Budgeting and Financing
Most of us had to collect pennies and dimes to pay for our first bicycle, our new Nike sneakers, or the Sony discman that all our friends had in 1995. And many of us used the cash from summers of flipping burgers and babysitting to buy a cheap car when we turned sixteen. Today our expenses are a bit different. A four year post-secondary educational experience is in a different ballpark than bicycles, sneakers and beater cars. This time, collecting change in a piggy bank won’t be enough. It’s exceedingly rare to meet a full-time student who is independently paying for their education with cash.
Most students must apply for government and private loans in order to pursue their studies. These loans have the potential to lock students in a cycle of debt the moment they enter the labor market. In 2002, the average debt load upon graduation from a post-secondary institution in Canada was $21,200. That number is only increasing.
In addition, many students have two or three credit cards. Assistant editor of Launch Magazine, Jeleen Yu, commented that, “Cardholders under the age of 21 are the most at risk for amassing large amounts of credit card debt due to financial illiquidity, the rising cost of post-secondary education and starting out their careers in unstable economic conditions.”
How can one approach their finances and budgeting for the college years in the face of such bleak odds? It is overly simplistic to suggest that tuition is the expense with which we must be primarily concerned. Financing one’s college tuition should not happen in a bubble; rather, the lifestyle created by college and university should be viewed holistically so students won’t be taken by surprise when their savings account begins to run low.
In this case, the best advice has withstood the test of time. It sounds antiquated, but is equally provocative: Work hard. Buy less. Pay off your debts.
Working hard at our studies and our jobs will help minimize a waste of time in either area. Buying less is a sure-fire way to save more of the money that we earn. And paying off whatever debts we do have will help us avoid costly penalties.
As I said, this advice is both antiquated and provocative. Working hard is a time-honored tradition in most communities. Paying off debts is also a standard ethic. However, we live in a civilization that is sustained by increasing appetites. Consuming less does not fit in with any popularized economic strategy. It is imperative that we challenge our economic assumptions if we intend to move through our college years and into adulthood with more financial freedom.
When we consider the post-secondary educational experience, we must think about its ripple effect in our lives and our communities. It is the responsibility of each student considering post-secondary education to evaluate the validity of the economic paradigms our spheres of culture embrace.
