With only the wealthy funding and communicating with the campaigns of elected officials, politicians are incentivized to make policy decisions that align with their donors’ interests, not those of their broader constituency. But the elite donor class holds views that don’t align with the general public’s, as a 2016 Demos study detailed.
“You’re going to have deductions and credits that primarily benefit the middle- and upper-class go away, but it’s not done in benefit to the working class,” said Mark Huelsman, a senior policy analyst at Demos, a left-leaning think tank. “It’s just done as a revenue raiser.”
Studies have shown that policy most reflects the preferences of the most wealthy members of society and that those preferences do not reflect the greater public opinion on issues including the economy.
A 2013 survey by Demos, a public policy organization that combats inequality, showed that 10 percent of respondents who were unemployed had been informed that they would not be hired because of some facet of their credit history. The same survey indicated that 1 out of every 7 job applicants with “blemished credit histories” had been told they were not hired because of their credit history. [...]
Demos, a liberal think tank, and the Institute on Assets and Social Policy at Brandeis University found African Americans are far more likely to have student debt, regardless of income. Black families, after decades of being shut out of traditional ladders of economic opportunity, have the fewest resources to cover the costs of college or to protect against the risk of borrowing.
“You hear the apocryphal story of being able to work your way through school, because it was true,” said Mark Huelsman, a senior policy analyst at Demos, a left-leaning think tank. “If you were a student in 1980 and you took on a full-time summer job and a part-time job in the school year, your college costs would be covered and your living expenses would be covered.” [...]
No-loan policies at selective institutions can be eye-catching for low-income students that may not have viewed those schools as a viable option said Mark Huelsman, a senior policy analyst at Demos, a left-leaning think tank. But they do little to increase equity in higher education because the group of low-income students educated at these schools is so small, he added.
For several years, Demos and our partners have been working to fulfill our Constitution’s democratic promise by forging a new legal order that is open to money-in-politics reforms, and marshalling the factual and legal arguments that could help the Court move in this direction.
There are specific reforms that could help black families. Standardizing same-day voter registration across states would benefit communities of color, which face disproportionate barriers to civic participation.
“There were fewer jobs available. So you had students or older workers wanting to retrain for a job,” said Mark Huelsman, senior policy analyst at Demos, a national public policy advocacy group.
Last fall, Point Loma began offering some of its 4,500 students money to pay for college in exchange for a percentage of their future earnings. The model, known as an income share agreement, requires colleges and students to take a chance on each other, a shared responsibility that attracted Point Loma. [...]
The D.C. Council unanimously backed publicly financed campaigns Tuesday, a move lauded by clean-government advocates in a city long plagued by its association with a pay-to-play culture.[...]
[M]ark Huelsman, a senior policy analyst at the think tank Demos, who focuses on student debt, says “we’ll see more and more” programs like Mission Scholarships. “There’s everything right with an institution looking at a labor market shortage” and trying to ameliorate it. “Free education is an obvious carrot.” [...]
Simply put, black families in the District overall have less wealth and income than white families — and therefore have less ability to give to political candidates. This helps explain why black D.C. residents are underrepresented year after year in political donations.
Overseas students subsidize other students and programs, as they often pay higher fees, said Mark Huelsman, a senior policy analyst at Demos, a left-leaning think tank. “Many colleges and, in particular, public colleges have relied on international students paying full-freight in order to make up for budget shortfalls elsewhere,” he said. [...]
The high-priced ads, which could reach an audience of more than 100 million, are just the latest indication that catering to student loan borrowers can be big business. Companies are now offering credit cards with rewards geared to student loan help and tools to help borrowers monitor their debt. Employers are even looking to lure talent with benefits packages that include student loan help.
A new analysis comparing how much members of Congress paid for their schooling to the costs of today’s students backs him up. When the members of the House of Representatives went to college, the average cost for a year of school was $8,487 in today’s dollars, according to the study published Thursday by Demos, a left-leaning think tank.
In every state except Wyoming, the share of revenue that public colleges receive from tuition — aka students and families — has grown since 2001, according to an analysis released Thursday by Demos, a left-leaning think tank. And in 24 states, tuition covered more than half of public colleges’ revenue in 2016. Compare that to public colleges of the past, which got much of their money from state and local funding, and kept the costs for families relatively low. In some cases, they were even free.