Matthew 20: 1-16

I wouldn’t call myself religious, though I do find some comfort in the belief that everyone on Earth was put here to help one another.

Lately, there’s been quite a lot of fracas about a government program to forgive a certain amount of student loan debt for folks who borrowed money to attend post-secondary schooling.

The argument against it boils down to these two things:

  1. I paid my debt, so everyone else should, too.
  2. If we subsidize people making bad money decisions, we only reward bad money decisions

The argument against the argument against it boils down to these two things:

  1. The former guy gave ridiculous handouts to really rich people, and you said nothing about it.
  2. Some of the loudest complaints came from people who themselves saw their loans forgiven (PPP loans during COVID pandemic)

And though I wouldn’t call myself religious, I did recall that there is a parable that covers something very similar: Parable of Workers in a Vineyard

In a nutshell, a vineyard owner goes out in the morning (sunrise), at 9 AM, at noon, at 3 PM, and at 5PM. At each time, he hires workers to tend his vines, in exchange for a fair wage. When it is getting late, he asks his paymaster to pay them; last ones hired get paid first, and reverse chronologically until the first one hired is paid last. Each receives the same amount, regardless of time spent in the field.

This is where the complaining begins. Those who worked longer felt that they deserved more pay than those who worked less.

[Matthew 20] v12 ‘These last have spent one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat!’ v13 “But he [the vineyard owner] answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Didn’t you agree with me for a denarius? v14 Take that which is yours, and go your way. It is my desire to give to this last just as much as to you. v15 Isn’t it lawful for me to do what I want to with what I own? Or is your eye evil, because I am good?’

In context, I graduated from my doctoral program owing more than one year’s salary - in the job I took, requiring a PhD - in student loan debt. I paid it off after a few years, using consolidations and accelerated payment plans. And I would admit first that I was initially on the bandwagon of “you borrowed it, you pay it back.”

I also realized pretty quickly that the nature of adulthood and reality is that sometimes, people get a better deal than you got. It is equally likely that I got a far better deal than predecessors got.

So, in my ongoing refrain about common dignity, I need to add this lesson: Be thankful for what you have, not envious or jealous about the “better deal” someone else got. Especially about student loans. For Pete’s sake, the level of inequity in the United States transcends an argument about who got which forgiveness from what.

HELP ONE ANOTHER

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