The politics of strife
Sir: SPECTATORS arrive here weeks late, but let me, however belatedly. explode.
Students are not living on the tax payers' money, but on their grants, because they have won them. To 'turn grants into loans' (as you suggest, 6 September) might prevent a good pupil from being educated, particu- larly if it is a girl, who might not want to present a prospective husband with a debt. But why prevent a good pupil from being educated? Nobody prevents secondary modern pupils from going to school.
If they do incur the debt and go to a uni- versity, what will they live on if they want to do some graduate research?
If they sacrifice the graduate research (and this may harm the economy), they will pre- sumably have to pay the loan when they are young husbands and wives, already trying to pay a mortgage for a house and raise a family. What you are really wanting is to put a big tax on young graduates. But why pick on them? Do you wish the intelligent people not to have children? Would that help the country? Surely a young, intelligent couple are just the ones who would enjoy a little extra money, and have the taste to use it for rational enjoyment. If somebody ought to have an extra tax, it should surely be, not the yciung, poor, and clever, but some- body rich, old, and stupid.
Taxation of the rich is already achieved by the existing income tax and surtax !system. A special tax on the old and the stupid is, admittedly, q novel suggestion.—Ed i to r, SPECTATOR.
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