Idiotic and Insulting Idea Originates, Surprisingly, in New Jersey
America’s student loan crisis is heavy weight that hangs over the heads of millions of people young and old, often preventing them from living the life they once dreamed of. One New Jersey legislator has a patronizing and useless pseudo-solution to this problem.
An asinine and borderline offensive idea—from New Jersey? Strange, but true. Inside Higher Ed reports that New Jersey state assemblyman John Burzichelli (pictured, at left), best known for undergoing an on-camera colonoscopy on local public access television, has introduced a bill that would create a lottery for people with student debt. How would this be different from a regular lottery? Well, it would only be available for people facing crushing student debt burdens, ensuring a high level of desperation among players; and, “The lottery would be run by an outside vendor, which would also receive about 25 percent of the pot.”
But not to worry—you would never win, just like a regular lottery. (And if you did, the money wouldn’t go to you, anyhow; it would go directly to the New Jersey school you owed money to, which would use it to buy a comically expensive table.)
In summation, New Jersey legislator John Burzichelli has succeeded in formulating an idea that will not solve the problem at hand; that will prey cruelly on the desperate; that will offer false and unfounded hope; and that will allow a private outside vendor to skim an enormous amount of the profits away from the public.
New Jersey: a constant surprise.
