” she said.

So I did. And I hang in that little black coat like a baseball player keeps his glove from a great catch, or a football player keeps his jersey from a championship game.

That little black coat is a sign of victory.

To this day, I don’t know how I got my three kids to go to college, but I did. everyone worked. Bed, bath, summer job at Beyond (daughter learned about sheet thread count and is certified to “lift”), mower with about 10,000 miles (son has dozens of customers now) did), there were endless babysitting jobs and jobs in nursing homes and hospitals.

Our son often mentions that there was a robbery at the end of every summer. He wouldn’t necessarily call him a robber. We used to think of it as a “buddy system”. Everyone contributed their earnings to college expenses.

Like many other families, our children worked and we worked. They all graduated with student loan debt. They all paid it off. We all paid it off.

Similar scenarios are playing out in hundreds of thousands of homes across the country.

College is expensive and keeps getting more expensive. The government cannot solve the problem because the government is the problem. Every time the government “helps” by raising student loan limits, colleges raise tuition. With more federal aid to students, colleges can simply raise admission fees.

Statistics vary by the number of Americans 25 and older who graduate from college, but most remain below 40%. Why should her 60% of the population who didn’t go to college be forced to pay the bills of those who did?

Even more infuriating, why should people who honored the legally binding contracts they signed and paid off their student loans have to pay off someone else’s loan?

You wouldn’t expect someone else to help you with your VISA or Mastercard payment at the end of each month. You don’t take out a remodel loan or remodel your kitchen and ask, “Who’s in there?”

There is no magic wand to cancel debt. Debt continues to exist and only appears elsewhere.

Three guesses this one appears.

Lori Borgman is a columnist, author, and speaker.contact her [email protected]