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Late last year, the United States Department of Education announced that student loan borrowers in default will see their wages garnished to repay their student loans in early 2026. Over 1,000 were supposed to receive notice of wage garnishment the week of Jan. 7.

On Jan. 16, though, the Education Department announced that this process would be temporarily delayed. While this gives borrowers in default some breathing room, it ignores the root of the problem of student loan debt and doesn’t actually translate into aid forgiveness.

Delays like this one are just stopgaps. Without substantive forgiveness, borrowers remain trapped in debt and President Donald Trump administration’s approach continues to prioritize ideological opposition over economic reality.

This debate isn’t new, either. I first grappled with it in high school, just months after the Supreme Court struck down former President Biden’s student loan debt forgiveness program. I frequently encountered the neoconservative viewpoint that federal student loan debt forgiveness is unfair to college graduates who have paid off their debt and forces non-college graduates to pay for debt forgiveness.

This line of thinking is not only outdated but incorrect. Federal student loan debt is held by the government, and forgiving it doesn’t burden taxpayers in the way this argument suggests. Claiming that student loan forgiveness is unjust because some borrowers have already paid off their debt is like arguing that we shouldn’t take medicine when we get the flu because our ancestors had to combat it without treatment.

Despite this logic, the neoconservative position on student loan debt forgiveness has gained new traction in government policy following the start of President Trump’s........

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