&gt; are solely there to get a piece of paper<p>And why should anybody care at all about this disgusting and lowly category? They wanted to game the system, they got what they deserved.<p>&gt; and many times taking on dangerous levels of debt<p>Student loans are quite a peculiar form of a debt. They can be largely ignored quite for a while (or ignored at all).<p>&gt; College has become a barrier to entry to the job market,<p>In most of the areas this is not true. In the other areas this is <i>great</i>, let&#x27;s keep it this way as long as possible. I do not want to be butchered by a doctor who bypassed an assessment on their &quot;performance on (sometimes quite arbitrary) classes&quot; by simply paying more.<p>If anything, this performance assessment must become more and more rigorous and tough. We need a grade deflation, not a grade inflation.<p>EDIT: since the article is UK-specific, I am talking about the UK only. Student loans here would not cripple anyone financially.