KIRO NEWSRADIO OPINION

‘Why should we feel sorry for college students?’: Curley backs May 5 loan restart

Apr 23, 2025, 5:00 AM

student loans...

Student loan borrowers hold a pop up action outside the White House to denounce Kevin McCarthy’s possible government shutdown and ask for an extension in the student loan payment pause on September 29, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Photo: Paul Morigi via Getty Images for We The 45 Million)

(Photo: Paul Morigi via Getty Images for We The 45 Million)

The U.S. Department of Education announced that the government is going to restart involuntary collections for federal student loan borrowers on May 5, reported USA Today Tuesday.

John Curley, host of “The John Curley Show” on KIRO Newsradio, believes college students should absolutely have to pay back their loans.

“This idea that, ‘Oh, I shouldn’t have to pay it back.’ Why not? What about everybody else? Guy takes out a loan for a truck, and he’s got some business. He’s going around putting up drywall or something, or raking up leaves. He’s got to pay the person for the truck. Why would you not? Right? You’re not writing off his loan. Same thing with houses and stuff. Why should we feel sorry for these college students? I have no sympathy at all,” he said.

John Curley: Not paying student loans increases inflation

Curley believes that students not paying their loans increased inflation.

“Now the college student that was paying on average $300, that’s the average college loan payment monthly, they had that extra $300 to spend on something else. So that helped to fuel the inflation,” he said.

Curley also argued that certain majors aren’t valuable.

“In this case, we just give an 18-year-old $50,000, and then you can go major in frisbee tossing, and then, ‘Oh, shocking, nobody wants to hire me. I thought people would want to hire me. I’ve got this degree in American pottery poetry, but apparently there’s no need for that. But I owe $50,000 or I owe $75,000, what am I going to do? Well, I’ll just wait for a person who’s running for president to come along and try to buy my vote by telling me you don’t have to pay it back,'” he mouthed sarcastically.

When asked why does it matter if the person pays back their loans, Curley responded: “You’re only one person, yeah, but if everybody does it, it screws over everybody. You just have the responsibility just to pay it. That’s why I look at it.”

Listen to John Curley and weekday afternoons from 3 – 7 p.m. on KIRO Newsradio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.

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