Lou Giglio: Predatory schools

Regarding the Dec. 30 column “Examining nonsensical Bernienomics”: The real nonsense is Megan McArdle’s tacit support of providing student loans to “people with no income, no credit history and somewhat imperfect prospects.”

Indeed, it has been well documented in N&O articles about the predatory lending to people who enroll in for-profit colleges that feast on admitting students who are unqualified, at the time, for college-level work! The University of Phoenix among others has been singled out as such a for-profit institution.

These institutions prey on Armed Forces veterans who have VA funds that cover part of the price of tuition and the balance is paid with student loans – the same University of Phoenix that had Margaret Spellings on its board of trustees.

And the same Margaret Spellings who was associated with the collection agency that hounded veterans who fell behind in loan payments. Yes, the same Margaret Spellings selected behind closed doors by the UNC Board of Governors to be president of the UNC university system.

Banks once had a fiduciary responsibility to their investors, which included loaning money only to qualified customers. Obviously McArdle skipped that part of her Banking 101 course.

This story was originally published January 7, 2016 at 4:41 PM with the headline "Lou Giglio: Predatory schools."